CAT and MBA Entrance Preparation Module 2 – Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension (VARC)
Vocabulary in context for MBA tests
Read a word's meaning from its sentence, predict a blank's charge from words like although and moreover, and solve analogies by stating the relation.
What you will learn
- Infer a word's meaning from its sentence before looking at the options
- Predict a blank's charge from the contrast or continuation word beside it
- Solve analogies by stating the relation as a sentence
- Complete sentences and cloze passages from logic and tone
Before you start
What you’ll learn · Before you start
What you will learn
- Infer a word's meaning from its sentence before looking at the options
- Predict a blank's charge from the contrast or continuation word beside it
- Solve analogies by stating the relation as a sentence
- Complete sentences and cloze passages from logic and tone
Before you start
On this page
In “The committee’s report was ___, yet its advice was ignored for a decade”, the word yet tells you the blank is positive before you read a single option. NMAT lists Sentence Completion and analogy (test item): An item that gives a pair of words and asks for the pair related in the same way, in the same order, such as SCALPEL : SURGEON and brush : painter. among its Language Skills and XAT’s overview names vocabulary and cloze test: A passage with words left out, each to be filled from options or typed, so that every blank is decided by its sentence and by the passage's line of thought., but neither publishes a word list.
So the dependable skill is reading meaning from context: the charge of a blank, the sense of a word you half know, and the relation in an analogy, stated as a sentence. Each is worked below on original sentences, and a program checks the charge rule on twelve of them.
A blank’s charge comes from its signal word
Before the options, decide the blank’s charge (of a blank): Whether the word a blank needs is positive, negative or neutral, read from the clause you can understand and the signal word that joins it to the blank, before any option.: positive, negative or neutral. Find the clause whose charge you can read, then the word that joins it to the blank. A contrast word flips the charge; a continuation word keeps it. Oxford’s entries say as much: however introduces “a statement that contrasts with something that has just been said”, and moreover “new information that adds to or supports” it (however, moreover). Step through one sentence:
The drawing shows the whole scene; its 6 steps are listed below.
Every step as text
- Cover the options. Read the sentence alone: 'The committee's report was ___, yet its advice was ignored for a decade.' Decide what the blank must carry before you look at a single option.
- Read the clause you can. Advice ignored for a decade is a disappointment, so the clause you can read has a negative charge.
- Read the signal word. Yet turns against what came before it, so the two clauses have opposite charges. The signal, not the topic, carries the logic.
- Predict the blank. The report itself must have been good: a careful report that nobody acted on is the surprise that yet announces. The blank is positive.
- Test two options. Meticulous, paying careful attention to every detail, is positive and fits. Slipshod, done without care, is negative, so with yet it makes no sense.
- Swap the signal word. Put 'and so' in place of 'yet' and the charge flips: 'The report was slipshod, and so its advice was ignored.' A continuation keeps the known clause's charge.
The program applies the same rule to the lesson’s twelve sentences, each with one clause of known charge:
"""Predict the charge of a blank from one clause you can read and the word that joins it to the blank.
Each of the lesson's twelve sentences has a blank, a clause whose charge is known (+ positive, - negative), and a
signal word. A contrast word gives the blank the opposite charge; a continuation word gives it the same one. The
program finds the signal in the sentence, says which kind it is and prints the predicted charge: a check on the
reasoning, not an answer key. Add a sentence of your own to SENTENCES and run it again.
"""
import re
CONTRAST = ["although", "though", "yet", "but", "however", "despite", "while", "rather than", "whereas"]
CONTINUATION = ["moreover", "indeed", "and therefore", "therefore", "and so", "so", "because", "and"]
# (sentence, the charge of the clause you can read)
SENTENCES = [
("The committee's report was ___, yet its advice was ignored for a decade.", "-"),
("Although the new bridge looked ___, it carried twice the traffic of the old one.", "+"),
("The speech was ___; moreover, it ran an hour over its time.", "-"),
("Her account was ___, and every listener could follow it.", "+"),
("The plan seemed ___, but it fell apart in the first week.", "-"),
("The stall's prices were ___, so the queue reached the end of the street.", "+"),
("Despite his ___ manner, the clerk solved our problem in minutes.", "+"),
("The evidence was ___; indeed, the court threw the case out.", "-"),
("While the first chapter is ___, the rest of the book drags.", "-"),
("The forecast was ___, and therefore the match went ahead as planned.", "+"),
("The minister's reply was ___ rather than evasive.", "-"),
("The repairs were ___, because the roof leaked again within a month.", "-"),
]
def signal_of(sentence):
"""The first contrast or continuation word of the sentence, longest phrases first."""
