The Secondary English Comprehension paper has 2 texts, a narrative and a descriptive text each.
Your main concern will be to analyse both the texts and answer according to the instructions.
How do you do this?
How Do You Analyse When Reading?
Analysis is a strategy. You cannot just read the text at one glance and expect to understand the entireSecondary English Comprehension text.
Reading theSecondary English Comprehension text properly means that you will have to understand them:
i) Theme
ii) Author’s intention
iii) Hidden meanings
iv) The pros and cons (if applicable)
In fact, when you read a text, you will have to understand the language features. That will be your main concern.
The language in a narrative text reveals more emotion and therefore hidden depths in a character. You will need to deduce what that means in the overall context and use that information to answer theSecondary English Comprehension questions.
Narrative language is often made of adjective phrases which include figures of speech. You may need to analyse metaphors, similes and irony. Your literary perception of the text should be accurate and you will need to know how this contributes to your greater understanding of the main points.
Most of the narrative text questions will allude to literary devices and what they infer. When you answer, you will need to rely on textual evidence to support your view/s.
Always rely on supporting evidence when you answer except when the question is purely inferential and only asks you for your opinion. Even in such a case, you are expected to infer based on theSecondary English Comprehension passage. Therefore, be precise in your analysis and answers.
How Do You Analyse Hidden Meanings?
Hidden meanings are usually seen within literary devices and dialogue.
Why?
Literary devices always need to be examined carefully and studied for inner meanings or related meanings. Therefore, it is likely to contain hidden meanings linking to the main theme.
Dialogue between characters or even a monologue indicates the inner workings of that character. They tend to be elliptical and may need to be examined for clues about why that character spoke that way.
Dialogues are not self-explanatory and you will need to understand why the character’s tone was that way or why the character spoke in monosyllables or why there were pauses.
Analysing The Pros And Cons In A Descriptive Text
It is only in a descriptive text that an author will reveal 2 sides to that theme. Descriptive texts are meant to reveal why advantages and disadvantages exist.
There is always a need to show another side to that point. Such passages are based on non-fiction texts and they contain statistics and references to actual events.
Naturally, the author would like to probe the matter further by expostulating the pros and cons.
How do you analyse such a text accurately and answer?
Firstly, you will need to understand the points made in favour of and those which are against.
Secondly, understand the points raised as criticism.
Thirdly, infer what the author is driving at in more acute criticisms. Such points are sometimes revealed in an irony and you will need to look at what the author is really trying to say.
Finally, the ending. Analyse this and look out carefully for the final parting shot. Since it is a factual text, it is more than likely that the author will end on a personal point of view. What is that? Make sure you know what the last reference was intended to mean.
Once you have understood these four steps, you will be able to answer theSecondary English Comprehension questions.
Answering comprehension questions after understanding questions means that you will always answer accurately. All comprehension questions are based on the points I have raised.
You will need to read theSecondary English Comprehension texts and analyse them carefully before attempting to answer. This will definitely save you all those marks you may have lost in answering before. Aim for accuracy and the best way is to analyse carefully. Good luck!