Sentence Improvement
🔒 Log in to trackPrecision fixes: articles, prepositions, pronouns, word choice
🔒 Log in to trackSome highlights contain no verb at all — the fault is a wrong small word or a wrong word pair.
Articles: sound decides a/an (an hour, a university, an MLA); specificity decides the (the same, the most intelligent, the Ganga). Improvement items usually highlight the article-plus-noun together: She is a honest woman → an honest woman.
Prepositions: recall the governor's fixed partner — insist on, apologize to... for, angry with (person), good at, married to, prefer to, depend on, consist of. The wrong partner is planted; the right partner is the answer.
Pronoun case: after prepositions → object form (between you and me); as reflexive only when the subject and object are the same person (She cooked herself lunch) — myself cannot replace me/I in ordinary sentences, a favourite decoy.
Word choice and redundancy:
- redundant pairs die: return back → return, repeat again → repeat, revert back → revert.
- confusables flip meaning: few/a few, little/a little, much/many, fewer/less — the improvement item asks which one the sentence's logic needs ('There is a little water left' = some, positive).
- elder (family, no than) vs older than; farther (distance) vs further (additional).
One-word economy: between two correct options, the standard written form wins — because over due to the fact that, although over despite of the fact that ('despite of' is itself wrong: despite or in spite of).
Detailed notes
Small words, big marks
Many bold parts contain no verb at all — the fault is an article, a preposition, a doubled word, or a swapped twin. The options then differ by one or two small words, and speed comes from knowing the fixed pairs cold.
Article: sound rule
- Vowel SOUND → an: an hour, an honest man, an MLA, an X-ray.
- Consonant sound → a: a university, a European, a one-day match.
- A ancient route → an ancient route (the a/an swap is the entire question).
Preposition partners (frozen pairs)
- approve of, insist on, fond of, afraid of, capable of
- agree with (person) / to (proposal), angry with (person) / at (thing)
- apply to (office) / for (post), abide by, comply with When the bold part is only the preposition, recall the partner and choose it — meaning will tempt you toward the wrong one.
Redundancy: cut the echo
revert back → revert; return back → return; repeat again → repeat; wrote back a reply → wrote a reply; final conclusion → conclusion. One idea, one word. In improvement items the fix is a subtraction — the correct option is simply shorter.
Swapped twins
| Wrong twin | Right twin | Why |
|---|---|---|
| advise (noun slot) | advice | advice = noun, advise = verb |
| effect (verb slot) | affect | affect = verb, effect = noun |
| loose (misplace) | lose | loose = not tight |
| principal (rule of conduct) | principle | principle = a rule |
More pairs to keep ready
- win / beat: India beat Australia (beat takes the opponent); India won the match (win takes the prize).
- say / tell: she said that…; she told me that… (tell needs a person).
- hear / listen: hear is accidental; listen to is deliberate — listen to the news.
- die of / die from: die of a disease, die from an injury.
- comprise: the team comprises eleven players (no of); is comprised of in formal prose.
- cope with, deal with, but cope up with is wrong — a favourite Indian-English decoy.
Pronoun case after prepositions
Between you and me (not I); for him and me. The reflexive (myself) cannot replace the object pronoun — it is the standard decoy.
Method
- Name the small word's job (article? preposition? adverb of the pair?).
- Recall the rule or pair.
- Prefer the option that changes only the faulty word. If the bold part is already standard, choose No substitution required.
Quick revision
- an hour, an MLA — a university, a European: sound, not spelling.
- approve of, insist on, fond of, agree with a person / to a plan.
- revert back, return back, repeat again → cut the echo.
- advice (n) / advise (v); affect (v) / effect (n); lose / loose.
- between you and me; myself never replaces me.
Types of questions asked
Every way this subtopic shows up in exams — how to recognise it, the formula or logic to use, and a solved example.
Type 1: Preposition-partner repairvery common2 practice Q
The bold part is (or contains) the preposition after a verb or adjective, and the options are preposition swaps.
- Find the verb/adjective the preposition hangs on (approve, insist, fond).
- Recall its fixed partner: approve OF, insist ON, fond OF.
- Ignore options that change the rest of the phrase — only the partner needs repair.
Why it works: preposition questions are memory questions; the partner is not chosen by logic but by usage.
Example: "The committee does not approve (for) the proposal." of / No substitution required / with / to
The fixed pair is approve of → 'does not approve of the proposal'. The other prepositions belong to different verbs.
Type 2: Article sound repaircommon2 practice Q
The bold part is an article + word where the article contradicts the word's first sound (a honest, an useful, a MLA).
- Say the word after the article aloud.
- Vowel sound → an; consonant sound → a.
- Ignore the spelling — hour and university are the classic traps.
Why it works: the rule follows speech, and exam words are picked so the letter and the sound disagree.
Example: "The temple was built near (a ancient) trading route." an ancient / No substitution required / a ancients / the ancients
Ancient begins with a vowel sound → an ancient trading route. Only the article needs repair — the smallest change wins.
Type 3: Redundancy cutvery common2 practice Q
The bold part carries an echo — return back, revert back, repeat again, wrote back a reply — and the correct option is simply shorter.
- Ask: does one word already contain the other's meaning?
- The repair is a subtraction: keep the single strong word.
- Reject options that keep the echo or alter the tense while 'fixing' it.
Why it works: the echo feels natural in speech, so the eye skips it; the shorter option only looks too plain.
Example: "Please (revert back) to my mail by Friday." revert to / No substitution required / revert back to / reversing to
Revert already means 'come back' (in exam usage, reply) → revert to my mail. 'Back' is the echo; cut it and keep to.
Type 4: Swapped-twin repaircommon2 practice Q
The bold word is the wrong member of a twin pair: advice/advise, effect/affect, lose/loose, principal/principle.
- Decide the slot's job: noun or verb?
- Map the job to the twin: advice (n) / advise (v); affect (v) / effect (n).
- Reject options that change the form further (advising, effecting) — the twin alone repairs the sentence.
Why it works: both twins are real words, so nothing looks misspelt; only the part-of-speech test convicts the wrong one.
Example: "The doctor's (advise) was to rest for a week." advice / No substitution required / advises / advising
The slot is a noun (the subject of 'was') → the doctor's advice. Advise is the verb; advising changes the structure.
Shortcut tricks
⚡ Small-word sweep
Read ONLY the small words in the highlight (a/an/the, in/on/at, I/me/myself). A wrong one usually stands alone in its wrongness — fix it and finish.
Example: She is a honest woman. Options: an honest / the honest / honest / No substitution required.
Vowel sound 'o' in honest → an honest woman. 'Honest' alone would leave 'She is honest woman' — ungrammatical.
⚡ myself firewall
Reflexives never replace plain object pronouns. Any option offering myself where me belongs is a decoy — kill it on sight.
⚡ Redundancy flinch
Train on the fatal pairs: return back, repeat again, revert back, final conclusion. When one appears highlighted, the shorter option is the key.
Where students lose marks
Choosing 'the' before a superlative-less unique noun or dropping it where it belongs.
Picking 'myself' as a polite-sounding substitute for 'me'.
Correcting few to a few (or back) without reading whether the sentence means 'some' or 'hardly any'.
Writing 'despite of' — the standard forms are despite and in spite of.
Practice sets — 12 questions
Sets of 10, mixed across the question types above. Each answer comes with a step-by-step explanation.
Topic test · 12 questions
Suggested time 6 min · wrong answers go to your mistake notebook automatically.