Reading-Step 3

Practice

More Reading Practice back to top

You’ve just walked a long path through the reading and should feel much more
confident in your abilities to score well. The following reading will serve as our analysis
of how much we have improved. You should still have your notebook which kept your
score for the first reading about water in the desert. Follow the instructions for this
reading, do your best, and apply everything that you learn to the best of your ability.
Let's see how much we improved. I'm very excited to see this.

Instructions

1. Set your online stopwatch to 20 min.

2. Start the stopwatch and start the reading. (click here)

3. When the timer stops, stop your work

4.  Mark your notes at the point where you stopped.

Your Reading back to top

Bluegill Mating
 

For a number of years, scientists have been making remarkable discoveries of

differences in mating behavior among members of some animal species. One of the most
fascinating of these discoveries is new research being done on the behavior of the male
bluegill fish.

This species, found in the lakes throughout eastern North America, is known for its
highly specialized nesting behavior. The males of the species build nests in the shallow
waters of a lake’s bay. To the outside observer, these colonies appear to be a compact set
of rings between twelve and twenty-four inches in diameter. The “owners” of these
hollowed-out nests are known as territorial males. The females of the species see these
nests as excellent spawning locations and soon are drawn into the nests to spawn. In
turn, the males protect the eggs by chasing away any predators, such as bullheads or
catfish, who might come by the nest or by fanning their eggs with their tails, thus
oxygenating the water around the nest, which offers some defense against egg eating
fungi.

At first glance, then, bluegill reproduction would seem to be a fairly straightforward

story, but in fact, the truth is infinitely more interesting. Recent research in Lake
Opricon in eastern Ontario, Canada has uncovered a far more complex pattern of
mating behavior than previously anticipated. In fact, studies by researchers Matt Gross
and A.J. Donnelly show that there is not one type of breeding male bluegill fish, but
three. The most obvious group, because of their larger size and brighter coloring, is
territorial males. These conspicuous males are the “owners” and residents of the nests,
and their mating success is based on their provision of egg protection services, but they
make up only about 15% of the entire male population. What about the remaining male
bluegills? They fall into two distinct and equally fascinating groups.

 
Sneakers, as their name might suggest, use stealth to enter into mating behavior. The
sneaker waits outside the nest until it notices spawning behavior between the female
and territorial male begins and then it swims quickly into the nest, shoots its seed, and
then makes a hasty exit out of the nest,  without the male ever recognizing its presence.
Satellites, on the other hand, depend on trickery and deception to spread their seed. As
they are much smaller than territorial males, satellites can often be mistaken for a
female bluegill. ❒ A satellite circles cautiously outside the nest in which spawning is
taking place (hence the name “satellite”). ❒ When the appropriate time arises, it then
darts into the nest and swims between the resident male and the female and copies the
behavior of the female to avoid detection. ❒ When the female releases her eggs, the
imposter releases a cloud of sperm that mixes with that of the territorial male. ❒ It then
exits the nest, leaving the territorial male behind to perform all of the egg-guarding
duties.

Because sneakers and satellites have, therefore, no to protect a territory as territorial

males do, they do not need to grow as large. Instead, they mature sexually at a much
younger age – at about three to five years old, compared with five to eight years for the
territorial males; instead, they spend that energy in the production of sperm, which
accounts for a significant drop-off in their growth rate in adulthood.

Even though the territorial males would seem to be dominant because of their size and
responsibilities, their mating strategies appear to be no more or less successful than
those of sneakers or satellites. Gross’s research shows that all three types are equally as
likely to pass on their genetic makeup to the next generation, thus ensuring that the
behaviors of all three categories will continue. As long as the territorial males cannot
seal off their nests from outside intruders, satellites and sneakers will be there to take
advantage of opportunities that present themselves. This variation among males of the
bluegill fish in mating behavior has shown scientists that generalizations about entire
species of animals may prove to be fraught with more peril than had been previously
assumed.

In light of this recent research, scientist are now looking more closely into the success
and failure of individuals within a species, and this pattern of study may prove to be
more eye-opening than anyone could have imagined as more discoveries are made.

