{"id":2996,"date":"2016-03-23T09:00:09","date_gmt":"2016-03-23T16:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/?p=2996"},"modified":"2020-12-10T13:43:52","modified_gmt":"2020-12-10T21:43:52","slug":"paraphrasing-practice-for-the-toefl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/paraphrasing-practice-for-the-toefl\/","title":{"rendered":"Paraphrasing Practice for the TOEFL"},"content":{"rendered":"

In TOEFL Speaking and Writing, paraphrasing is very important. Even if a response in these sections is grammatical and easy to understand, it will still receive a very low score if the test-taker copies a lot of the language from the passages or audio tracks.<\/p>\n

\u201cEchoing\u201d words you read or hear, repeating them with minimal changes, is something you can easily do without even realizing it. In less formal, non-academic English use, it can be natural and acceptable to imitate words you\u2019ve just heard or read\u2014but this is definitely not<\/em> OK in the academic English on the TOEFL exam. To avoid this common TOEFL mistake, it\u2019s important to practice paraphrasing during TOEFL prep. And it\u2019s good build mental habits that help you to paraphrase things easily. You want true paraphrasing to come very naturally to you on test day.<\/p>\n

Kate has already written a great post on paraphrasing practice exercises<\/a> you can include in your TOEFL studies. In today\u2019s post, I\u2019ll walk you through another activity that can help get really comfortable with paraphrasing.<\/p>\n

As you look over the activity below, remember that paraphrasing is more than just someone else\u2019s words and saying them differently. In the broadest sense, paraphrasing is about understanding that there are many different ways to say the same thing. In a good paraphrase, you choose a new way of saying something that personally works for you. In this way, you don\u2019t just restate a piece of information\u2014you put it in your preferred<\/em> words, making the information your own.<\/p>\n

Think of paraphrases as learning tool that allows you to understand ideas more fully, in your own thoughts and words. To see how this works, I\u2019m going to show you refer you to some lines from a TOEFL Speaking passage that can be found on the ETS website. After that, I’ll show you several different paraphrases of the same original information. <\/p>\n

The passage is one for Speaking Task 2. Its heading begins with the word “Sculpture Courses…”, and you can find the passage on page 23 of TOEFL Quick Prep Volume 1<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

Do you have that passage open now? Good! <\/p>\n

TOEFL Speaking Task 2 reading passages like this one are ideal for paraphrasing practice. This is because the information in a Task 2 passage needs to be shortened into a very brief summary that you can easily recall and restate when you start speaking. This kind of shortened restatement requires sharp paraphrasing skills. Let\u2019s look at three of my own possible paraphrases of this 85 word article:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

PARAPHRASE 1:<\/strong><\/p>\n

The university will discontinue the sculpture program. Administrators say students simply don\u2019t have much interest in sculpture anymore, and the one sculpture professor in the art department is about to retire anyway.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

PARAPHRASE 2:<\/strong><\/p>\n

University officials have announced that the sculpture program will be cancelled. They cite declining student interest as one of the main reasons for the cancellation. Another issue is a lack of instructors; the only teacher of sculpture courses will be retiring shortly. Finally, the art department doesn\u2019t have enough money for more sculpture classes.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

PARAPHRASE 3:<\/strong><\/p>\n

The school\u2019s sculpture classes are all about to be permanently removed from the art department\u2019s offerings, as students are no longer interested in sculpture, the only sculpture professor is leaving, and there is not enough funding to keep offering these courses.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

PARAPHRASE 4:<\/strong><\/p>\n

The art department at the university is getting more and more students, but at the same time, fewer and fewer students are enrolling in sculpture classes. Because students are no longer interested in sculpture and because the sculpture professor is retiring, school administrators decided to cancel the sculpture program.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The fun thing about human language is that there are almost infinite ways to say anything. I could probably come up with at least ten more paraphrases of the passage, easily. There\u2019s a lot of different directions you can go with a paraphrase! Just remember the two important rules for TOEFL paraphrasing: make the new statement shorter, and try to use as few of the original words as possible.<\/p>\n

