PPEFEfor everyone

03 The passage on the screen · 8 min

The word they twist

Vocabulary items are not a quiz of rare words. They are a quiz of whether you let the paragraph correct you. Airtime is not radio. Record, next to meetings, may be a noun.

Objective

Choose the meaning a word has in this paragraph, not the meaning from a word list.

On the exam

The line often says “the word X in the passage is closest in meaning to.” The right synonym fits the sentence if you swap it in. The wrong ones are real meanings from a different context.

Don't translate it like this

Don't say

Airtime means time spent on a radio show.

Say

In this passage, airtime means the share of speaking time a person actually gets.

The dictionary meaning is a distractor. The paragraph defines the word on purpose, a few words later.

Phrases

Read them aloud. Listen if you want a model. Nothing is recorded.

I missed the figure. Was it 12 percent or 20?

숫자를 놓쳤습니다. 12퍼센트인가요, 20인가요?

Ask a closed question. “Pardon?” makes them guess what you missed.

I'm not convinced the data supports that.

그 데이터가 그 결론을 받치는지는 아직 모르겠습니다.

I'm not convinced is professional. I don't think so is thin.

In the room

Swap the word

If the synonym does not fit in the same sentence, it is the wrong sense, even if you have seen it before.

  1. Sentence

    Remote staff received less airtime even when they were senior.

  2. Swap

    Remote staff received a smaller share of speaking time even when they were senior.

What would you say?

All three have to be right to close the lesson.

1. Vocabulary“Remote staff received less airtime.” In this sentence, airtime is closest in meaning to
2. Vocabulary“The record of the meeting looked fairer than the meeting was.” Here, record means
3. MethodYou know two meanings of a word. What do you do first?

Answer every question, then check.

Next lesson: Inference without inventing