Special Suggestions for Objective Tests
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Answer all questions in order without skipping or
jumping around. Identify doubtful answers by marking in the margin and
recheck these as time permits after all questions have been answered.
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Do not linger too long on any one question. Mark
your best guess and move on, returning later if you have sufficient time.
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Reread all questions containing negative wording
such as "not" or "least". Be especially alert for the use of double or even
triple negatives within a sentence, as these must be read very carefully to
assure full understanding.
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Check for qualifying words such as
"all-most-some-none", "always-usually-seldom-never", "best-worst", or
"smallest-largest". When you see one of these qualifiers, test for truth by
substituting the other members of the series. If your substitution makes a
better statement, the question is false; if your substitution does not make
a better statement, the question is true.
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Watch for modifying or limiting phrases inserted
into the true/false questions. Instructors often use inserted names, dates,
places, or other details to make a statement inaccurate.
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Be alert for multiple ideas or concepts within
the same true/false statement. All parts of the statement must be true or
the entire statement is false.
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Be alert for grammatical inconsistencies between
the question stem and the answer choices on multiple-choice questions. A
choice is almost always wrong if it and the stem do not make a grammatically
correct sentence.
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Be cautious about changing your answer to a
true-false or multiple-choice question without a good reason. Your first
"guess" is more likely to be correct than are subsequent "guesses", so be
sure to have a sound reason for changing our answer.
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Apply the same approach to answering both
true/false and multiple-choice questions. The same techniques will work
equally well for both, since multiple-choice questions are basically
true/false questions arranged in groups.
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On matching exercises, work with only one column
at a time. Match each item in that column against all items in the second
column until you find a proper match, marking through matches about which
you are certain, so that it will be easier to match out the rest about which
you are unsure.
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