RW Fill in the Blanks:

Test-takers will be asked to complete 5 or 6 of these tasks on the exam. This is the highest scoring part of the Reading section as the maximum score will be between 20 and 24 marks. There will be 4 blanks to fill in each task.

• This task uses academic form paragraphs.
• Remember this task emphasizes formal language in the context of science.
• If gerunds are used in the answer options, they are usually incorrect (unless the exam offers 4 gerunds for one blank).
• This task uses single-word answers with meanings that can be similar.

You will be asked to look at a text with blanks and then click on each blank to observe a list of choices – usually 4 words. You should select the appropriate answer choice for each blank.

Generally, with formal writing, infinitives are preferred over gerunds. Gerunds are present participles like jogging or thinking). Gerunds are usually misleading answers for this reason.

People like to think about winning the lotto. (infinitives over gerunds)

People like thinking about the lotto. (gerunds are usually wrong in ‘RW Fill in the Blanks’)

Thus, infinitives are preferred over gerunds because the text is academic or more formal. In the next section, ‘Fill in the Blanks’, gerunds are more appropriate.

Usually, because there are 4 words to select from in the answer options, 2 of these words will be quickly eliminated as incorrect. Of the remaining 2 words, always choose the more formal word.

Example 1:

Dreams are a source of creativity and (1. stagnation, innovation, revolution, origination) for a culture’s expressive repertoire.

• Notice immediately: that all the words in 1. have the suffix ‘ation’ which indicates that all of these words are nouns.

In the above example, number 1. Lists 4 words in the context of ‘Dreams are a source of creativity and’ – ALWAYS READ TO THE END OF THE CLAUSE OR SENTENCE; NEVER STOP AT THE BLANK AND CHOOSE!

The background schemata of psychology should be considered. Notice, too, that all word’s suffixes are ‘ation’ which indicates that all of these words are nouns. In this context of dreams, the words stagnation and revolution do not make any logical sense -try to think of any possible combination of a dream with the word ‘stagnation or revolution’, remembering these words have to fit with ‘creativity and _____’  and with ‘for a culture’s expressive repertoire’. Thus, these two words can be eliminated. Further, as a form of misdirection that is commonly used in this task, ‘origination’ is not a word form that can be used in this context either, as its meaning refers to home mortgage or loan! Therefore, by this process of elimination, the correct word is ‘innovation’.

 

Example 2.

Below is a text with blanks. Click on each blank, a list of choices will appear. Select the appropriate answer choice for each blank

 

Researchers have engineered a low-cost plastic material that could become the basis for clothing that cools the wearer, reducing the need for 1. energy-consuming / energy-engrossing / energy-absorbing / energy-devouring air conditioning. Describing their work in Science, the researchers suggest that this new family of fabrics could become the basis for 2. costumes/garments/outfits/attires that keep people cool in hot climates without air conditioning. “If you can cool the person rather than the building where they work or live, that will save energy,” said Yu Xiao, an associate professor at Stanford. This new material works by allowing the body to 3. remove / discharge / dismiss/eject heat in two ways that would make the wearer feel nearly 4 degrees Fahrenheit cooler than if they wore cotton clothing. The material cools by letting perspiration 4. evaporate/vaporize/volatilize/condense through the material, something ordinary fabrics already do. But the Stanford material provides a second, revolutionary cooling mechanism: allowing heat that the body emits as infrared radiation to pass through the plastic textile.

Abate, T. (2016, September 1). Engineers develop a plastic clothing material that cools the skin. Retrieved January 21, 2020, from https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/09/160901151933.htm

In the example above, the background schemata refer to engineering, perhaps chemical engineering, and there is an explicit reference to ‘Science’ magazine (real world) Notice, too, that all the options at 1. have ‘ing’ or present participle/gerund endings. Here energy-engrossing and energy-devouring can be eliminated immediately because the former does not answer the context (reducing); rather, it means ‘to get your attention’, and the latter is an opinion as a personification (to give human qualities to an inanimate object). The final two, energy-absorbing and energy-consuming, are close in meaning, but by way of collocation, energy-absorbing becomes the correct answer (words that are used more frequently in a particular order than others with similar meanings). Of course, test-takers are well read to notice collocations.

Collocations

At 2., three of the four choices have a specific purpose (attire, costumes, outfits) where only ‘garments’ remains neutral to fit the context of a ‘new family of fabrics’.

