The GED, or general education development test, is divided into five sections. Writing, reading, math, science, and social studies are the five subjects covered on the GED exam. People in the United States and Canada who have not yet received a high school diploma are eligible to take the GED test.
The GED test’s writing section is divided into two sections. The first part usually consists of a series of multiple-choice questions. The test taker will be asked to correct or revise informational documents in order to improve their grammar. This section of the exam assesses the student’s ability to recognize sentence fragments, as well as their ability to use proper subject and verb agreement and punctuation. The test taker will be required to write an essay during the second part of the writing section.
The GED test’s reading section assesses a student’s ability to comprehend and analyze texts. It is made up of multiple choice questions that are based on the reading prompt. Three-quarters of the reading questions are based on a prompt, which could be a play, a piece of literature, or a poem. A quarter of the questions require the student to respond to a critical or nonfiction review.
The third section of the test assesses a person’s social studies knowledge. There are also multiple choice questions in it. Depending on the student’s country, one-quarter of the questions in the social studies section may be about US or Canadian history. Another 25% of the questions are about government, with 15% of the questions being about world history. The rest of the social studies section is made up of geography and economics questions.
The remaining sections of the GED exam are math and science. Multiple-choice questions are included in the science section. The majority of the science questions are from the life sciences, such as biology. About 20% of the questions focus on Earth and space science, while 35% of the questions test a student’s physics and chemistry knowledge.
For one half of the math questions, students may use a calculator, but not for the other half. The GED math test has a majority of multiple-choice questions, but some also require the test taker to plot points on a grid. Statistics, geometry, and alegbra are among the topics covered in the math section of the exam. During the exam, students are given a formula sheet to refer to.