As you go through my paraphrases, you may find reasons to criticize the four different approaches I took above. You might feel I left out an important idea, included an unnecessary detail, or made a paraphrase too long or too short. If you can find fault in my re-wording of the passage, good! The example paraphrases above should help you think about how you<\/em> would paraphrase something, if you did the activity yourself.<\/p>\n

On your own, try making multiple paraphrases of text or dialogue from a TOEFL practice material. Do this multiple-paraphrase exercise for other samples English writing and speech too. Think about which of your multiple paraphrases would work best for you if you were sitting for the actual exam. Aim for the paraphrases that are efficiently short and capture your true thoughts on the info you\u2019ve just taken in.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In TOEFL Speaking and Writing, paraphrasing is very important. Even if a response in these sections is grammatical and easy to understand, it will still receive a very low score if the test-taker copies a lot of the language from the passages or audio tracks. \u201cEchoing\u201d words you read or hear, repeating them with minimal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":80,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13602],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[13630],"class_list":["post-2996","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prep"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nParaphrasing Practice for the TOEFL - Magoosh Blog \u2013 TOEFL\u00ae\ufe0f Test<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/paraphrasing-practice-for-the-toefl\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Paraphrasing Practice for the TOEFL\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In TOEFL Speaking and Writing, paraphrasing is very important. 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Additionally, he's helped students with TOEIC, PET, FCE, BULATS, Eiken, SAT, ACT, GRE, and GMAT. David has a BS and MA from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and an MA from the University of Wisconsin-River Falls.","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/MagooshEnglishLearning","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/david-recine\/","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/channel\/UCra3KQoJlOP7RYwaCyH2qew"],"knowsAbout":["TOEFL","IELTS","TOEIC","PET","FCE","BULATS","Eiken","SAT","ACT","GRE","GMAT"],"knowsLanguage":["English","Italian"],"jobTitle":"Content Creator","worksFor":"Magoosh","url":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/author\/davidr\/"}]}},"authors":[{"term_id":13630,"user_id":80,"is_guest":0,"slug":"davidr","display_name":"David Recine","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/b70c17ee6f3ef87dc4cc5dbdebda911d6dd30dfe15845e4b1d459a3e1b33ef98?s=96&d=mm&r=g","user_url":"","last_name":"Recine","first_name":"David","description":"David is a Test Prep Expert for Magoosh TOEFL and IELTS. Additionally, he's helped students with TOEIC, PET, FCE, BULATS, Eiken, SAT, ACT, GRE, and GMAT.\r\n\r\nDavid has a BS from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and an MA from the University of Wisconsin-River Falls. His work at Magoosh has been cited in<a href=\"https:\/\/scholar.google.com\/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C50&q=Recine+magoosh&btnG=\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> many scholarly articles<\/a>,<a href=\"https:\/\/minds.wisconsin.edu\/handle\/1793\/65479\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> his Master's Thesis<\/a> is featured on the<a href=\"https:\/\/www.readingwithpictures.org\/2013\/09\/research-highlight-teaching-english-language-learners-with-comics\/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> Reading with Pictures<\/a> website, and he's presented at the<a href=\"https:\/\/www.witesol.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/2014-WITESOL-Program-FINAL-10-28-14.pdf\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> WITESOL (link to PDF)<\/a> and<a href=\"https:\/\/issuu.com\/interoff\/docs\/nafsaregionv_2014conference\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> NAFSA<\/a> conferences. David has taught K-12 ESL in South Korea as well as undergraduate English and MBA-level business English at American universities. He has also trained English teachers in America, Italy, and Peru.\r\n\r\nCome join David and the Magoosh team on<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/channel\/UCra3KQoJlOP7RYwaCyH2qew\"> Youtube<\/a>,<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/MagooshEnglishLearning\"> Facebook<\/a>, and<a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/magooshenglish\/?hl=en\"> Instagram<\/a>, or connect with him via<a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/david-recine\/\"> LinkedIn<\/a>!"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2996","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/80"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2996"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2996\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2996"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2996"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2996"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=2996"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}