1)    The word “drawn” in the passage is closest in meaning to

a)    moved

b)    lured

c)    repelled

d)    forced

Recent research in Lake Opricon in eastern Ontario, Canada has uncovered a far
more complex pattern of mating behavior than previously anticipated.

2)    Which of the sentences below best expresses the essential information in the
highlighted sentence in the passage? Incorrect choices change the meaning in important
ways or leave out essential information.

a)    Unexpectedly complex breeding habits among bluegills have been recently
discovered by researchers in Canada.
 b)    Scientists’ latest research into bluegills has confirmed long-standing theories
regarding their mating behavior.

c)    The possibility of a more complex system of mating behavior existing within
male bluegills has been uncovered by recent research.

d)    Canadian researchers recently learned that the breeding habits of bluegills
have a lack of complexity that they had not expected to find.

3)    The word “stealth” in the passage is closest in meaning to

a)    secrecy

b)    creativity

c)    sullenness

d)    courage

4)    According to paragraphs 3 and 4, what is implied about non-territorial male

bluegills?

a)    They are larger in size than territorial males.

b)    They make up the vast majority of male bluegills.

c)    They do not fully participate in mating behavior.

d)    They are fascinating because of their egg-guarding services.

 
5)    In Paragraph 4, why does the reading mention the fact that satellites are often
mistaken for female bluegills?

a)    To show how deception is vital to their mating strategy

b)    To explain why they circle outside a nest in which spawning is occurring.

c)    To describe why size is an unimportant part of the mating process.

d)    To imply that satellites are named for their mating habits.

6)    The word “imposter” in the passage is closest in meaning to

a)    aggressor

b)    breeder

c)    original

d)    deceiver

7)    The word “mature” in the passage is closest in meaning to

a)    age

b)    develop

c)    retire

d)    discover

 
8)    According to paragraph 5, what accounts for the difference in sizes among the three
different subspecies of male bluegills?

a)    Territorial males spend their energy in the production of sperm, which
reduces their growth rate.

b)    With no territory to protect, it is unnecessary for non-territorial males to grow

as large as territorial males do.

c)    The inactivity of non-territorial males causes them to grow at a much slower
rate than territorial males.

d)    Non-territorial males grow for 5 to 8 year s instead of 3 to 5 years as territorial

males do.

9)    According to paragraph 6, what is the relationship between mating strategies of the
bluegills and their success in mating?

a)    Territorial males have a distinct advantage over non-territorial males in

mating.

b)    The varying strategies are likely to continue into the future because they are
equally successful.

c)    Satellites are unwilling participants in the mating process, and as such have a
less successful mating life.

d)    Sneakers create a diversion in the nest that allows them to distract females.

10)    Why does the author state that “As long as the territorial males cannot seal off
their nests from outside intruders, satellites and sneakers will be there to take advantage
of opportunities that present themselves.”?
 a)    To argue that bluegills take advantage of every opportunity to mate

b)    To suggest that bluegills would be better off in environments sealed off from
intruders

c)    To explain why the three types of male bluegills will always coexist

d)    To provide evidence that bluegill reproduction is a vital part of the lake’s
ecosystem

11)    According to paragraph 5, what can be said about the sexual development of
territorial males?

a)    They mature sexually faster than others because they grow larger.

b)    They experience a significant reduction in growth rate in adulthood.

c)    They become sexually mature later than non-territorial males.

d)    They reach sexual maturity at about 3 to 5 years of age.

12)    According to paragraph 6, what conclusions can be drawn from the research about
the variations in bluegill mating behavior?

a)    Behavioral differences within the same sex of the same species exist and are
worthy of study.

b)    Scientists have focused too much attention on individual differences in the
past at the expense of true discovery.

c)    Territorial males are taken advantage of by non-territorial males in the mating
process, which accounts for their small numbers.
 d)    Generalizations about species are proving to be more eye-opening than
anyone could have imagined.

13)    Look at the four squares [ ❒ ] that indicate where the following sentence could be
added to the passage.

