SAT Reading Comprehension: Main Idea Questions

As we've seen, main idea questions require you to identify the most general summary of the ideas in a non-fiction reading passage. To identify the main idea:

1) Find the most boring thing or most boring person who is repeated the most throughout the entire SAT reading passage.
2) Find the most boring thing or most boring person who is repeated the second-most throughout the SAT reading passage.
3) Hang on to these two words and use them to eliminate incorrect choices and identify the correct answer in main idea questions.

WHAT DO MAIN IDEA QUESTIONS LOOK LIKE?

1) The main idea of the passage is that (Yeah, I know, stick with it.)
2) The author's main idea in the passage is that
3) The main point of the passage, according to the author is that
4) The author's main point in the passage is that
5) The passage primarily states that
6) Both passages state that
7) The passage expresses the view that

TIPS FOR MAIN IDEA QUESTIONS

TIP 1
Main Idea questions depend on finding the right nouns (people, places, or things). Do not pick adjectives or verbs as your main idea because they don't contain ideas as nouns do.

TIP 2
Pick two nouns as your main ideas. One noun will not provide enough information, while more than two nouns gets too specific to accurately capture the main idea.

TIP 3
For each answer choice in a main idea question, determine whether it applies to the entire passage. Most commonly, wrong answer choices apply only to a portion, or one paragraph, of the reading passage.

SAT Reading: Line Questions

Lesson Includes:

—Overview of Main Idea Question

—What do Main Idea Questions Look Like?

—Tips for Main Idea Questions

SAT Math

SAT Writing

SAT Reading

SAT Vocabulary