Celebrity English | Test-Taking Tips

The "Improving Sentences" questions in the Writing Skills sections of the SAT and PSAT require you to identify and correct grammatical errors and errors in diction.

One Writing Skills section will consist of 35 questions, 11 of which will be "Improving Sentences" questions. A separate Writing Skills section will consist of 14 questions of this type. Each examination will contain one experimental section; if it is a Writing Skills section, it will be in the 35-question format.

Each question will present a sentence with some or all of the words underlined. The underlined portion of the sentence may contain one or more errors; however, sometimes the sentence will be correct as written. You will be given 5 different formats of the underlined section, the first of which (option A) is always the same as the underlined portion of the sentence. If the sentence is correct as written, choose option A. If it is incorrect, choose the answer that corrects the error(s).

Keep these tips in mind when answering the "Improving Sentences" questions:

1. Never read option A. Option A is always exactly the same as the underlined portion of the sentence. Do not waste your time reading this option.
2. Try to identify the error(s) before you read the answer. The error(s) may be obvious to you as you read the sentence. Some of the answers may duplicate an error; cross these out as you read the choices.
3. Do not introduce a new error. Some answers may correct the error(s) in the sentence but will be incorrect because they introduce a new error. Eliminate the choices that do not correct the error(s), then compare the remaining choices. Only one will be correct, so make sure that your choice does not contain a new error.
   
4. Group commonly confused words. Some sentences will contain errors in diction in combination with grammatical errors. Many errors in diction are based on two words that are commonly confused (e.g., allusion/illusion, appraise/apprise, imply/infer). If you know which word in the pair is correct in the context of the sentence, cross out the choices that do not contain this word and look for the answer that does not have another error. If you are uncertain about which word in the pair is the correct choice, look at only the choices containing one of the words and try to eliminate those that contain additional errors. Then look at the choices containing the other word and eliminate those with additional errors. If you are left with two choices that are identical except for the two words that are commonly confused, consider guessing as you will have a 50% chance of choosing the right answer.
5. Trust your ears. As you read the sentence and the answer choices, you may notice that some of the language sounds funny to you. You may not be able to name the error, but you may be able to eliminate a choice simply because it does not sound as if it could be correct. However, be careful: the test will contain colloquialisms that will sound perfectly fine to you but that are considered to be errors by the writers of the examination.
6. Double-check before you choose option A. Several questions will not contain an error, and you may easily identify these sentences. Before you mark your answer, quickly review the common errors and look for them in the sentence. Does the subject agree with the verb? Is there a pronoun, and if so, does it agree with its antecedent? Is there a comparison, and if so, is it logical? Is there a list or a pair of correlative conjunctions, and if so, is the sentence parallel in structure? If there are two verbs, did one action occur before the other and is the verb tense sequence logical? If there is a modifier, does it logically describe a word in the sentence? The answers to many of these questions may be intuitive to you, so if you are certain that there is no error, mark option A and move on. If you have extra time at the end of the section, you may choose to review those questions you marked with option A. However, only change your answer if you are absolutely certain that you have identified an error that you originally overlooked.