analyzing and interpreting literature

[halegn]

ive been studying for this exam through instacert and the study book from clep. however the questions on instacert seem much easier then the ones in the clp book. is there anyone who has taken this exam an can say whether instacert helped them or not? thanks

[AngelaP]

I used Instacert, the REA book and Peterson's to study for this test. I also browsed the exam specific section. I can't state specifically if Instacert helped, but it certainly didn't hurt.

[OfficerA]

Can't speak for InstaCert, but I can offer the following:

The exam is broken down into two parts, the first one prose (I believe) and the second poetry. In either case you'll usually be reading a passage and will either have to interpret a specific word/phrase, or possibly the whole passage (including answering questions about what the passage is).

I used the REA book exclusively for this (as I tested on this before I heard of this site) and scored 69/80 on my very first CLEP test. I haven't taken an English class in years prior to taking it, as well as English being my second language.

Key would be to be able to read fast and to be able to reason out why this or that section is interpreted a certain way (hence the name of the exam). I don't recall if it got deep into the mechanics of writing, as I definitely don't remember anything from what I studied of poetry, but just a lot of reading throughout the exam.

Each passage usually has several questions to it, so skip ahead to see if you need to read the whole thing, or can just pick out parts. Another common feedback I've seen is that the study materials tend to be harder than the actual exam, but I like to think that's a bonus to being able to read and interpret well.