Vocabulary in Context

This looks like a Word Knowledge question inside a passage, and it is not quite. Word Knowledge asks what a word means. This asks what it means here, and the difference is the whole question.

The tell

If the tested word is one you already know, the question is about a second meaning.

A test does not spend a question asking whether you know what "run" means. It spends a question on a passage where "run" means a sequence, or a tear in fabric, or to manage something, and then offers "to move quickly" as a choice.

So when you see a familiar word underlined, your first thought should not be its definition. It should be: which of this word's meanings does this sentence need?

The cover-and-predict method

The most reliable procedure on this question type.

1. Cover the word with a finger, or read the sentence replacing it with "blank".
2. Say what would fill the gap, in your own words.
3. Match your prediction against the choices.
4. Substitute the winner back and read the sentence again.

Predicting before you look is what stops the word's usual meaning from pulling you.

The engine was dressed before it went back into the airframe.

Cover dressed. What would fit? Something like prepared, fitted out, made ready.

Not clothed. The choices will offer "clothed", and it is wrong.

Common words with test meanings

The test draws on a stable set of words that have a plain sense and a technical or formal one.

None of these is exotic. That is exactly why they are used: the plain meaning is so available that it takes deliberate effort to notice it does not fit.

Working one through

The inspector's report was measured. It acknowledged the unit's failures without exaggerating them, and it gave equal space to what had gone well. The commander, who had expected an attack, read it twice.

As used in the passage, "measured" most nearly means

(A) quantified (B) restrained (C) timed (D) hostile

Cover the word. The report acknowledged failures without exaggerating, and gave equal space to successes. The gap wants something like balanced, careful, not extreme.

(B) restrained.

(A) is the everyday sense of measured - to have measured something - and it is the trap. (C) is another literal sense. (D) is contradicted by the passage, which says the commander expected an attack and by implication did not get one.

Notice how much work the surrounding sentences did. The sentence containing the word was four words long. Everything that decided the question was in the sentences around it.

Read the whole context, not the sentence

That is the general point. A vocabulary-in-context question gives you a passage rather than a sentence because the passage is what you need.

Look for:

• A restatement nearby, often after a comma or a colon.
• A contrast that tells you the opposite of the word.
• Examples that show the word in action.
• The tone of the passage, which fixes whether the word is approving or not.

What you can skip

• Memorizing unusual meanings. The words asked are common words used in a particular sense, and the passage always supplies the context to decide it.

Where people lose points

Answering with the dictionary's first definition rather than the passage's sense.

Reading only the sentence with the word in it. The deciding evidence is usually a sentence away.

Not substituting back. The sentence should read naturally with your choice in it, and a wrong sense usually sounds slightly odd.

Assuming an unfamiliar word. If you do not recognize the word at all, the same method still applies - cover and predict - and word parts are available as a second tool.

Choosing a word that fits the sentence but changes the passage's meaning. The substitute has to be consistent with the whole thing.

Work one in under a minute

Funding for the program was checked by a committee that considered it premature. Work continued at the original pace for another quarter, but no new positions were approved and the expansion was quietly shelved.

As used in the passage, "checked" most nearly means

(A) verified (B) halted (C) inspected (D) marked

Cover it. The committee considered the program premature, and what followed was no new positions and a shelved expansion. The gap wants stopped or held back.

(B) halted.

(A) and (C) are both the everyday sense and both are wrong, and (A) is the most commonly chosen wrong answer here because "checked the funding" reads perfectly naturally - right up until you read the next sentence.

Where this leads

This is Word Knowledge's context lesson applied over a longer stretch of text, and the same sensitivity to a word's charge is what tone questions ask for.