ACET English Review: Grammar, Vocabulary, Usage
ACET English Review: Grammar, Vocabulary, Usage
The Ateneo College Entrance Test English sub-test tests language proficiency at SHS academic level. Items focus on grammar, vocabulary, sentence completion, and language usage.
This post is the topic-by-topic plan that the ACET 2026 pillar guide hands off to.
What ACET asks
| Item type | Approx. share |
|---|---|
| Grammar (correctness, usage) | 30% |
| Vocabulary (synonyms, antonyms, contextual) | 25% |
| Sentence completion | 20% |
| Sentence improvement | 15% |
| Spelling and idiomatic usage | 10% |
Grammar
Drill list:
- Subject-verb agreement
- Pronoun reference and pronoun-antecedent agreement
- Tense consistency
- Active vs passive voice
- Misplaced and dangling modifiers
- Comma splice and run-on sentences
- Word choice (affect/effect, fewer/less, etc.)
- Apostrophe usage
- Parallel structure
- Subjunctive mood basics
ACET grammar items often present a sentence with multiple potential errors and ask which is correctly formed.
Vocabulary
ACET vocabulary tests at solid academic English level. Most efficient daily habit:
- One English editorial per day from major Philippine paper
- 12 weeks of this builds vocabulary recognition
Supplemental: most common 200 academic English words.
Sentence completion
Strategy:
- Read entire sentence first
- Identify context clues (transition words: however, because, although)
- Predict what type of word fits before looking at options
Sentence improvement
Format: a sentence with the underlined portion to revise; pick the best alternative.
Strategy: identify the specific issue (parallelism, dangling modifier, tense shift) and pick the cleanest revision.
Spelling + idiomatic
- Common misspellings in PHL English
- Distinguish similar words
- Idiomatic prepositions ("interested in," "agree with")
A 3-week ACET English drilling plan
| Week | Focus | Volume target |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Grammar drilling: agreement, modifiers, parallelism | 80 items |
| 2 | Vocabulary + sentence completion | 60 items |
| 3 | Sentence improvement + spelling + mock | 1 mock + 40 items |
Throughout: daily English editorial reading.
Realistic English scores
| Diagnostic baseline | Realistic test-day score |
|---|---|
| 55% | 75% |
| 65% | 82% |
| 75% | 87% |
Where Super Tutor fits
Super Tutor's ACET track covers English with item drilling. Free tier opens grammar; the Focused plan (₱49/week, ₱249/month, ₱1,999/year) opens vocabulary + sentence improvement + mocks.
What to read next
The ACET 2026 pillar guide covers the full review. The ACET RC review covers reading comprehension specifically.
Start your ACET review
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