The territorial male is confused by this, but does not see the
intruder as a threat, so the male continues with the mating
process undisturbed.

Where would the sentence best fit?

14)    Directions: An introductory sentence for a brief summary of the passage is

provided below. Complete the summary by selecting the THREE answer choices that
express the most important ideas in the passage. Some sentences do not belong in the
summary because they express ideas that are not presented in the passage or are minor
ideas in the passage.

New research about mating behavior in bluegills has yielded some

interesting findings.

a)    Neither sneakers nor satellites guard eggs for females but use other methods
to enter into mating behavior.

b)    Scientists have discovered that satellite males are the least successful breeders
due to their inability to enter the nest undetected.
 c)    Territorial bluegill males provide egg protection services that attract females,
but two other groups, sneakers and satellites, also participate in breeding.

d)    Even though sneakers and satellites are smaller than territorial males, they
reach the age of sexually maturity much earlier.

e)    The studies of the breeding strategies of sneakers and satellites led to the
conclusion that all three groups of fish are equally likely to pass on genetic
information to the next generation.

f)    The studies of bluegill breeding habits are part of a growing trend in science
that focuses on the study of individual behavior and difference.

Scoring back to top

The way that we will understand the likely score that we are going to receive on the
TOEFL exam is by doing a little bit of math. First, remember that the TOEFL reading
section is scored out of 30 points. Each reading has approximately 14 questions. In
order for us to know the score that you're likely to receive on the exam from the reading
that you just did is by following a few steps.

1. Count the total number of answers that you got correct.

2. Question 14 is worth 2 points.

If you chose 3 out of 3 correctly, you earn 2 points.

If you chose 2003 correctly, you earn one point.

 If you chose one out of 3 correctly, you earn no points.

3. Divide the number of correct answers by 14.

4. Multiply the number in step 3 by 30. 

This number is your likely score on the test.

5. Record the dates, the name of the reading, and your score in your notebook.

Bluegill Mating Answer Key

1. Vocabulary-B

2. Paraphrase-A

3. Vocabulary-A

4. Inference-B

5. Purpose-A

6. Vocabulary-D

7. Vocabulary-B

8. Detail-B

9. Detail-B

10. Purpose-C

11. Detail-C
12. Detail-A

13. Plug-in-C

14. Summary-C, E, and F

Vocabulary Advice back to top

If you find that you scored 2 out of 4 (or less) vocabulary quesitons, it’s imortant to start
studying vocabulary separately. It will stand in your way of improving. For fast fee help,
there are many vocabulary lists on the internet and you can always build your own list
from these example readings and others. We have also developed a powerful vocabualry
system whose words we’ve taken directly from the most frequently occuring words from
over 60 actual TOEFL readings. It’s a powerful system that can help you as well. Click
here to get an overview it and some further direction on how to improve. If you have any
questions or conerns about it, you can always send us an email
(StudentHelp@NoteFull.com). Whatever you decide to do though, start working on
vocabulary!

If you scored 3 out of 4 (or more), studying vocabulary is not a major recommendation.
At this level, it can be a waste of time bceause your vocabulary will build naturally and
it’s more important to practice actual readings than simply memorize words. Of course,
this is unless you know that your vocabulary is an issue, but I don’t recommend studying
it separately unless you have a few hours to study whenever you study and you’re
looking to improve your score as quickly as possible.

 Improve Yet Again

Yes, a Third Time back to top

And I hope a third and a fourth. Study hard and good luck with your exercises today and
tomorrow.

Expanding Your Vocabulary back to top

Your vocabulary is an important part of success on the reading section. Without a strong
vocabulary, it will be him to improve over time. The easiest way to know if your
vocabulary is an issue is to check the number of vocabulary words that you missed on
the previous reading.

The TOEFL asks you 4 vocabulary questions per reading on average. If you 1 or less
every reading, you are okay; your vocabulary is strong enough. However, if you miss 2 or
more questions, then we must focus on vocabulary or suffer a consistently lower score
than we deserve.