text = sentence.lower()
found = []
for kind, words in (("contrast", CONTRAST), ("continuation", CONTINUATION)):
for w in words:
m = re.search(rf"\b{re.escape(w)}\b", text)
if m:
found.append((m.start(), -len(w), w, kind))
start, _, word, kind = min(found)
return word, kind
flip = {"+": "-", "-": "+"}
flips = 0
print(f"{'#':>2} {'signal':<14}{'kind':<14}{'known':>6}{'blank':>7}")
for n, (sentence, known) in enumerate(SENTENCES, 1):
word, kind = signal_of(sentence)
blank = flip[known] if kind == "contrast" else known
flips += kind == "contrast"
print(f"{n:>2} {word:<14}{kind:<14}{known:>6}{blank:>7}")
print()
print(f"{flips} of {len(SENTENCES)} blanks take the opposite charge of the clause you can read; "
f"{len(SENTENCES) - flips} take the same charge.")Output
# signal kind known blank 1 yet contrast - + 2 although contrast + - 3 moreover continuation - - 4 and continuation + + 5 but contrast - + 6 so continuation + + 7 despite contrast + - 8 indeed continuation - - 9 while contrast - + 10 and therefore continuation + + 11 rather than contrast - + 12 because continuation - - 6 of 12 blanks take the opposite charge of the clause you can read; 6 take the same charge.
Recorded with Python 3.14.8 on macOS 26 arm64. To run it yourself: mise exec python@3.14.8 -- python3 charge.py
Runs on this device, in your browser. The first run downloads Python (about 13.5 MB), which is kept for the next runs.
Your run, in this browser
Six blanks flip at a contrast word, yet, although, but, despite, while or rather than, and six keep the
charge of a continuation, moreover, and, so, indeed, and therefore or because. Add a sentence of your own
to SENTENCES, with the charge of its known clause, and run it again.
Taking the charge from the topic
A sentence about a flood can need a positive word, and one about a prize a negative one. Read the clause you can and its signal word, never the subject matter, before you predict the blank.
Checkpoint
Check: A blank's charge from its signal word
A word you half know is defined by its sentence
The sentence around a word you half know usually defines it, and four clues do most of the work:
| Clue | Its signal | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Restatement | a colon, a dash, “that is” | “His reply was laconic: two words, then silence.” |
| Example | “such as”, “for instance” | “Ephemeral goods, such as festival posters, are thrown away within days.” |
| Contrast | “unlike”, “rather than” | “Unlike her slipshod first draft, the final report was meticulous.” |
| Cause and result | “because”, “so … that” | “The argument was so cogent that even its critics changed their votes.” |
Predict a meaning in your own words before you read the options, then choose the option nearest the prediction. A root can check the guess but never replace the sentence: candid comes from Latin candidus, white, and means honest. The aptitude lesson on roots covers them.
Not affiliated
MySmartCoPilot is not affiliated with GMAC or XLRI. NMAT and XAT are described from their own published pages, and the sentences and items here are this track’s own.
Checkpoint
Check: Meaning from the sentence
Analogies: say the relation as a sentence
An analogy gives a pair and asks for the pair related in the same way. Write the relation as a sentence that uses both words, then put each option into the same sentence. For SCALPEL : SURGEON the sentence is “a scalpel is the tool a surgeon works with”:
| Option | In the same sentence | Fits? |
|---|---|---|
| brush : painter | a brush is the tool a painter works with | Yes |
| hospital : patient | a hospital is the tool a patient works with | No |
| knife : butter | a knife is the tool butter works with | No, butter is what a knife works on |
| stethoscope : heart | a stethoscope is the tool a heart works with | No, it examines the heart |
If two options fit, the sentence is too loose: make it say more, as “the main tool of the worker’s own craft” would, and test again. A handful of relations are worth knowing by name: a kind of, a part of, the tool of, the opposite of, a stronger degree of, or what something lacks.
Key idea
Put the first pair’s relation into a sentence that uses both words, and keep the option that fits the same sentence in the same direction.
