7R3 plot elements and ideas
Question 1 of 92
2026 Practice Test A English, question 17Passage Excerpt from A Voice in the Wilderness
Excerpt from A Voice in the Wilderness
by Grace Livingston Hill
With a lurch the train came to a dead stop and Margaret Earle, hastily gathering up her belongings, hurried down the aisle and got out into the night.
It occurred to her, as she swung her heavy suit-case down the rather long step to the ground, and then carefully swung herself after it, that it was strange that neither conductor, brakeman, nor porter had come to help her off the train, when all three had taken the trouble to tell her that hers was the next station; but she could hear voices up ahead. Perhaps something was the matter with the engine that detained them and they had forgotten her for the moment.
The ground was rough where she stood, and there seemed no sign of a platform. Did they not have platforms in this wild Western land, or was the train so long that her car had stopped before reaching it?
She strained her eyes into the darkness, and tried to make out things from the two or three specks of light that danced about like fireflies in the distance. She could dimly see moving figures away up near the engine, and each one evidently carried a lantern. The train was tremendously long. A sudden feeling of isolation took possession of her. Perhaps she ought not to have got out until some one came to help her. Perhaps the train had not pulled into the station yet and she ought to get back on it and wait. Yet if the train started before she found the conductor she might be carried on somewhere and he justly blame her for a fool.
There did not seem to be any building on that side of the track. It was probably on the other, but she was standing too near the cars to see over. She tried to move back to look, but the ground sloped and she slipped and fell in the cinders, bruising her knee and cutting her wrist.
In sudden panic she arose. She would get back into the train, no matter what the consequences. They had no right to put her out here, away off from the station, at night, in a strange country. If the train started before she could find the conductor she would tell him that he must back it up again and let her off. He certainly could not expect her to get out like this.
She lifted the heavy suit-case up the high step that was even farther from the ground than it had been when she came down, because her fall had loosened some of the earth and caused it to slide away from the track. Then, reaching to the rail of the step, she tried to pull herself up, but as she did so the engine gave a long snort and the whole train, as if it were in league against her, lurched forward crazily, shaking off her hold. She slipped to her knees again, the suit-case, toppled from the lower step, descending upon her, and together they slid and rolled down the short bank, while the train . . . ran giddily off into the night.
The horror of being deserted helped the girl to rise in spite of bruises and shock. She lifted imploring hands to the unresponsive cars as they hurried by her—one, two, three, with bright windows, each showing a passenger, comfortable and safe inside, unconscious of her need.
A moment of useless screaming, running, trying to attract some one’s attention, a sickening sense of terror and failure, and the last car slatted itself past with a mocking clatter, as if it enjoyed her discomfort.
Margaret stood dazed, reaching out helpless hands, then dropped them at her sides and gazed after the fast-retreating train, the light on its last car swinging tauntingly, blinking now and then with a leer in its eye, rapidly vanishing from her sight into the depth of the night.
She gasped and looked about her for the station that but a short moment before had been so real to her mind; and, lo! on this side and on that there was none!
The night was wide like a great floor shut in by a low, vast dome of curving blue set with the largest, most wonderful stars she had ever seen. Heavy shadows of purple-green, smoke-like, hovered over earth darker and more intense than the unfathomable blue of the night sky. It seemed like the secret nesting-place of mysteries wherein no human foot might dare intrude. It was incredible that such could be but common sage-brush, sand, and greasewood wrapped about with the beauty of the lonely night.
No building broke the inky outlines of the plain, nor friendly light streamed out to cheer her heart. Not even a tree was in sight, except on the far horizon, where a heavy line of deeper darkness might mean a forest. Nothing, absolutely nothing, in the blue, deep, starry dome above and the bluer darkness of the earth below save one sharp shaft ahead like a black mast throwing out a dark arm across the track.
As soon as she sighted it she picked up her baggage and made her painful way toward it, for her knees and wrist were bruised and her baggage was heavy.
A soft drip, drip greeted her as she drew nearer; something plashing down among the cinders by the track. Then she saw the tall column with its arm outstretched, and looming darker among the sage-brush the outlines of a water-tank. It was so she recognized the engine’s drinking-tank, and knew that she had mistaken a pause to water the engine for a regular stop at a station.
cinders: track bed made from the residue of burnt coal
From A VOICE IN THE WILDERNESS by Grace Livingston Hill—Public Domain
Question
How do Margaret’s earlier interactions with the conductor, brakeman, and porter affect the plot?
