Also in 2024 Test B English, question 10; 2026 Practice Test D English, question 41.
Passage Moving through Mountains
Moving through Mountains
(1) An age-old proverb says that necessity is the mother of invention. (2) Centuries of human ingenuity in the face of obstacles prove this to be true. (3) For many years the Swiss Alps, a mountain range spanning southern Switzerland and northern Italy, were such an obstacle. (4) Roads and railways had to navigate around the mountains or through winding tunnels inside the mountains, making the transportation of people and goods difficult and time consuming. (5) In 2016 these burdens were eased with the completion of the Gotthard Base Tunnel.
(6) Construction of the high-speed railway tunnel began in 1996. (7) The tunnel was created through the use of tunnel-boring machines, which are giant drills with a flat rotating head called a cutter head. (8) Each of the tunnel-boring machines used during the construction of the tunnel was about the length of four football fields arranged end-to-end. (9) During the seventeen-year construction period, 28 million tons of rock were removed, enough to rebuild the Great Pyramid of Giza five times. (10) This massive construction project is reported to have cost $12 billion. (11) After that, 4 million cubic meters of concrete, or enough concrete to build eighty-four Empire State Buildings, were used to construct and support the tunnel.
(12) By 2020 the high-speed railway will carry more than 250 freight trains and 55 passenger trains a day, with most traveling at speeds of around 100 to 125 miles per hour. (13) It will be faster for people to travel between northern and southern Europe. (14) The travel time between the European cities of Zurich, Switzerland, and Milan, Italy, will be reduced by an hour. (15) Many European leaders compare the Gotthard Base Tunnel to the Channel Tunnel, a 33-mile underwater tunnel that connects the United Kingdom and France. (16) While there is no roadway in the Channel Tunnel, people can drive their cars onto special trains that will carry vehicles through to the other side.
(17) Just as traffic congestion in major cities led to the construction of underground local transportation, natural formations, such as mountain ranges, have also sent people underground for faster, easier, and cheaper methods of transportation across larger areas. (18) There is renewed interest in constructing innovative methods of transportation that will help eliminate problems associated with traveling to and from certain areas.
Question
Which sentence should be added after sentence 5 to introduce the main topic of the passage?
- AThe construction of the Gotthard Base Tunnel was approved by Swiss voters in 1992 and was funded by tolls, fuel taxes, and government loans.
- BLeaders from several European countries attended the opening ceremonies for the Gotthard Base Tunnel, a Swiss tunnel.
- CThe Gotthard Base Tunnel is the world’s longest and deepest railway tunnel, stretching 35.5 miles straight through the base of the Swiss Alps.
- DThe Gotthard Base Tunnel continues to help reduce the number of freight trucks on the roadways in the Swiss Alps.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The Answer is (C)
The question asks which sentence should be added to the end of the first paragraph in order to introduce the topic of the passage, which is the description, construction, and use of the Gotthard Base Tunnel.
Option C correctly presents and describes the Gotthard Base Tunnel.
Option A is incorrect because it offers overly detailed information about the funding used to build the Gotthard Base Tunnel, and it does not provide a description of the tunnel.
Option B is incorrect because it gives details about the opening ceremony of the tunnel, and it does not provide a description of the tunnel.
Option D is incorrect because it offers a result of completing the Gotthard Base Tunnel, rather than offering an introductory statement presenting and describing the tunnel.
Question analysis
This revising question uses a short informational passage about the Gotthard Base Tunnel through the Swiss Alps and asks which sentence best introduces the main topic at the end of the first paragraph. Several choices offer true-sounding facts about the tunnel, so students must tell an introduction apart from a supporting detail.
- NYS standards
- 7W2a introducing and organizing a topic
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Choosing a sentence that introduces a topic and previews what follows is standard grade 7 writing work. The passage is short and factual, and the wrong choices are related details, much like a classroom revision exercise.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- Evidence in several places moderate
- How sentences fit together minor
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 362 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 97 words.
- Students, last 30 days
- Not enough answers yet to show (it takes 10).
Why it is hard, traps and wrong answers (shows the answer)
Why it is hard
Most students find the descriptive sentence once they ask what a reader needs right after the tunnel is first named. Points are lost to sentences that follow on smoothly from the word “completion” or that name a real benefit, but which set up a passage about something else. The right sentence even adds facts the passage never states, so students should judge fit rather than hunt for repeated words.
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The topic the new sentence must introduce only emerges across all four paragraphs: what the Gotthard Base Tunnel is, how it was dug, and what it will do for travel. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
How sentences fit together minor Working it out
The added sentence follows sentence 5, which names the tunnel only as what eased the burdens, so it should present the tunnel itself before paragraph 2 turns to its construction. (Halliday & Hasan, 1976)
Strategy: Skim the first sentence of each paragraph to see what the passage as a whole covers, then pick the sentence that would prepare a reader for all of it.
Traps
- Too narrow: A single detail offered as the central idea or a summary, or a summary that keeps minor details and leaves out an essential part.
- Off the point: Adds or keeps something that does not support the paragraph's or the passage's focus, or an introduction or conclusion that misses the main point.
The wrong answers, classified
A Off the point (Halliday & Hasan, 1976)
Picks voter approval in 1992 and funding by tolls, fuel taxes and loans, background that would set up a passage about financing, which this one never discusses.
B Off the point (Halliday & Hasan, 1976)
Follows naturally from “the completion of the Gotthard Base Tunnel” in sentence 5, but an opening ceremony with European leaders is not what the passage goes on to describe.
D Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Offers one result, fewer freight trucks on Alpine roads, which echoes the difficult roads of sentence 4 but does not present the tunnel before the passage explains it.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
The new sentence goes at the end of paragraph 1, right after sentence 5. It must introduce the main topic, which is what the whole passage is mostly about. So first you need to know what the whole passage covers.
Skim the passage for its topic
Sentence 5 ends paragraph 1: “In 2016 these burdens were eased with the completion of the Gotthard Base Tunnel.” Paragraph 2 tells how the tunnel was built. Paragraph 3 tells how it will make travel faster. Paragraph 4 tells why people build tunnels like it. So the passage is about the Gotthard Base Tunnel: what it is, how it was built, and what it does.
See what sentence 5 leaves out
Sentence 5 names the tunnel, but it doesn’t say what the tunnel is. A reader doesn’t yet know how long it is or what makes it special. Then paragraph 2 jumps right into building it. So the new sentence should describe the tunnel itself. That gets the reader ready for the rest.
Check each choice
- A is about voters and money from tolls and taxes. The passage never discusses how the tunnel was paid for.
- B is about an opening ceremony. The passage never describes one.
- C says what the tunnel is: “the world’s longest and deepest railway tunnel,” running “straight through the base of the Swiss Alps.”
- D gives one result, fewer trucks on the roads. That is a detail, not an introduction.
Watch out: D links back to the slow roads in sentence 4, so it seems to fit. But it is one benefit, and the passage never mentions trucks.
Pick the answer
Choice C presents the tunnel and tells what makes it special. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
Choice D is the closest wrong answer. It is about the tunnel, and it ties back to the hard travel in sentence 4. But it gives a result before the reader even knows what the tunnel is. C describes the tunnel itself, and that is what an introduction needs.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Moving through Mountains” as printed (page 48)
