The Exact Kind: Size, Certainty, Cause, Objection, Scope

Before You Start

This is the chapter where reaching costs the most. Check you are ready to be told that, repeatedly.

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You should be able to say yes to these

Six Kinds of Small

The Band 8 descriptor asks you to convey precise meanings. This is what that phrase actually means — and what it does not.

Six sentences, all correct

The fee was small.
The traces were small.
The gesture was small.
The evidence was small.
The inspection was small.
The difference was small.

Nothing is wrong with any of them. And small has done something slightly dishonest in all six: it has reported that a thing was little, while quietly declining to say in what way.

A fee can be small because it is a formality. Traces can be small because they are physically tiny. A gesture can be small because nobody meant it seriously. Evidence can be small because there is not enough of it. An inspection can be small because whoever did it could not be bothered.

English has a separate word for each of those, and this chapter is five sprints of that.

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Chapter Diagnostic

Five questions, one per sprint. In three of them the ordinary word is correct — and that is the chapter's argument in miniature.

Five questions, one per sprint. This is a baseline, not an exam.

Read each stem for what it actually establishes. In three of the five, nothing establishes a particular dimension, and the plain word is therefore the precise one.

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A museum charges £2 for entry. The paragraph says only that, and nothing about why the figure is low. Which word?

Before You Start

Six Kinds of Small

Six sentences, all correct

Chapter Diagnostic

Six Kinds Of Small

Degrees Of Certainty Beyond Hedging

Degrees Of Causation

Degrees Of Objection

Degrees Of Scope

Review: Which Kind, And When There Isn't One

Before You Start

Six Kinds of Small

Six sentences, all correct

Chapter Diagnostic