- AThey prompt Margaret to get off the train without further assistance.
- BThey cause Margaret to think that she knows what to do once she gets off the train.
- CThey compel Margaret to wonder whether the train has not pulled all the way into the station.
- DThey lead Margaret to believe that train stations in rural areas lack platforms.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how Margaret’s earlier interactions with the conductor, brakeman, and porter affect the plot.
A. CORRECT. Because the conductor, brakeman, and porter have all “taken the trouble to tell her that hers was the next station” (paragraph 2), Margaret assumes that the next time the train stops, she will have reached her station. This assumption causes Margaret to get off the train at the next stop without waiting for help or confirmation, but the stop turns out to be just “a pause to water the engine” (paragraph 15). This mistaken assumption creates the main problem that Margaret confronts in the passage.
B. Incorrect. Although Margaret’s earlier interactions with the three railroad employees cause her to think that she knows when to get off the train, it is clear from paragraph 4 that Margaret is deeply confused and does not know what to do once she has exited the train car. She muses uneasily, “Perhaps she ought not to have got out until some one came to help her. Perhaps the train had not pulled into the station yet and she ought to get back on it and wait” (paragraph 4).
C. Incorrect. Margaret wonders in paragraph 3 whether the train is “so long that her car had stopped before reaching [the station]” and speculates in paragraph 4 that “the train had not pulled into the station yet.” These thoughts reflect her assumption (based on her interactions with the three railroad employees) that the next stop is her station. However, Margaret’s speculation that the train has not fully pulled into the station does not significantly affect the plot.
D. Incorrect. Margaret wonders in paragraph 3 whether they “have platforms in this wild Western land” and is expecting to see a platform because her interactions with the three railroad employees have led her to believe that she has reached a station. However, it is unclear whether Margaret really believes that rural stations all lack platforms, and her speculation on this point is not further developed in the passage and does not affect the plot.
Question analysis
This plot question on A Voice in the Wilderness asks how Margaret’s earlier dealings with the conductor, brakeman and porter, mentioned only in passing in paragraph 2, affect what happens to her. Students must connect that brief remark to later events in the excerpt. Several choices describe things that do happen, so students must judge which one those conversations truly cause.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 plot questions ask how story elements affect one another, usually through an event and its result. Here the cause is a clause inside a long sentence of century-old prose, and students must trace its effect across the excerpt rather than within one paragraph.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Complex sentences minor
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 981 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 72 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
The talks with the trainmen are mentioned once, in the middle of a long sentence, and the question asks students to see them as the start of the whole plot. Several choices describe thoughts Margaret really has right after she steps down, which makes them feel connected, but those thoughts change nothing. The point goes to students who trace cause to consequence: told her stop was next, she gets off alone at a water tank.
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The cause sits in paragraph 2, where all three men had told her “hers was the next station,” and the effect shows only in paragraph 15, when the stop proves to be a water tank. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The excerpt never says the men’s words made her step off; students must infer that their assurance is why she left the train at the first stop without waiting for anyone. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
The interactions appear in a 66-word sentence in paragraph 2, tucked into a “when” clause after a run of commas, so they read as a passing detail rather than a cause. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Strategy: Reread paragraph 2 to find what the three men told Margaret, then trace how that information shapes the events that follow, and choose the effect that matters most to the plot.
Traps
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Rightly links the men’s words to her confidence about when to get off, but stretches it to knowing what to do afterward, when paragraph 4 shows her at a loss.
C True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Names a real result of the men’s words, her guess in paragraphs 3 and 4 that the train has not yet reached the station, but that passing worry changes nothing in the plot.
D Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Turns her puzzled question about platforms in “this wild Western land” into a firm belief about rural stations, an idea the excerpt never develops.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how something from earlier affects the plot. The plot is the chain of events in a story. What did the three train workers tell Margaret, and what did that cause?
Find what the workers told her
Paragraph 2 says it was strange that “neither conductor, brakeman, nor porter had come to help her off the train, when all three had taken the trouble to tell her that hers was the next station.” A conductor, a brakeman and a porter are all people who work on a train.
Trace what happened because of it
Three workers told her that her stop was next. So when the train stopped, she was sure she had arrived. She got off alone, without waiting for anyone to help. But in paragraph 15 she learns it was only “a pause to water the engine.” Their words set off the whole problem: she is left alone in the dark.
