No one likes staring at a mass of text on the monitor of their computer adaptive test on the big day of your GMAT exam, whether it’s a reading comprehension passage or a long critical reading prompt. But one particularly area where it’s particularly daunting to see a lot of text is on sentence correction question that’s four lines long- and all four are underlined. One question could be almost as long as a short reading comprehension passage.
First, we have to break down the question into layers and eliminate accordingly. See a plural singular error in the first answer choice? See if you can spot a similar error in another answer choice- and eliminate both of them. Often, errors repeat themselves.
After that, compare the answer choices to one another two at a time. Pick which one you think sounds better, and eliminate the other one. Eventually, you’ll arrive at the correct answer- and with less stress than if you had tried to compare all 5 in your head at once.
Finally, learn to spot the common sentence correction errors- especially ones involving parallel structure, comparisons, and modifiers. These will help you get through the longer prompts much more quickly.
Remember that the GMAT is about more than getting the correct answer- it’s about getting the correct answer in enough time and without stress. The test designers know this- that’s why they use longer stimuli for sentence correction questions- for intimidation as much as difficulty. If you can break the stimulus down, compare two choices at a time, and remember common errors, you’ll have more than enough preparation to stare down those intimidating monster questions.
