Every year, thousands of Nigerian students sit for the JAMB Use of English paper, and every year, many of them lose marks to avoidable mistakes. English Language is compulsory for all JAMB candidates regardless of your chosen course, so a poor score here can drag down your entire aggregate. The good news is that most of the mistakes students make follow predictable patterns. Once you understand what these errors are and why they happen, you can train yourself to avoid them and significantly improve your score.
Comprehension Section Mistakes
Let us start with the Comprehension section, which typically carries a substantial portion of the marks. The single biggest mistake students make here is answering questions based on their general knowledge rather than what the passage actually says. JAMB comprehension questions are designed to test your ability to extract information from a given text, not to test what you already know about a topic. For example, if a passage discusses the effects of deforestation and states that deforestation leads to soil erosion, the correct answer must reflect what the passage says, even if you personally know additional effects. Students often choose answers that are factually true but are not supported by the passage. Always go back to the passage and find the specific sentence or paragraph that supports your answer before selecting it.
Another common comprehension error is misunderstanding questions that ask for the tone or mood of a passage. When a question asks about the author's attitude, students frequently confuse words like "critical," "satirical," "nostalgic," and "indifferent." To handle these questions well, pay attention to the choice of words in the passage. If the author uses words with negative connotations, the tone is likely critical or disapproving. If the language is playful and mocking, it may be satirical. Practice identifying tone in different passages so that these distinctions become second nature.
Lexis and Structure Errors
The Lexis and Structure section is where many students lose the most marks, often without realizing it. This section tests your understanding of English grammar, vocabulary, and sentence construction. One of the most frequent mistakes involves subject-verb agreement. For instance, consider the sentence: "The group of students were waiting outside." Many students would choose "were" because "students" is plural, but the correct answer is "was" because the subject is "group," which is singular. Collective nouns and phrases that separate the subject from the verb are classic JAMB traps. Always identify the true subject of the sentence before choosing the verb form.
Tense consistency is another area where students stumble. JAMB often presents sentences where you must choose the correct tense to maintain consistency within a passage or sentence. A common error is mixing past and present tenses. For example, "He walked into the room and sees his friend" is incorrect because the sentence starts in the past tense, so "sees" should be "saw." Pay close attention to time markers and the tense of other verbs in the sentence.
Idiomatic expressions cause significant trouble as well. JAMB loves to test whether you know the correct prepositions that go with certain words and phrases. For example, "comply with" is correct, not "comply to." "Congratulate on" is correct, not "congratulate for." "Preside over" is correct, not "preside at." These are tested repeatedly, and the only reliable way to master them is through consistent reading and deliberate memorization of common collocations. Keep a notebook of idiomatic expressions you encounter during your preparation and review it regularly.
Synonym and Antonym Question Traps
The Nearest in Meaning and Opposite in Meaning questions are deceptively tricky. The mistake most students make is choosing the first option that seems close to the given word without considering the context. JAMB always provides these words within a sentence, and the context matters enormously. Take the word "charged" as an example. In the sentence "The atmosphere was charged with excitement," the nearest meaning might be "filled." But in "He was charged with theft," the nearest meaning would be "accused." Students who ignore context and rely on a single memorized meaning of a word will consistently get these wrong. Always read the full sentence, understand how the word is being used, and then look for the option that can replace it without changing the meaning.
For Opposite in Meaning questions, a common trap is choosing a word that is merely different rather than truly opposite. If the question gives you "generous" and the options include "stingy," "careful," "poor," and "frugal," the correct opposite is "stingy." Some students might choose "poor" thinking that a poor person cannot be generous, but "poor" is not the opposite of "generous" in meaning. Focus on the direct antonym, not on loosely related words.
Oral English Pitfalls
Oral English is the section that many students neglect entirely, and this is a costly mistake. Oral English questions test your knowledge of vowel and consonant sounds, stress patterns, and rhyming words. The most common error is pronouncing words the way they are spelled rather than the way they actually sound. Nigerian English pronunciation often differs from Standard British English, which is what JAMB tests. For example, many students pronounce "receipt" with a "p" sound, but the "p" is silent, making the correct pronunciation "ri-seet." Similarly, "psychology" begins with a silent "p."
Stress pattern questions trip up students who have not practiced them. In English, words change meaning based on which syllable is stressed. The word "present" stressed on the first syllable (PRE-sent) is a noun meaning a gift, while stressed on the second syllable (pre-SENT) it is a verb meaning to show or introduce. JAMB tests your knowledge of primary stress placement, and the only way to prepare is to practice with a list of commonly tested words. Focus on two-syllable and three-syllable words, as these appear most frequently.
For emphatic stress questions, remember that the stressed word in a sentence indicates the new or contrasting information. If the question is "John bought a RED car" with emphasis on "red," the implied meaning is that the car was red, not blue or some other color. Students often overthink these questions. Simply ask yourself: what is being emphasized, and what contrast does that emphasis create?
Literature Section Mistakes
The Literature section, when it appears, tests students on recommended texts. The biggest mistake here is relying on summaries instead of reading the actual texts. JAMB questions often focus on specific details, direct quotes, and minor characters that summaries skip over. If a question asks about a specific event in Chapter 7 of a novel, no summary will save you if you have not read it yourself. Read the recommended texts thoroughly, paying attention to character names, key events, themes, and notable quotes.
Another literature mistake is confusing characters across different texts, especially when you are studying multiple novels and plays simultaneously. Keep separate notes for each text with character lists, plot summaries, and thematic analyses. This organized approach prevents the kind of confusion that leads to wrong answers on exam day.
Time Management and Your Action Plan
Finally, a mistake that cuts across all sections is poor time management. JAMB Use of English typically has many questions to be answered in a limited time. Students often spend too long on comprehension passages and rush through the rest. A better strategy is to quickly scan all sections first, answer the questions you are most confident about, and then return to the harder ones. This ensures you collect all the easy marks before wrestling with difficult questions.
To summarize your action plan: read comprehension passages carefully and answer based only on the text, master subject-verb agreement and tense rules, build your vocabulary of idiomatic expressions and collocations, always consider context for synonym and antonym questions, practice oral English sounds and stress patterns with audio resources, read your literature texts completely, and manage your time wisely during the exam. With deliberate practice in these areas, you can turn JAMB English from a weakness into one of your strongest subjects.