{"id":6240,"date":"2013-10-10T11:12:37","date_gmt":"2013-10-10T15:12:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.manhattangmat.com\/blog\/?p=6240"},"modified":"2019-09-05T16:09:08","modified_gmt":"2019-09-05T16:09:08","slug":"sentence-correction-get-the-most-out-of-your-first-glance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/blog\/sentence-correction-get-the-most-out-of-your-first-glance\/","title":{"rendered":"Sentence Correction: Get the Most Out of Your First Glance"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"gmat For the past couple of weeks, we\u2019ve been learning the 4-step SC Process<\/a>. (If you haven\u2019t read that two-part article yet, go do so now!) Also, grab your copy of The Official Guide 13th<\/sup> Edition (OG13); you\u2019re going to need it for the exercises in this article.<\/p>\n

People often ask what they should check \u201cfirst\u201d in SC, or in what order they should check various potential grammar problems. It would take too long to check for a laundry list of error types every time, though, so what to do? You take a First Glance: a 2-3 second glance at the screen with the goal of picking up a clue or two about this problem before you even start reading it.<\/p>\n

Open up your OG13 to the SC section right now\u2014any page will do\u2014and find a really long underline. Now find a really short one.<\/p>\n

How would you react to each of these? Each one has its own hints. Think about this before you keep reading.<\/p>\n

A really long underline increases the chances that \u201cglobal\u201d issues will be tested. These issues include Structure, Meaning, Modifiers, and Parallelism\u2014it\u2019s easier to test all of these issues when the underline contains a majority of the sentence.<\/p>\n

A really short underline (around 5-6 words or fewer) should trigger a change in strategy. Instead of reading the original sentence first, compare the answers to see what the differences are. This won\u2019t take long because there aren\u2019t many words to compare! Those differences can give you ideas as to what the sentence is testing.<\/p>\n

Either way, you\u2019ve now got some ideas about what might be happening in the sentence before you even read it\u2014and that is the goal of the First Glance.<\/p>\n

Read a Couple of Words<\/h3>\n

Next, we\u2019re going to do a drill.\u00a0 Flip to page 672 (print edition) of OG13 but don\u2019t read anything yet. Also, open up a notebook or a file on your computer to take notes. (Note: I\u2019m starting us on the first page of SC problems because I want to increase the chances that you\u2019ve already done some of these problems in the past. It\u2019s okay if you haven\u2019t done them all yet. You can also switch to a different page if you want, but I\u2019m going to discuss some of these problems below, FYI.)<\/p>\n

Start with the first problem on the page. Give yourself a maximum of 5 seconds to glance at that problem. Note the length of the underline. Read the word right before the underline and the first word of the underline, but that\u2019s it! Don\u2019t read the rest of the sentence. Also go and look at the first word of each answer choice. As you do this, takes notes on what you see.<\/p>\n

For the next step, you can take all the time you want (but still do not go back and read the full sentence \/ problem). Ask yourself whether any of that provides any clues.<\/p>\n

– Remember what we said about short vs. long underlines above.<\/p>\n

– Was the last non-underlined word any kind of maker that you\u2019ve seen before (such as the word and<\/em>)? What about the first underlined word?<\/p>\n

– Do the differences among the first word in the answer choices provide any clues about what might be tested?<\/p>\n

Note that you\u2019re not actually going to be able to figure out an answer or even eliminate one from this exercise. The goal is to develop ideas about what might be happening in the sentence before you read it. If I hand a problem to you and say, \u201cThink about Modifiers while you do this one,\u201d your job just got easier.<\/p>\n

Finally, review the problem to see how good your First Glance was. For now, the problem should be one you did a few days to a few weeks ago\u2014then you can \u00a0review it quickly to remind yourself of what was tested and see whether your First Glance was reasonably accurate.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t forget to play the \u201chindsight\u201d game: if you review the full problem and think, \u201cHey, this one was testing Modifiers via the first word of the underline but I didn\u2019t pick up on that,\u201d perform the First Glance again. This time, ask yourself how the differences could or should signal Modifiers.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s look at some examples to see how this works. The very first problem (p. 672, OG13) is a tough one. There are solid clues in the First Glance, but you have to have a lot of experience with the method to notice them. I\u2019m going to defer this one for now (but we\u2019ll discuss later, don\u2019t worry).<\/p>\n

What about #2? What\u2019s the last word before the underline starts?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not a word at all; it\u2019s a semi-colon! The underline starts immediately after, so the first thing you should think is, \u201cOkay, I\u2019ll be checking that part to make sure it\u2019s a complete sentence in all of the answer choices.\u201d<\/p>\n

The original sentence also starts with the word if<\/em>, but the other answers change substantially, including the higher<\/em> and when<\/em>. Something starting with if<\/em> should have an if-then<\/em> meaning (even if the word then<\/em> isn\u2019t written explicitly). Something starting with the higher<\/em> should be making some kind of comparison: the higher I jump, the farther I fall. The more I study, the more I learn. The varied starting points here tell me that I need to examine\u00a0the structure and meaning of this portion of the sentence\u2014what is it that they\u2019re actually trying to convey?<\/p>\n

