English Comp w/out Essay help

[mklgry]

So my school requires I take English Comp w/out essay. I am hoping someone could help me with what to expect on the test.
I have done the IC falshcards but before finding IC I purchased another study guide for this test. The problem I have is there are stark differences between the questions. I would say that 50% of the questions in the other study guide are more literature based. For example they ask provide quotes and you have to know who wrote it and there are questions regarding different critics of the eras of literature and questions regarding the philosophy those critics approached literature with, etc...
I am strong in sentence structure, paragraph structure, essay structure, etc... type thing but am definitely weak when it comes to literature.
Basically my question is, are the IC flashcards are good indication of what I can expect or are they totally off base and I need to focus more on literature type stuff?

[retake]

It sounds like your study guide is for the English Lit CLEP, which is a completely different test than the English Comp CLEP.

I'm currently studying for the English Comp w/ essay. I ordered a few books that should arrive next week. I believe that the "Basic Grammar Multiple Choice" flashcards under the English Comp section on IC are relevant to the test. However, the questions are more similar to those found on the Peterson's practice tests.

The exam w/o essay may be more closely related to sentence correction (fill in the blank).

[flutefreak]

I have taken both the Eng. Comp w/ and w/out essay, so I can offer what I know.
The only difference between the 2 is, the essay, no suprise. The multiple choice sections cover the same type of questions.
Here's types of questions:
- Grammar correction
- Sentence correction
- "Choose the best-wording" questions
- Reading comprehension: There will be sections of various types of
writing and you will be asked questions
on the section's theme, meaning, better
ways to arrange it, etc.
The only lit. would be in the reading comprhension, and you don't need to know authors or what piece it's from.
You must be thinking of Eng. Lit.

[retake]

I have taken both the Eng. Comp w/ and w/out essay, so I can offer what I know.
The only difference between the 2 is, the essay, no suprise. The multiple choice sections cover the same type of questions.
Here's types of questions:
- Grammar correction
- Sentence correction
- "Choose the best-wording" questions
- Reading comprehension: There will be sections of various types of
writing and you will be asked questions
on the section's theme, meaning, better
ways to arrange it, etc.
The only lit. would be in the reading comprhension, and you don't need to know authors or what piece it's from.
You must be thinking of Eng. Lit.

How many questions are on this exam? What's the time-limit?

[Levi]

That's kind of a bummer that your school requires the test w/out the essay, because that test is generally known to be the harder of the two. If there is any chance you could take English Comp w/ Essay, that might be the better choice. Otherwise, I'm sure you'll do fine with the right study materials.

[mklgry]

Thanks for the helpful responses. It seemed to me that the other study guide was more of a literature one, but it has the sentence structure, word usage type stuff as well which is what confused me. It is about 50-50 in "comp and lit" practice questions.
I have just never been a good one at reading a poem and dissecting and deciphering what an author is "really saying in line 5". It scared me a bit when I saw this in that other comp study guide.

On another note I will say this to anyone who went through the IC eng comp flashcards you need to check out the Peterson's site. Perhaps it is just me but I had zero problems going through the IC one's while Peterson's practice test are definitely giving me a harder time.

Retake points out in an earlier post above that the questions on the real test more resemble the ones on the Peterson test. They are not quite as simple IMO as the IC ones.

Thanks again everyone, I am definitely not stressing now as much.