TOEFL EXAM SUCCESS In Only 6 Steps

Introduction ix Building your English reading, writing, and listening skills is important, of course. But before addressing these specific skill sets, this book takes you through a review of basic study skills and learning strategies. It also helps you prepare a detailed study plan. The stronger your study skills, and the better you understand learning strategies, the more you will get out of each skill-building chapter. Each skill-building chapter of this book includes several practice exercises, and detailed answers and explanations are provided in Appendix A. Appendix B offers an extensive list of resources to help you further strengthen your basic skills. Chapter 6 provides general information about the TOEFL exam, including notes about registration and scoring.  The TOEFL Exam: What the Test Is About The TOEFL exam has four sections: Listening, Structure, Reading, and Writing. The Listening section measures your ability to understand English as spoken in North America. If you have lived in an English-speaking country or region where the accent is different than you will find on the TOEFL exam, you may need to spend some extra time adjusting to the sound of American English. The Structure section of the exam tests your knowledge of English grammar and usage, including topics such as verb tenses, idioms, and parallel structure. The Reading section measures your ability to understand passages written in English. You will be asked to identify the main idea, determine the meaning of vocabulary words, identify specific details, and draw inferences based upon the passage. Finally, the Writing section will ask you to write a short essay on a general topic. A list of possible topics is included in the TOEFL® Computer-Based Test Information Bulletin and online at . (For more information, see Chapters 5 and 6.) BECAUSE test centers fill up quickly, you should begin the TOEFL exam registration process right away. The first step you need to take is to obtain the Bulletin. If you have access to the Internet, the easiest way to get the Bulletin is to download it from . Bulletins for both the paper-based and the computer-based exams are available on this site. If you don’t have Internet access, you can get the Bulletin from an English language center or the international student office at the university to which you are applying. You can also send a written request to: TOEFL®/TSE® Services P.O. Box 6151 Princeton, NJ USA Don’t Delay—Register Right Away –INTRODUCTION– x Why the TOEFL Exam? Why Me? Proficiency in English is essential if you are to follow class discussions and complete the reading and writing assignments in most college classes. In many courses, you may also be required to deliver oral presentations. And if you are applying to a graduate program, you may be given a position as a teaching assistant, which means you will be expected to help undergraduate students with their schoolwork, instruct them, and grade their assignments. In order to ensure that you can succeed even though you are not studying in your native language, and that you will be a competent teaching assistant if you are applying to graduate school, colleges and other institutions require you to take the TOEFL exam. The TOEFL exam is administered by the Educational Testing Service (ETS®), the organization that also administers other standardized tests, including the Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT®) and the Graduate Record Examination (GRE®). Even if you have lived in the United States or another English-speaking country for several years, you still may be required to take the TOEFL exam if English is not your native language. Don’t be offended—this may be of benefit to you because some schools will look at your verbal SAT score with kinder eyes if you have done well on the TOEFL exam. Look at the TOEFL exam as an opportunity to learn English better if you don’t know it well, or to brush up on what you already know if you are already pro