Only one word can fit the blank precisely

At 3., eject and dismiss are immediately eliminated as the body does not eject; unless it is a crude reduction referring to a type of sickness or as another personification, nor dismiss because the body does not order itself to do anything! Therefore, the better choice between remove and discharge is ‘discharge’ because this the scientific term commonly used to describe the process of transferring heat into the atmosphere, whereas ‘remove’ contains the context of ‘lifting’ something and then removing it.

Scientific words over a slightly more inappropriate word

At 4., perspiration is closer to water than a chemical that ‘vaporizes’ or ‘volatilize’(s) at room temperature. Thus, both words can be eliminated on the basis of context–yes, perspiration can be argued to be a chemical reaction and react, in certain circumstances, not unlike a vapor or volatilize, but you have to use common sense as well. We have all sweat/perspire and the cooling feeling we feel on our skin is not of a hastened chemical reaction. On the contrary, this is why condense is eliminated because we feel warmer when perspiration is ‘wet’ on our skin. The correct response is ‘evaporate’ as it is akin to the water cycle.

Common sense

NOTE: With RW Fill in the blanks, there are 2 areas of inquiry that are part of the machinations you must go through to get the correct answer:

 

1. The precise meanings of the words
2. The context that the words are used in

 

The bolden words above indicate ‘tips’ or constant reminders to help you locate 1. The precise meaning or 2. Help define the context

 

Example 3.

 

Below is a text with blanks. Click on each blank, a list of choices will appear. Select the appropriate answer choice for each blank

 

Africa’s overall elephant population has seen the worst 1. decays/decline/degenerations/drops in 25 years, mainly due to poaching – according to IUCN’s African Elephant Status Report launched at the 17th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to CITES, taking place in Johannesburg, South Africa. The report is an authoritative source of knowledge about the numbers and 2. spreading/scattering/distribution/allocation of African elephant populations across their 37 range states in sub-Saharan Africa. Based on population 3. guesses/estimates/values/appraisals from a wide range of sources, including aerial surveys and elephant dung counts, the numbers for 2015 are 93,000 lower than in 2006. The continental total is now thought to be about 415,000 elephants. The surge in poaching for ivory that began approximately a decade ago, the worst that Africa has experienced since the 1970s and 1980s, has been the main driver of the decline, while 4. habitat/environment/territory/land loss poses an increasingly serious, long-term threat to the species, according to the report.

Mentzel, C. (2016, September 23). Poaching behind worst African elephant losses in 25 years – IUCN report. Retrieved January 21, 2020, from https://www.iucn.org/news/species/201609/poaching-behind-worst-african-elephant-losses-25-years-–-iucn-report

 

In the example above, the background schemata refer to wildlife environmentalism/biology and there is a long reference to an official real-world conference: this should work to remind you of the ‘formal’ scientific context of this text.

At 1. The only possible answer is ‘decline’ because all other answers have a plural ‘s’ or are a verb written in the 3^rd person with an ‘s’ (?), but grammatically the blank requires a superlative, which is an adjective form that does not usually end with an ‘s’ (unless the word’s root ends with an ‘s’). For example, It was a great party; That is the worst movie I have ever seen; She is the greatest player, never greatest players. Superlatives usually point to one event or thing, never plural events or people (However, you do get rare sayings, like- These are the greatest days of our lives).

Grammar

At 2., you must see that the two gerunds are to be eliminated immediately as they are closely related to informal language and they do not conform to any widely used collocation. Thus, of the remaining two words, distribution and allocation, distribution is the correct choice because it is the ‘scientific’ correct choice – as we distribution charts are common in most types of fieldwork, whereas allocation, by definition means some person placed the elephants in designated areas, which seems almost impossible to do without great effort (though they do run free), so this seems highly unlikely.

Eliminate gerunds and choose the more formal word

At 3., The context is set as elephant populations, so it hard to accept the words ‘values’ and ‘appraisals’ because these words seem to monetize the elephants, which doesn’t make any logical sense. The two remaining words, guesses, and estimates are close in meaning but the better formal expression is ‘estimate’ over the informal ‘guesses’.

Formal words over informal

At 4., territory and land loss are immediately eliminated because they both mean the same, so they cancel each other out as part of a double elimination, as we cannot choose one over the other because they mean the same. A careful reading of the context provides the correct answer ‘habitat’. Since ‘environment’ refers to a place with multiple live forms, habitat is specific to one species – the elephant. The context throughout this paragraph has been ‘the elephant’.

Double elimination, close contextual reading