Anyone having/had trouble with Language section?

lovetosleep · Mar 1, 2012

Taking Teas V on Friday. I'm a 4.0 student and a strong writer but it has been 10 years since I've actually had to identify sentence structure/grammar. I scored a 58% on the practice test for this section! I can't seem to figure out the best way to approach studying for this. I've tried videos online and I took the practice test after I read the Teas book so I don't know what else to do.Have you has trouble with this also? How did you study for this section?

Yes!!! I am having the hardest time with sentence structure for some reason. I wish I could give you some tips, but im stressing about it too. I am taking the TEAS on Saturday March 3rd. I think I am going to get there a hour early and review the English section right before I go in so it is fresh in my mind. I took the TEAS version 4 a couple years back and the English section was nothing like what all these practice tests have been like. It was mostly just finding word meanings, correct tenses, and stuff like that. I remember the last TEAS test was NOTHING like the TEAS study guide I had.

I'm just going to hope that it will like last time. There is not much I can do about it. Im just going to have to do really well on the other sections to make up for it. Good Luck!

willowita, ADN, RN · Mar 3, 2012

I had a hard time with that section too. I studied from the book like my life depended on it and I managed to get it in the end. The biggest mistake I kept making in the practice tests was subject-verb agreement with regards to numbers. When they lump people or sums of money together into a group, they are treated as singular in verb agreement. So a choir is treated as singular. $20,000 is singular. Either he or she is singular. The choir is talented, is the correct subject verb agreement. The choir are talented, is incorrect.

The other section that had me stumped in the ATI practice book was simple vs complex sentence. Simple sentences are complete sentences on their own regardless of length. A complex sentence has more than 1 clause so if the sentence is separated by a comma, read each part before and after the comma by themselves. Can each part stand on its own to be a sentence? Or does it only make sense together? If it doesn't make sense when you look at each clause, it's a complex sentence. Same goes for compound sentences. When clauses are joined with "and", then it's a complex sentence.

Study the prefixes. Some are obvious, others are not. You may be asked to identify the meaning of a prefix.

kandamom · Mar 3, 2012

Taking Teas V on Friday. I'm a 4.0 student and a strong writer but it has been 10 years since I've actually had to identify sentence structure/grammar. I scored a 58% on the practice test for this section! I can't seem to figure out the best way to approach studying for this. I've tried videos online and I took the practice test after I read the Teas book so I don't know what else to do.Have you has trouble with this also? How did you study for this section?

I am a 4.0 student as well and I too struggled with that section! I scored in the upper 70's on every practice test I took because I am a strong speller. However, when I took the actual test I totally tanked the language arts section! I got a 66.7 which barely put me above the national average.

I am a good writer and have scored well in all my English writing classes in high school through college....I think at this point the English language and grammar are intuitive for me. To have to go back and try and remember all the rules and how to apply them in a non intuitive setting is really hard.

runforfun · Mar 5, 2012

I actually had a lot of trouble with this as well. I took the TEAS V in October 2011, and thought it went really well. I knew I was in trouble with the language sections while I was taking the test. I specifically had trouble trying to label the writing styles. I bought a study book from Barnes and Noble that covered multiple tests, and I was not prepared for these kinds of questions. It sounds silly, but if you have kids, siblings, nieces, nephews, etc. around 8-9th grade, they are learning this stuff right now. I would imagine they would be a GREAT help (and you get the satisfaction of sneakily helping them study ).