About This Chapter
THEA Test: Understanding Words & Phrases - Chapter Summary
This comprehensive overview of words and phrases is designed to increase your understanding and strengthen your chances of success on the THEA test. Watch the lessons in this chapter to ensure you're ready to:
- Use context to determine the meaning of words
- Understand words by their relationships
- Determine and find the meaning of words using structural analysis, affixes and roots
- Know how to construct meaning with context clues, prior knowledge and word structure
- Define connotation, denotation, idiom, simile and metaphor
- Interpret figurative language in fiction
- Identify types of irony and define allusion and illusion
The lessons can be tailored to your studying needs. You can take an in-depth look at words and phrases if you haven't studied in awhile, or skip to specific topics using timelines if you only need a quick review of this subject area.
THEA Test: Understanding Words & Phrases Chapter Objectives
A primary objective of this chapter is to ensure you understand words and phrases, which is a subject area explored in the reading section of the Texas Higher Education Assessment (THEA) Internet-Based Test (IBT). This section, one of three total sections, consists of 40 multiple-choice questions and requires a score of at least 230 to pass.
To increase your chances of passing and showing you're ready to excel as an entering freshman at your Texas public college or university of choice, utilize chapter resources like self-assessment quizzes and practice exams. They can help you reinforce topics covered in the lessons and give you access to the kinds of questions you'll see on the exam.
1. How to Use Context to Determine the Meaning of Words
With diligence and intrepid ingenuity, you can use context to ascertain the purport of a word. In other words, in this lesson, we'll find out how to use context to figure out what words mean.
2. Understanding Words By Their Relationships
Many words in the English language have multiple meanings. To really understand a word, we have to understand the relationship between particular words. In this lesson, we will examine this through connotations, denotations, synonyms, and analogies.
3. Using Structural Analysis to Determine the Meaning of Words
Discover the importance of using structural analysis to understand unfamiliar words. In this lesson, we'll discuss how to divide unknown words into known pieces to comprehend their overall meanings.
4. Using Affixes and Roots to Find the Meaning of Words
In this lesson, we will learn how to understand the meaning of words by breaking them down into the parts that form them. This requires knowledge of the Greek and Latin roots, and affixes, which are parts we add to roots to make new words.
5. Constructing Meaning with Context Clues, Prior Knowledge & Word Structure
In this lesson, you will learn how readers use prior knowledge, context clues and word structure to aid their understanding of what they read. Explore these strategies through examples from literature and everyday life.
6. What Are Connotation and Denotation? - Definitions & Examples
Discover the difference between a word's denotation and its connotation in this lesson. Explore how authors use both denotation and connotation to add layers of meaning to their work with some literary examples.
7. What is an Idiom? - Definition & Examples
Break a leg! It takes two to tango. In this lesson, we'll learn all about idioms, those colorful figures of speech that play with language and take on a meaning of their own.
8. Interpreting Figurative Language in Fiction
In this lesson, we will discuss how to interpret figurative language in fiction. We will explore several types of figurative language and learn how to identify them.
9. Similes in Literature: Definition and Examples
Explore the simile and how, through comparison, it is used as a shorthand to say many things at once. Learn the difference between similes and metaphors, along with many examples of both.
10. What is a Metaphor? - Examples, Definition & Types
Metaphors are all around you. They're the bright sparkling lights that turn plain evergreens into Christmas trees. Learn how to spot them, why writers write with them, and how to use them yourself right here.
11. Types of Irony: Examples & Definitions
Discover, once and for all, what irony is and is not. Explore three types of irony: verbal, situational and dramatic, and learn about some famous and everyday examples.
12. Allusion and Illusion: Definitions and Examples
Allusions and illusions have little in common besides the fact that they sound similar. Learn the difference between the two and how allusions are an important part of literature and writing - and how to spot them in text.
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Other chapters within the THEA Test: Practice & Study Guide course
- THEA Test: Analyzing Literature
- THEA Test: Reading Comprehension & Interpretation
- THEA Test: Point of View & Meaning in Literature
- THEA Test: Drawing Conclusions from Ideas in Text
- THEA Test: Using Critical Thinking to Evaluate Writing
- THEA Test: Understanding Reading Assignments
- THEA Test: Writing Style
- THEA Test: Writing Organization
- THEA Test: Writing Grammar & Mechanics
- THEA Test: Using Verbs
- THEA Test: Using Modifiers
- THEA Test: Using Nouns & Pronouns
- THEA Test: Proofreading & Editing Your Writing
- THEA Test: Fundamental Arithmetic
- THEA Test: Simplifying Whole Number Expressions
- THEA Test: Negative Numbers
- THEA Test: Absolute Value
- THEA Test: Properties of Basic Math
- THEA Test: Solving Word Problems
- THEA Test: Fractions
- THEA Test: Decimals & Percentages
- THEA Test: Ratios & Proportions
- THEA Test: Units of Measurement
- THEA Test: Scientific Notation
- THEA Test: Radicals & Square Roots
- THEA Test: Radical Expressions
- THEA Test: Exponents
- THEA Test: Calculating & Plotting Data
- THEA Test: Solving Rational Equations
- THEA Test: Graphing Linear Equations
- THEA Test: Principles of Algebra
- THEA Test: Algebraic Expressions & Equations
- THEA Test: Word Problems in Algebra
- THEA Test: Properties of Functions
- THEA Test: Quadratic Equations
- THEA Test: Two-Variable Equations & Systems of Equations
- THEA Test: Properties of Polynomial Functions
- THEA Test: Properties & Theorems of Geometry
- THEA Test: Principles of Geometry
- THEA Test: Area, Perimeter & Volume in Geometry
- THEA Test: Problem Solving in Math