The TOEFL Reading insertion task gives you a new sentence and four possible positions in a paragraph, and only one of them keeps the paragraph coherent. The clue is nearly always a reference word or a connector: this, these, such, the latter, therefore, however. Work from those links rather than from the general topic and the task becomes mechanical.
Before you look at the paragraph, decide what it needs in front of it: a cause, a contrast, a plural noun, a named person, a date.
This, these, such, that decision, the latter, he, they. Almost every insertion item is decided by one of them.
Look for the sentence that supplies the noun your reference word points at. The square immediately after that sentence is your first candidate.
Therefore demands a cause before it. However demands a claim to contradict. For example demands a generalisation. Instead demands an idea just rejected.
Read the sentence before, then the new sentence, then the sentence after. Both joins have to work; candidates check only the first.
If two sentences are linked by a pronoun of their own, do not drive your sentence between them.
A square whose neighbour repeats a noun from the new sentence feels right and is often the trap. Logic beats vocabulary overlap.
If the reference word points cleanly at one square, take it and go. Rereading the whole paragraph a third time is where the minute disappears.
Not thisPlacing “These trees act as a filter” before any tree is mentioned.
ThisPlacing it after the sentence about mangroves.
The demonstrative has no antecedent, so the reader cannot tell which trees are meant.
Not thisPutting a “However” sentence at the start of the paragraph.
ThisPutting it after the claim it contradicts.
A contrast marker needs something in the same paragraph to push against.
Not thisChoosing the last square by default when time is short.
ThisChoosing the square the reference word points to.
A sentence dropped at the end usually strands the writer’s own conclusion and breaks the last link in the paragraph.
Not thisChoosing a square because the neighbouring sentence uses the same noun.
ThisChoosing the square where the logic follows.
Repeated vocabulary is the easiest trap to build, and it is the one candidates fall into most.
Not thisReading only the sentence before the square.
ThisReading the sentence after it too.
An insertion that fits backwards can still cut the link between two sentences that were already joined.
Not thisAssuming “the latter” means the first thing mentioned.
ThisTaking it as the second.
Former and latter map onto first and second, and a reversed reading places the sentence a square too early.
40 original questions. The first 10 are open to everyone. Answers are checked in your browser and never sent to us, so you can share this page with a class as it is.
2Complete with one verb (third person) beginning with r.
5Complete with one adverb beginning with b.
6Why does an inserted sentence beginning “However,” rarely belong at the very start of a paragraph?
One good answer
However signals a contrast with something already said, so there has to be an earlier statement for it to push against; at the opening of a paragraph there is nothing yet to contradict.
7Complete with one noun beginning with c.
9Complete with one verb beginning with r.
11Complete with one grammatical term beginning with n.
14Complete with one adjective beginning with k.
16Explain what goes wrong if “Such speculation was not confined to the wealthy” is placed before any mention of buying land.
One good answer
“Such speculation” has nothing to point back to, so the reader cannot tell what speculation is meant and the paragraph stops hanging together.
17Complete with one noun beginning with d.
19Complete with one noun beginning with r.
23Complete with one word beginning with a.
24Give one reason candidates pick the last square by default, and say why that is risky.
One good answer
Under time pressure the final square looks safe because nothing follows it, but a sentence dropped at the end often strands the writer’s conclusion and cuts the link between the last two sentences.
25Complete with one noun beginning with c.
27Complete with one noun beginning with c.
29Complete with one noun beginning with n.
33Complete with one noun beginning with c.
35Complete with one noun beginning with a.
37Complete with the past participle of a verb beginning with r.
39Write a sentence that could reasonably be inserted straight after: “The new bridge cut the journey from two hours to twenty minutes.”
One good answer
Within a year, three villages on the far bank had doubled in population.
40Complete with one noun beginning with t.
Note
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Yes. The paragraph is written so that three positions break a reference, a time sequence or a logical link. If two look equally good, you have not yet found the word that decides it.
No. The squares sit in one paragraph and the answer is inside it, so read that paragraph and, if the first square is at the start, the last sentence of the paragraph before.
Then look for a repeated noun or a time reference, and ask what the sentence is doing: adding an example, drawing a consequence, or qualifying a claim. Put it where the paragraph needs that move.
Under a minute once you have spotted the reference word. It is one of the better-value questions on the section, so do not leave it until the clock is nearly gone.
It can, but only when it links back to the previous paragraph or introduces the idea the paragraph then develops. A sentence full of this and these almost never belongs there.