2.3 Sentence Forming (Disarranged Sentences) and Word Meaning in Context

2.3 Sentence Forming (Disarranged Sentences) and Word Meaning in Context

Sentence forming is one of the item types Wonderlic names in both its SLE and SLE-Q administrator guides. You get a jumbled set of words and must mentally rebuild the sentence. Then you answer a question about the result. Wonderlic's published sample questions also include a related format: a word in a sentence is highlighted, and you choose its opposite. Both formats reward the same skill of seeing how words fit together quickly. Both also have an easy trap: answering before you have read the exact question.

Wonderlic does not publish the exact wording of every sentence-forming variant. Prep publishers' practice versions usually ask one of these:

• Position questions: "Rearrange the words to make the best sentence. Which word comes just before (or just after) 'door'?"
• True/false questions: "Rearrange the words to make a sentence. Is the sentence true or false?"
• First/last-word questions: "Which word would come first (or last)?"

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Why These Items Are Faster Than They Look

You do not have to write the sentence out. You only need enough of the structure to answer the question. In a position question, you usually need just the two or three words around the target word. In a true/false question, you need the meaning, and word order matters only where it changes the meaning.

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The Chunking Method for Disarranged Sentences

Rebuild the sentence in chunks, not word by word:

1. Find the verb. Every sentence has one: rises, lock, catches, is, freezes. If there are two candidate verbs, one is usually part of a phrase (to go) or a helper (can, will, is).
2. Find the subject. Ask who or what can do that verb. Sun rises. Bird catches. In a command, the subject "you" is unstated and the sentence often begins with the verb or with please.
3. Attach the small words to their nouns. Articles and adjectives stick to the noun they describe: the door, an early bird, the west. These noun chunks rarely change position.
4. Attach prepositional phrases. Prepositions travel with their object: in the west, behind you, at zero degrees.
5. Assemble and read once. Put subject, verb, object, and phrases together. Read the result silently once to confirm it sounds like normal English.
6. Answer the question asked. Recheck the target word and the direction: before or after, first or last.

Worked Example 1: A Position Question

Words: you, lock, behind, please, door, the Which word comes just before "door"?

• Verb: lock. This is a command, so the likely opener is please.
• Noun chunk: the door. Prepositional chunk: behind you.
• Sentence: "Please lock the door behind you."
• The word just before door is the.

Notice that "Lock the door behind you, please" is also acceptable English, and the still comes just before door. Position questions usually target a word inside a stable chunk, so you can often answer from the chunk alone without settling the full order.

Worked Example 2: A True/False Question

Words: not, season, a, summer, is, winter Rearranged, is the sentence true or false?

• Verb chunk: is not. Noun chunks: summer, a winter season.
• Sentence: "Summer is not a winter season." That is true.
• Trap: if you read summer is a winter season and drop the not, you answer "false." Before judging, account for every word in the set, especially not, never, all, no, and only.

Worked Example 3: When Meaning Decides

Words: the, rises, sun, west, the, in

The only natural sentence is "The sun rises in the west." It is grammatical, but it is false, because the sun rises in the east. True/false items test whether you judge what the sentence says, not what you expected it to say.

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Words in Context: Opposites and Meanings Inside a Sentence

Wonderlic's own sample format highlights one word in a sentence and asks for its opposite. In the sample sentence, "She gave a complex answer to the question and we all agreed with her," the opposite of complex is simple. The sentence confirms which sense of the word is meant.

Use the sentence as evidence:

• Identify the sense first. Many words have more than one meaning. Fair can mean just, light-colored, or a festival. The sentence tells you which sense to reverse.
• Say a plain-English meaning, then flip it. Complex means "complicated," so the opposite is "simple." Scan for that idea among the choices.
• Watch the part of speech. The opposite of an adjective is an adjective. If the highlighted word is a verb (expand), look for a verb (shrink), not a noun.

Signal Words That Show Direction

Some items put a blank or an unfamiliar word in a sentence with a clue elsewhere. Linking words tell you whether the clue agrees with the missing idea or contrasts with it:

Example: "Although the first draft was careless, the final report was ___." Although signals contrast with careless, so the blank means careful, as in thorough or meticulous.

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Common Traps

1. Dropping a word. Every word in the jumble must be used. A leftover not reverses a true/false answer.
2. Answering "before" when asked "after." Circle or repeat the direction word to yourself before choosing.
3. Over-building. Stop rebuilding as soon as you can answer. If the target is inside a stable chunk, answer from the chunk.
4. Judging familiarity instead of truth. A sentence that sounds like a saying can still be false once rebuilt, like the sun rises in the west.
5. Flipping the wrong sense. In opposite items, reverse the meaning the sentence uses, not the word's most common meaning.