Which best describes how context clues aid word meaning?

• A. They determine the author’s purpose.
• B. They supply hints about word meaning within surrounding text.
• C. They indicate tone of the passage.
• D. They show the frequency of vocabulary usage.

Answer: (B)

Context clues are hints tucked into the surrounding text that help you figure out what an unfamiliar word means. When you encounter a word you don’t know, you look at nearby words and phrases—definitions given in the sentence, restatements, examples, contrasts, or the overall sense of the passage—to infer the intended meaning. This allows you to understand the sentence without stopping to consult a dictionary. For example, if a sentence says, “The meadow was verdant, lush with green plants,” the nearby word lush helps you infer that verdant means green and thriving. The other choices describe things like the author’s purpose, the tone of the passage, or how often a word appears, which aren’t about figuring out a word’s meaning from context.