Fill in A Table Questions are Back

Fill in A Table Questions are Back Well, Ive had enough reports from students to confirm that fill in a table questions are again being used in the reading section of the TOEFL.This is interesting because before the TOEFL changed in August of this year they had mostly disappeared.It is important to note that when a fill in a table question is used with a reading passage, that passage will only have nine questions in total. This means that ETSs statement that each reading passage has ten questions is not exactly correct.There are a few things to note:You will not get both a prose summary question and a fill in a table question with the same passage.The prose summary question is still more common that the fill in a table question.You can earn from zero to three points from the fill in a table question.Regarding scoring, heres what the Official Guide to the TOEFL says:You can earn up to a total of 3 points, depending on how many correct answers you select and correctly place. For zero, one, or two correct answers you wil l receive no points. For three correct answers you will receive 1 point; for four correct answers you will receive 2 points; and for all five correct answers you will receive the entire 3 points.Overall, I think this is a positive development. The fill in a table question is challenging, but it is a bit more reasonable that the other question types which sometimes seem intentionally obtuse.