To improve your vocabulary, write down every word that you don't know in a reading
and master 7 of those words every day. To push your score ahead faster, focus on 14
words a day.

 
Another strong choice is to try our vocabulary system. Click here to learn more about it.
It's a fantastic system that we recommend strongly because every single word in that
system comes from actual TOEFL readings that have been released on the Internet-
based TOEFL. Also, we teach you these words in context. In addition, we teach the
correct pronunciation and focus your mastery on these words not only to develop your
reading ability through vocabulary, but also your speaking ability, listening ability, and
writing about.

Getting Faster Reading Speed back to top

One common difficulty among students is how quickly they can read through the
reading in order to attack the questions in 20 min. So, reading speed stands as an
incredibly important point to work on. Do you feel that the reading speed that you have
is too slow to answer all the questions?

You can improve your reading speed and maximize it to your level of fluency and even
go beyond it. But, it's going to take consistent work. Again, you have to do the following
exercise consistently every day in order to see benefits or else it's not going to be an
effective use of your time. Excited? Here it is.

First, you want to make sure that you have plenty of reading material to do this exercise.
You can find this by purchasing any National Geographic magazine or any Scientific
American magazine. You can also print several pages from National Geographic or
Scientific American online. Those are the only sources that I recommend. I don't
recommend TOEFL readings because you're going to go through them too quickly. I
don't recommend newspapers or magazines because they don't match the language of
the TOEFL very well.
 

Once you have, let's say, National Geographic, you want to begin the exercise. You will
need a stopwatch. Set your stopwatch for 1 min. When you start your stopwatch, your
goal is to read through any article in National Geographic (try to pick a very large one).
Once the timer buzzes and your 60 seconds are up, you want to stop and count the
number of lines that you were able to read. The reason why we count lines and not
words is that counting words is too time-consuming. Write this number down in your
notebook. For example, let's say that you did this exercise and read 12 lines in 60
seconds. That is your current ability and it's not strong enough, so we want to improve
it.

Reset your timer for 60 seconds. Now, your goal is to read twice as much information as
you did before in the same time. I know what you're thinking, “that's not possible.” It is.
But, you have to remember that you're pushing your limits and you're not going to read
at full comprehension. This exercise is meant to push you to read faster, so make sure to
follow it exactly. With a pen, mark the last line that you read in your article and then
count the number of lines that you need to read in this step and make another mark.
These marks will make it easier for you to know where you should read to. If we
continue our example, we have to read 24 lines. When you start the timer, read quickly.
Go through the words fast. Skip some that you think are not important. But, make sure
to continue to try to understand what you are reading. If you just go through the
information, it won't help.

Did you succeed? If you did, you can go onto the next step. However, if you did not
succeed, try again until you do. Never give up!

 
Now you should get the pattern. You want to, again, try to read twice as many lines as
you did. If you find that you don't have enough lines in your article, start a new article.
To clarify, if we continue our previous example, we now have to read 48 lines in 60
seconds. Make sure to try this again and again until you succeed. Remember that you
are not reading every single word. You are jumping around, skipping words, and reading
through lines quickly to grab as much content as you can. But, be aware that you only
have 60 seconds to complete your task.

It’s time to push ourselves. Let's do it one more time. If we continue our example, we
now must read 96 lines. If you really try, you're going to find that your brain is starting
to focus on nouns and verbs and nothing else. Also, it’ll focus on subjects and it's also
going to skip lines every now and then. You should still be able to grab some
information and understand the content that you’re reading. Well, you should at least a
little bit.

Now, here's the important part: we get to see if this exercise helped. If you followed it
carefully, you should see that it did; otherwise, do the whole thing again. Set your timer
for 60 seconds and read at full comprehension. You don't have any specific number of
lines that you want to read here but you want to read with full energy. Once the timer
buzzes, count the number of lines that you were able to read. Isn't it amazing? You
should now have read at least one line more than you did before and likely 2 to 6 lines
more. Remember that this is at full comprehension and you’ve just increased your
reading speed within 10 minutes. That’s serious progress.