Checkpoint
Check: An analogy's relation as a sentence
Practise: charge, context and relations
The practice set mixes all three skills in ten questions and puts the one you are weakest at first.
Practice that adapts to you
Practise this lesson
10 questions about 5 ideas of this lesson. Each answer is explained at once, and what you get right is kept in this browser.
Fifteen completion, analogy and cloze items, fully worked Pro: opens with a Pro, Premium or Ultimate pass
Six sentence completions, five analogies and a cloze passage of four blanks, all original. Each is worked the same way: the charge or the relation first, then every option tested against it.
In this part:
- Six sentence completions, the charge first
- Five analogies, the relation as a sentence
- A cloze passage of four blanks, read for logic and tone
about 5 minutes
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Twenty words, with their roots and a sentence each Pro: opens with a Pro, Premium or Ultimate pass
Twenty harder words, seventeen of them from this lesson’s items, with the meaning, the origin and the charge each takes. Meanings and origins are summarised from the words’ entries in the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary.
In this part:
- Twenty words, their origins and their charge
- Each word in a sentence that defines it
1 runnable example (Python) · about 3 minutes
Opening this part with your pass…Pro part. It opens with the same pass as the part above.
Interview questions
-
Fresher to mid
In a sentence completion, three options are words you know and can rule out, and the fourth is a word you have never seen. Do you choose the unknown word, and how do you check it before you do?
-
Fresher to mid
In an analogy, two answer pairs both fit your relation sentence. How do you sharpen the sentence, and what does the tie tell you about how you stated it?
-
Fresher to mid
In a cloze passage, the charge you predicted from "although" clashes with the tone of the whole passage. Which do you follow, and why?
Flashcards · 7 cards
Recall it, then check
Say the answer to yourself before you look: recalling it is what makes it stick.
-
How do you predict the charge of a blank before reading the options?
Read the clause whose charge you can tell and the signal word joining it to the blank: a contrast word (yet, although, but) flips the charge, and a continuation word (moreover, and, so) keeps it.
-
In "The committee's report was ___, yet its advice was ignored for a decade", what charge does the blank take?
Positive. Being ignored for a decade is negative, and "yet" flips that, so the report itself was good.
-
Why not take a blank's charge from the sentence's topic?
A sentence about a flood can need a positive word and one about a prize a negative one. The known clause and its signal word decide, never the subject matter.
-
Which four clues let a sentence define a word you half know?
Restatement (a colon, a dash, "that is"), example ("such as"), contrast ("unlike", "rather than") and cause and result ("because", "so … that"). Predict the meaning before reading the options.
-
Can a word's root replace the sentence as evidence of its meaning?
No, it can only check a guess: "candid" comes from Latin "candidus", white, yet means honest. The sentence decides.
-
How do you solve an analogy such as SCALPEL : SURGEON?
Say the relation as a sentence using both words, "a scalpel is the tool a surgeon works with", and put each option into it. Brush : painter fits; knife : butter does not, since butter is what a knife works on.
-
What do you do when two analogy options fit your relation sentence?
Make the sentence say more, such as "the main tool of the worker's own craft", and test the options again, rather than guess between them.
Key takeaways
- Predict a blank’s charge from the clause you can read and its signal word: a contrast word flips it, a continuation keeps it.
- A word you half know is usually defined by its sentence, through a restatement, an example, a contrast or a cause.
- In an analogy, state the relation as a sentence using both words and test every option in that sentence.
- When two options fit an analogy, make the relation sentence sharper rather than guessing between them.
Terms in this lesson
- analogy (test item)
- An item that gives a pair of words and asks for the pair related in the same way, in the same order, such as SCALPEL : SURGEON and brush : painter.
- charge (of a blank)
- Whether the word a blank needs is positive, negative or neutral, read from the clause you can understand and the signal word that joins it to the blank, before any option.
- cloze test
- A passage with words left out, each to be filled from options or typed, so that every blank is decided by its sentence and by the passage's line of thought.
References
- About the NMAT exam (Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC))
- XAT 2026: a quick overview (XLRI – Xavier School of Management)
- although (conjunction), Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary (Oxford University Press)
- however (adverb), Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary (Oxford University Press)
- moreover (adverb), Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary (Oxford University Press)
- therefore (adverb), Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary (Oxford University Press)
- Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary: the entries, meanings and word origins of the words of this lesson (Oxford University Press)
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