Multiple Choice Tips

Multiple choice questions in the TOEIC test include a phrase or stem followed by 4 options. You are usually know them in part 5, part 6, part 7 in the TOEIC Reading section. There are some basic ways for you to answer correctly

1. Test strategies:

Preview the test: Read through the test quickly and answer the easiest questions first

- Read the question before you look at the answer: Come up with the answer in your head before looking at the possible answers, this way the choices given on the test won’t throw you off or trick you. Mark those you think you know in some way that is appropriate.

- If time allows, review both questions and answers

Answering options
Improve your odds, think critically:

Cover the options, read the stem, and try to answer
Select the option that most closely matches your answer

2. Strategies for answering difficult questions:

1. Eliminate options you know to be incorrect
   If allowed, mark words or alternatives in questions that eliminate the option
2. Give each option of a question the “true-false test:”
   This may reduce your selection to the best answer. Do not spend too much time on any one question.
3. Question options that grammatically don’t fit with the stem: When you have to complete a sentence, see if one of the answers fits better grammatically than the others.
4. Question options that are totally unfamiliar to you
5. Question options that contain negative or absolute words.
   Try substituting a qualified term for the absolute one.
   For example,  frequently for always; or typical for every to see if you can eliminate an option
6. “All of the above:”
   If you know two of three options seem correct, “all of the above” is a strong possibility
7. Number answers:
   toss out the high and low and consider the middle range numbers
8. “Look alike options”
   probably one is correct; choose the best but eliminate choices that mean basically the same thing, and thus cancel each other out
9. Double negatives:
   Create the equivalent positive statement
10. Echo options:
    If two options are opposite each other, chances are one of them is correct
11. Favor options that contain qualifiers
    The result is longer, more inclusive items that better fill the role of the answer
12. If two alternatives seem correct,
    compare them for differences,
    then refer to the stem to find your best answer

3. Guessing:

• Always guess when there is no penalty for guessing or you can eliminate options
• Don’t guess if you are penalized for guessing and if you have no basis for your choice
• Use hints from questions you know to answer questions you do not.
• Change your first answers  when you are sure of the correction, or other cues in the test cue you to change.
• Remember that you are looking for the best answer, not only a correct one, and not one which must be true all of the time, in all cases, and without exception.