This effect doesn't last forever. We lose our focus and our energy for reading very
quickly. That's why we have to do this exercise every single day before we start studying
and track our progress every time we do it in our notebooks to check that we’re always
improving and pushing ourselves.
 

Building Better Comprehension back to top

Through my years teaching, I've noticed that a lot of students don't really focus on
comprehension. They focus on everything else: vocabulary, reading speed, answer
choices, question types, strategy, and anything else you can name. However, I rarely see
a student ask me questions on how to improve his or her reading comprehension. And,
that's the most important element in your TOEFL success. High-level students who have
no strategy when reading but read a large amount of material develop the
comprehension that lets them score at a much higher level than many lower-level
students who know yeah I'm going to finish this really fast and you strategy very well.

Does this mean that the strategies that you're learning don't work? Of course not. The
point is to emphasize that deep down behind everything is comprehension. If you can’t
understand a sentence well, then you're not going to have an easy time answering a
question about that sentence regardless of how much strategy you know. Of course,
strategy will help you get the best result that you can though.

This pushes us to ask an important question: how can we improve our reading
comprehension? There are several ways. Some are very general; others are very specific.
Here's a system of reading that will push you to develop your reading comprehension.

First, you want to take any book that you find interesting. Don't focus on a book that you
believe will help you on the TOEFL. If you do that, you're not going to read with energy
and you're not going to benefit from it. Any book about any subject that's interesting to
you will work. A book is better than magazines or anything else because it forces you to
consistently read about the same information. This reinforces your vocabulary because
it will be recycled throughout the book. It also recycles the plot, which is the story of the
book, and that pushes you to consistently assess what it is that you're reading. In
simpler terms, a book is the most powerful way to improve your comprehension.

You should read consistently every day or every other day for about 30 to 60 min. Don’t
do it only for the TOEFL but for you in general and it will help your TOEFL score. Many
students who do this tell me how much it helps. Don't be one of the students who avoids
this exercise and in a few weeks communicates that he or she still hasn’t improved as
much as they needed to on the exam. You need to do this.

You can enhance your development of reading comprehension as you read by following
this next system of analysis. First, you always want to focus on the subject, verb, and
object of every sentence. The easiest way to do this is to have a pencil in your hand as
you read. Every time you have a subject, underline it; every time you have a verb,
underline it; and, every time you have an object, underline it. This will get pretty tedious
over time, so you don't have to do this all the time but you do want to do this for at least
10 to 20 min. of your reading time. This really helps because sometimes it will be hard
for you to find the subject, verb, or object and you will be forced to really think critically
about that sentence and its major meaning.

The next thing that you want to do is gradually work up your understanding of what it is
that you're reading. When you start reading you want to read with your pencil
underlining the subject, verb, and object as you just learned. You also want to have a
notebook next to you. In this notebook, restate every sentence that you read in one
paragraph. This doesn't mean that you copy it down but it means that you read this
sentence, digest it, and then rewrite it in your own words. Then, compare the sentence
in the reading to the sentence that you wrote down to make sure that the meaning is the
same. This is not easy. This will take time. But, you want to improve and this will
improve you.

You don't have to do this for every sentence that you read. That would be too much.
After the first paragraph or two, what you want to do instead of restating every sentence
is now restate every paragraph. You don't want to have more than one sentence
summarize one paragraph though. Write only one sentence to summarize a paragraph
that you read. By doing that, you'll force yourself to think about what the most
important piece of information is within that paragraph. That develops comprehension.

You want to do that for several paragraphs. To give you a good number, do this for about
10 paragraphs. Next, you want to summarize what you learned on an entire page if
you’re reading a book or if you're reading an article in a magazine or newspaper, you
want to summarize what you read in five paragraphs with one sentence. This is good if
you do it throughout the whole time you read but you don't have to; 20 minutes of your
reading time is fine. This focus on understanding the material that you're reading will
push her comprehension to the next level.

If you really want to be specific to the TOEFL, then do this exercise with TOEFL
readings that you have already read. Good luck!