What do you think about #3? The underline starts with have<\/em>. That\u2019s a verb. What could they be testing? Possibly Subject-Verb Agreement, possibly Verb Tense. Glance down that first word of the answers. Sure enough, some answers are singular vs. plural. Others do change the verb tense from present perfect to past to past perfect. Excellent! When I read this sentence, I\u2019ll be looking for the subject and also thinking about what timeframe should be conveyed.<\/p>\n

All right, let\u2019s go back to that first problem. This one is harder to see; you need more sophisticated First Glance skills in order to pick up on some of the clues.<\/p>\n

First, the sentence and underline are long, so suspect Structure, Meaning, Modifiers, or Parallelism. (This will be the case 80% or more of the time with long sentences and underlines.)<\/p>\n

Next, the first two words you\u2019ll read are Swiss psychologists<\/span><\/em>. You\u2019ll also train yourself, over time, to add punctuation marks into your glance. The sentence contains a comma a couple of words before the underline starts, so the sentence is looking like it might<\/strong> start with an opening modifier, then a comma, and then the subject of the sentence, Swiss psychologists<\/em>. (But we don\u2019t know for sure yet!)<\/p>\n

A glance down the first word of the answers reveals something unusual: the first word is the same in all 5 answers. There is one small difference though (very small!): two of the answers have a comma after the word psychologists.<\/p>\n

So what? Well, something\u2019s changing with the structure. You don\u2019t know what, yet, but something is definitely changing. This is a good time, then, to read the second<\/em> word of the answers. Does that give you any ideas?<\/p>\n

Answers (A) and (B) say psychologists, declaring<\/em>. That\u2019s a classic modifier set up: comma + declaring<\/em> must be introducing a modifier.<\/p>\n

Answers (C), (D), and (E), by contrast, say psychologists declared<\/em>. That\u2019s just a straight subject-verb pairing.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s fascinating! Why? Because in answers (A) and (B) the subject-verb core of the sentence is NOT psychologists declared<\/em>. But every sentence has to have a core subject and verb, so what is it in those two answers? I\u2019ll be looking for that when I read the original sentence.<\/p>\n

When to Compare Answers First<\/h3>\n

Quick! Start scanning through the OG, starting on page 672, and find the first problem with such a short underline that you\u2019d definitely want to look at the answers before you read the original sentence.<\/p>\n

Some people might pick #3 or #5. Those ones are on the shorter side, but it\u2019s still a judgment call\u2014some will want to read the answers first here and some won\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Question #9, though, is a definite slam dunk. It\u2019s so short that you can see at a glance that there are only a couple of differences in the answers. What are they?<\/p>\n

(1) less than<\/em> vs. fewer than<\/em><\/p>\n

(2) those of<\/em> \/ that of<\/em> vs. (nothing)<\/p>\n

(3) 1978 harvest<\/em> vs. 1978<\/em> vs. India\u2019s 1978 harvest<\/em><\/p>\n

You can\u2019t know which versions are correct but you know now that you should be thinking about whether a pronoun is needed (issue #2) or whether the comparison involves countable or non-countable things (issue #1). Both of those items items point to a Comparison in the sentence (what are we comparing and how are we comparing it?), so you\u2019ll want to find and focus on that comparison when you read the original sentence.<\/p>\n

Drill!<\/h3>\n

Keep trying the above exercises. If you\u2019re pretty far into your study already, learn how to get better at the First Glance by using problems you\u2019ve already studied in the past. Then you can test your skills on new problems.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re still pretty early in your study and don\u2019t have a lot of \u201calready done\u201d problems, then you\u2019re also still likely concentrating on learning one overall issue at a time (for example, Parallelism or Pronouns). As you do each lesson and try some practice problems, keep the First Glance in mind and, after you\u2019ve done your homework problems, go back and ask yourself whether you could have gotten more out of your First Glance.<\/p>\n

As you continue to analyze your work and think about what a First Glance can reasonably show you, you\u2019ll start to build more sophisticated skills. You\u2019ll discover that, most of the time, you can pick up some clues that will help give you a solid direction when you start to read the original sentence.<\/p>\n

Good luck and happy studying!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For the past couple of weeks, we\u2019ve been learning the 4-step SC Process. (If you haven\u2019t read that two-part article yet, go do so now!) Also, grab your copy of The Official Guide 13th Edition (OG13); you\u2019re going to need it for the exercises in this article. People often ask what they should check \u201cfirst\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,10],"tags":[52750],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-6240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sentence-correction","category-verbal-on-gmat","tag-sentence-correction"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6240"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6240\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17492,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6240\/revisions\/17492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6240"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=6240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}