Reading Practice Test 3

1. Read the following short biography below and identify the main idea.Even though George Washington Carver is very well known for the agricultural work that he did with the peanut plant, he also did a lot of work with research and education about other types of crops. In his adult life, George Washington Carver did research into soybean and sweet potato plants, and taught many farming families proper nutrition so that they could feed themselves well and live a healthy lifestyle. He also created around 100 products that could be made directly from peanuts, such as various types of makeup, gasoline, and plastics.

What is the main idea of this biography?

2. Teachers should limit the amount of homework students are assigned each night. Students must complete multiple homework assignments from multiple classes each night, which can result in hours of homework to complete.                , students have extracurricular activities and other obligations when the school day ends.

Which transition best connects the two pieces of supporting evidence?

3. Which word/phrase in the sentence below is redundant and can be removed without changing the meaning of the sentence?In 2014. researchers discovered and uncovered one of the biggest dinosaurs of all time, a new species of titanosaur, one of the largest species of dinosaurs to ever have walked on Earth.

4. Read the text and answer the question. Goodbye Pencil, Hello KeyboardLook around a modern-day classroom today and you will certainly note many changes from the classrooms of the past. Overhead projectors and chalkboards have been replaced; desks rarely feature a piece of paper, but rather sport a computer monitor. In addition, the days of taking notes, filling out tests, and writing reports with a pen or pencil in hand is utterly obsolete, exchanged for keyboards.

In more than 40 states throughout the country, cursive writing and penmanship are no longer considered an essential part of the curriculum, and none of the major standardized tests require any type of handwriting. Instead, keyboarding skills have taken precedence. The ability to form clear curves and loops on the paper is now outdated; the ability to avoid the painfully slow “hunting and pecking” and type at least 50 words per minute has taken precedence.

The age-old tradition of handwriting is not going quietly in some parts of the nation as at least four states have gone to their legislatures with bills mandating instruction in cursive writing in public schools. Advocates of keeping penmanship skills as part of a curriculum point to a plethora of evidence to support their stance. According to their studies, handwriting training helps young students develop hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills, and even improve overall memory retention. Additional studies have indicated that students who wrote by hand not only wrote faster than on a standard keyboard, but also wrote higher quality sentences.

Opponents to cursive in the classroom, however, point out that today’s generations of students have been keyboarding since before they attended kindergarten. This form of communication is part of how their brains operate, and many find the feel of a pen or pencil in their hands uncomfortable, unwieldy, and generally unpleasant. Keyboarding is quicker, freeing up precious time to work on other projects, and is, inarguably, the preferred communication method of the modern student.

Less than half of the states in the U.S have stopped teaching cursive as part of their curriculum.

5. DIRECTIONS: Read each passage and identify how the information is being organized.There are two kinds of metamorphosis: complete and incomplete. Animals that undergo complete metamorphoses, like frogs and butterflies, begin life in one form, and then at a stage in their lives, they change into a completely different form. In contrast, animals that undergo incomplete metamorphosis have no pupa stage in their life cycle.

6. Civil disobedience is the refusal to obey certain laws or to pay taxes and fines and is a peaceful form of political protest. Just because something is the law doesn’t mean it is right. For example, segregation used to be legal in this country, and it was only changed by many years of dedicated civil disobedience by people who wanted to do what was right, not just what was legal. Civil disobedience makes the government more accountable and is sometimes the only way that laws that are deeply rooted in damaging customs (like segregation) can be changed. Some Americans that are famous for their civil disobedience are Rosa Parks, who refused to give her bus seat to a white passenger in Montgomery Alabama, and Martin Luther King Jr. who advocated peaceful civil disobedience as a way to advance the rights of black Americans. Our country is what it is today largely thanks to acts of civil disobedience by brave and thoughtful Americans.

Rosa Parks is famous for:

7. Read the text and answer the question.In your hands, my fellow citizens, more than in mine, will rest the final success or failure of our course. Since this country was founded, each generation of Americans has been summoned to give testimony to its national loyalty. The graves of young Americans who answered the call to service surround the globe.
Now the trumpet summons us again - not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need; not as a call to battle, though embattled we are - but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle, year in and year out, "rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation" - a struggle against the common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease, and war itself.
Can we forge against these enemies a grand and global alliance, North and South, East and West, that can assure a more fruitful life for all mankind? Will you join in that historic effort?
In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shank from this responsibility - I welcome it. I do not believe that any of us would exchange places with any other people or any other generation. The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our country and all who serve it -- and the glow from that fire can truly light the world.
And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you -- ask what you can do for your country.

My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.
Finally, whether you are citizens of America or citizens of the world, ask of us the same high standards of strength and sacrifice which we ask of you. With a good conscience our only sure reward, with history the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God's work must truly be our own.

Which mode of persuasion does JFK use to make his point? 

8. Choose the main idea sentence in the paragraph below.For centuries, people have had different ways of trying to cure their hiccups. Many people drink water to get rid of their hiccups. Other people hold their breath until their hiccups go away. Some people even have their friends or their family spook them to scare away the hiccups. What are some ways that you know of to rid of your hiccups?

9. Read the text and answer the question. Goodbye Pencil, Hello KeyboardLook around a modern-day classroom today and you will certainly note many changes from the classrooms of the past. Overhead projectors and chalkboards have been replaced; desks rarely feature a piece of paper, but rather sport a computer monitor. In addition, the days of taking notes, filling out tests, and writing reports with a pen or pencil in hand is utterly obsolete, exchanged for keyboards.

In more than 40 states throughout the country, cursive writing and penmanship are no longer considered an essential part of the curriculum, and none of the major standardized tests require any type of handwriting. Instead, keyboarding skills have taken precedence. The ability to form clear curves and loops on the paper is now outdated; the ability to avoid the painfully slow “hunting and pecking” and type at least 50 words per minute has taken precedence.

The age-old tradition of handwriting is not going quietly in some parts of the nation as at least four states have gone to their legislatures with bills mandating instruction in cursive writing in public schools. Advocates of keeping penmanship skills as part of a curriculum point to a plethora of evidence to support their stance. According to their studies, handwriting training helps young students develop hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills, and even improve overall memory retention. Additional studies have indicated that students who wrote by hand not only wrote faster than on a standard keyboard, but also wrote higher quality sentences.

Opponents to cursive in the classroom, however, point out that today’s generations of students have been keyboarding since before they attended kindergarten. This form of communication is part of how their brains operate, and many find the feel of a pen or pencil in their hands uncomfortable, unwieldy, and generally unpleasant. Keyboarding is quicker, freeing up precious time to work on other projects, and is, inarguably, the preferred communication method of the modern student.

What do advocates of keyboarding list as one of their main reasons?

10. Candidate B's plan to build a wall to keep out illegal immigrants lacks substance.                   that Candidate B has failed to submit both a design and a cost analysis plan for the wall. Candidate A, on the other hand, has offered up a 20-page document outlining both the cost and specific design features or the barrier he plans to construct along the border.

Which transition best connects the evidence to the claim it supports?