Improve your odds, think critically: - Cover the options, read the stem, and try to answer
Select the option that most closely matches your answer - Read the stem with each option
Treat each option as a true-false question, and choose the "most true"
- Strategies to answer difficult questions:
· Eliminate options you know to be incorrect If allowed, mark words or alternatives in questions that eliminate the option · Give each option of a question the "true-false test:" This may reduce your selection to the best answer · Question options that grammatically don't fit with the stem · Question options that are totally unfamiliar to you · Question options that contain negative or absolute words. Try substituting a qualified term for the absolute one, like frequently foralways; or typical for every to see if you can eliminate it · "All of the above:" If you know two of three options seem correct, "all of the above" is a strong possibility · Number answers: toss out the high and low and consider the middle range numbers · "Look alike options" probably one is correct; choose the best but eliminate choices that mean basically the same thing, and thus cancel each other out · Double negatives: Create the equivalent positive statement and consider · Echo options: If two options are opposite each other, chances are one of them is correct · Favor options that contain qualifiers The result is longer, more inclusive items that better fill the role of the answer · If two alternatives seem correct, compare them for differences, then refer to the stem to find your best answer
· Always guess when there is no penalty for guessing or you can eliminate options · Don't guess if you are penalized for guessing and if you have no basis for your choice · Use hints from questions you know to answer questions you do not. · Change your first answers when you are sure of the correction, or other cues in the test cue you to change.
- Remember that you are looking for the best answer,
not only a correct one, and not one which must be true all of the time, in all cases, and without exception.
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