除了詞匯的掌握外，考生們還會碰到這么一種狀況：句子并沒有出現(xiàn)特別難的生詞，甚至是句子中沒有生詞，可是句子的意思依然不太明確。 這樣的句子同樣給考生們帶來了閱讀中的障礙，其實這也是雅思閱讀的另外一個考查點： 句子結構錯綜復雜，長句屢屢皆是。 例：

Original text: Such expansion, which was to take the English language west to America and east to India, was supported by scientific developments such as the discovery of magnetism (and hence the invention of the compass), improvements in cartography and – perhaps the most important scientific revolution of them all— the new theories of astronomy and the movement of the earth in relation to the planets and stars.

Statement: The most important scientific development of the renaissanceperiod was the discovery of magnetism.

這是一個典型的長句， 不僅語法復雜，包含了非限定性定于從句“which was to take the English language west to America and east to India”，而且還運用了復雜的并列結構和插入語。 根據(jù)三原則，“discovery of magnetism” ，“improvements in cartography”  以及“the new theories of astronomy and the movement of the earth in relation to the planets and stars”等三條信息都是對前面的“scientific developments”進行的舉例說明， 而中間“—perhaps the most important scientific revolution of them all—”這樣的一段破折號內的內容僅僅是充當插入語， 來修飾后面的“the new theories of astronomy and the movement of the earth”，這樣整個句子就清楚了。 最重要的科學發(fā)現(xiàn)還應屬天文學和地球運動的理論，而非題目中所講磁場的發(fā)現(xiàn)。

鑒于此點，考生就需要在英語語法結構上有所準備，除了了解一些常用的句型結構外，還需對英語文章中的一些復雜結構做有針對性的練習，從而可以從錯綜復雜的長句中快速地捕捉到主要信息。