Mastering Our Crucial Strategy back to top

 
This is the element that brought you to NoteFull. This is what you have been focusing on
for hours a day. Some of us have high levels of fluency and others of us have medium
levels of fluency but if we can make sure to follow strategy whenever we answer reading
questions, we will get the maximum points possible. And, if you really focus, you're
going to get a higher score than your current fluency level.

So, let me ask you a question: do you know all of the different question types on the
reading? Do you know all of the strategies associated with those question types? Do you
practice them consistently when you do a reading or do you still follow your own habit of
answering questions? Do you have them memorized so that you can bring them up in
your head quickly? Or, does it take you a lot of time to think of them and do you usually
forget one or two?

I cannot stress this enough: if you don't have these strategies and question types
mastered, you are not getting the highest score possible. It's that simple. If you want a
higher score, you must have these ideas consistent in your mind.

In my experience, the easiest way to develop mastery of something like this is to create
flash cards. One way to do that would be to take several index cards and on one side of
each index card write down a question type and on the other side, write down an
example question from an actual reading of that question type. Do that for every
question type. That is your first set of two flash cards.

For the next set of flashcards, you want to write, again, on one side, the question type.
Then, on the other side, you want to outline the strategy for it.

 
Review these flashcards as many times as it takes until it is easy in your mind to recall
not only the different question types but also the strategies associated with them. Why?
Because if you do not have them clear in your head right now when you're practicing in
the comfort of your own home, how easy do you think it's going to be under the stressful
conditions of the exam to remember them and get the highest score possible?

Improving on Your Most Difficult Questions back to top

One key quality that you need to make sure that you are improving in leaps instead of
very small steps is to know how to improve what is most difficult for you. This often
involves the hardest work because you have to focus on what is the most challenging and
as a result sometimes the most frustrating thing to improve.

For the reading section of the TOEFL, this means that you have to identify which
question type is holding you back the most. Do you find vocabulary questions the most
difficult? Do you find detail questions the most difficult? Whatever question is usually
the one that you miss, whatever question is the one that is the most difficult for you to
answer, whatever question takes the most time for you to answer, you want to identify it
and work on it.

How do you do that? After about two or three readings, you should know which question
type challenges you the most. Write this question type down in your notebook. Then, go
back to all of your old readings and circle all the questions that belong to this question
type. For example, let's say that my most difficult question is the detail question and I've
done about three readings in my time studying. I want to go through each reading and
circle every question that is a detail question. Then, what I want to do is write down or
copy and paste each question and the answer choices connected to it in one document. I
also want to copy and paste the paragraph that the answer is found in.

Let me clear this up a bit. Let's say that in one reading, question number 5 is a detail
question. I will copy question number 5 along with the answer choices and paste it in a
new word-processing document or write it down in my notebook if I have the time. In
the TOEFL, you know that the paragraph the answer is found in is always stated. So, if
question 5 says that the answer is in paragraph 4, then what I want to do is copy and
paste paragraph 4 above question number 5 in my document. Why are we doing this? If
you do this for every reading and for every question type that gives you difficulty, you're
going to have a powerful resource for practice.

Every time you study the reading section, review these questions. Review them following
strategy because if you don't then it's a useless exercise that's just going to push you to
memorize the right answer rather than develop a stronger answering ability.

The easiest way to do this is to go through the steps in choosing the right answer and
always review why each wrong answer is wrong. This will develop a much stronger skill
with the question type. It's a fantastic tool.

You can also do this not only for the question types that are most difficult but also for
any question in a reading that is really challenging for you. It's common that you'll find a
question in your practice that is very tough for you to understand even if you study the
answer key and even if you review it several times. That is one of the best tools for you to
improve with. Study that question every day until you really master it and understand
why the answer is what it is and why each wrong answer is incorrect. That will shoot up
not only your ability with strategy but your reading comprehension as well.

Remember that studying in this manner is incredibly important. Many students just go
through readings and practice and practice and don't improve because they're not really
developing new skills; they are just reviewing new vocabulary and building reading
comprehension little by little. Be as effective and improve as quickly as possible by
following these steps. Good luck!