Practice Test Answers

An effective thesis in an argumentative essay must

Which sentence best demonstrates the language required of an argumentative speech?

What is a counterclaim in an argumentative speech?

Having a counterclaim in an argumentative essay allows the author of the essay to

Read the following excerpt from Neil deGrasse Tyson’s “Death by Black Hole.” That’s the gory moment when your body snaps into two segments, breaking apart at your midsection. Upon falling further, the difference in gravity continues to grow, and each of your two body segments snaps into two segments. Shortly thereafter, those segments each snap into two segments of their own, and so forth, and so forth, bifurcating your body into an ever-increasing number of parts: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, etc. Read the following excerpt from Billy Collins’s “Man Listening to Disc.” The music is loud yet so confidential I cannot help feeling even more like the center of the universe than usual as I walk along to a rapid little version of “The Way You Look Tonight,” What do these two excerpts reveal about the difference in ideas presented by Tyson and Collins?

Read the excerpt from Neil deGrasse Tyson’s “Death by Black Hole.” That’s the gory moment when your body snaps into two segments, breaking apart at your midsection. Upon falling further, the difference in gravity continues to grow, and each of your two body segments snaps into two segments. Shortly thereafter, those segments each snap into two segments of their own, and so forth, and so forth, bifurcating your body into an ever-increasing number of parts: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, etc. After you’ve been ripped into shreds of organic molecules, the molecules themselves begin to feel the continually growing tidal forces. Eventually, they too snap apart, creating a stream of their constituent atoms. And then, of course, the atoms themselves snap apart, leaving an unrecognizable parade of particles that, minutes earlier, had been you. Which statement best describes how the author conveys the message that humans are no match for the power of a black hole?

Read the following excerpt from Levitt and Dubner’s Freakonomics . The bagel data also reflect how much personal mood seems to affect honesty. Weather, for instance, is a major factor. Unseasonably pleasant weather inspires people to pay at a higher rate. Unseasonably cold weather, meanwhile, makes people cheat prolifically; so do heavy rain and wind. Worst are the holidays. The week of Christmas produces a 2 percent drop in payment rates—again, a 15 percent increase in theft, an effect on the same magnitude, in reverse, as that of 9/11. Thanksgiving is nearly as bad; the week of Valentine’s Day is also lousy, as is the week straddling April 15. There are, however, a few good holidays: the weeks that include the Fourth of July, Labor Day, and Columbus Day. The difference in the two sets of holidays? The low-cheating holidays represent little more than an extra day off from work. The high-cheating holidays are fraught with miscellaneous anxieties and the high expectations of loved ones. Which of the following best summarizes the main idea of this paragraph?

Read the following excerpt from Levitt and Dubner’s Freakonomics . In the real world, Feldman learned to settle for less than 95 percent. He came to consider a company “honest” if its payment rate was above 90 percent. He considered a rate between 80 and 90 percent “annoying but tolerable.” If a company habitually paid below 80 percent, Feldman might post a hectoring note, like this one: The cost of bagels has gone up dramatically since the beginning of the year. Unfortunately, the number of bagels that disappear without being paid for has also gone up. Don’t let that continue. I don’t imagine that you would teach your children to cheat, so why do it yourselves? The excerpt serves as which type of support for the authors’ argument?

Read this excerpt from Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close . I stood on all of that and it worked for a second. But then I had the tips of my fingers on the vase, and the tragedies started to wobble, and the tuxedo was incredibly distracting, and the next thing was that everything was on the floor, including me, and including the vase, which had shattered. “I didn’t do it!” I hollered, but they didn’t even hear me, because they were playing music too loud and cracking up too much. How does the narration shape Oskar’s characterization in this excerpt?

Read this excerpt from Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close . She said, “Ron is a great person,” which was an answer to a question I didn’t ask. So I asked again. “True or false: you are in love with Ron.” She put her hand with the ring on it in her hair and said, “Oskar, Ron is my friend .” Which statement best describes the ambiguity in this excerpt?

Read the excerpt from Fast Food Nation . English is now the second language of at least one-sixth of the nation’s restaurant workers, and about one-third of that group speaks no English at all. The proportion of fast food workers who cannot speak English is even higher. Which type of evidence does the author use in this excerpt?

Which of the following excerpts from Fast Food Nation best provides evidence that fast food restaurants are designed for using unskilled labor?

Read the excerpt from Amy Tan’s essay “Mother Tongue.” I know this for a fact, because when I was growing up, my mother’s “limited” English limited my perception of her. I was ashamed of her English. I believed that her English reflected the quality of what she had to say. That is, because she expressed them imperfectly her thoughts were imperfect. What is the purpose of this text?

Which best describes the purpose of this passage?