Check each choice
- A fits. Their words led her to get off by herself.
- B does not fit. They told her when to get off, not what to do next. In paragraph 4 she is lost: “Perhaps she ought not to have got out until some one came to help her.”
- C does not fit. She does wonder this, but the thought changes nothing in the story.
- D does not fit. She only asks a question about platforms. She never decides anything about country stations.
Choose the answer
The workers’ words made Margaret step off the train on her own at the wrong stop. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong choice. The workers’ words do make her guess that the train has not reached the station yet. But that guess goes nowhere. What changes the story is that she gets off alone at a stop that is not a station. That is A.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from A Voice in the Wilderness” as printed (pages 128–129)
Question 2 of 92
2026 Practice Test A English, question 18Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from A Voice in the Wilderness”.
Question
How does Margaret’s experience in paragraph 9 emphasize a theme of the excerpt?
- AIt confirms Margaret’s understanding that she cannot rely on help from anyone else.
- BIt leads Margaret to realize that her desire to change her situation is impractical.
- CIt causes Margaret to believe that her own actions led to an unfavorable outcome.
- DIt reinforces Margaret’s frustration about her lack of control over her surroundings.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks about the relationship between the theme and paragraph 9, where Margaret desperately tries to get someone on the train to notice her.
A. CORRECT. One important theme of this excerpt concerns Margaret’s willingness to take action to ensure that she reaches her destination. This determination, described in Option A, is why she gathers her belongings together without help, gets off the train without being assisted by employees, and then attempts to climb back on while the train employees are busy examining the engine.
B. Incorrect. While the narrator describes her screaming as useless, she does not feel that her efforts overall are useless, and she does not give up until paragraph 10.
C. Incorrect. While Margaret is feeling a sense of “failure” in paragraph 9, she does not condemn herself as the train moves away.
D. Incorrect. Margaret expresses “terror” in paragraph 9 over being unable to catch someone’s attention, not frustration about her lack of control over her surroundings.
Question analysis
This theme question asks how Margaret’s experience in paragraph 9 of A Voice in the Wilderness, as she screams and runs while the train pulls away, emphasizes a theme of the excerpt. It is a lightly reworded version of an earlier handbook question. Every choice describes a believable reaction to being left behind, so the answer depends on the excerpt’s larger pattern.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Typical grade 7 theme questions trace a given theme through a text. Here students must decide which theme one frantic paragraph supports, and all four choices describe reactions that fit the scene, so the decision draws on the whole excerpt.
- Estimated difficulty
- Among the hardest on the SHSAT: a non-obvious approach, heavy reading, or a well-hidden trap.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines major
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 981 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 65 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
Each choice names a feeling a stranded traveler might have, and two lean on the paragraph’s own words, “useless” and “failure,” so the paragraph alone cannot decide it. Paragraph 9 must be read as the last link in a chain of trainmen, passengers and a departing train that all leave her to herself. Students who judge from that one paragraph often decide she has given up, though she soon picks up her bags and walks toward the dark shaft by the track.
Reading between the lines major Working it out
The theme is never stated; it must be drawn from paragraph 9’s cries that no one answers and from the passengers “comfortable and safe inside, unconscious of her need” in paragraph 8. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The pattern begins in paragraph 2, when no trainman helps her off, and runs through the train lurching away “as if it were in league against her” in paragraph 7. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Sum up in a phrase what keeps happening to Margaret from the start of the excerpt to its end, then check which choice paragraph 9’s own words most clearly add to.
Traps
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Wrong tone or attitude: Misjudges the tone, attitude or point of view, such as reading admiration as criticism, or taking a character's or subject's feelings for the author's.
The wrong answers, classified
B Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Stretches the “useless screaming” of one moment into a judgment that changing her situation is impractical, though she soon gathers her bags and sets off toward the shaft ahead.
C Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Turns the “sense of terror and failure” into self-blame, though Margaret never says that her own choice to step off the train caused her trouble.
D Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Fits the indifferent train, but names frustration over control where paragraph 9 stresses terror at being ignored by everyone aboard.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks about a theme: a big idea a story keeps coming back to. How does what happens in paragraph 9 point to a theme? The right choice should fit a pattern across the whole excerpt.
Read paragraph 9
Paragraph 9 describes “A moment of useless screaming, running, trying to attract some one’s attention, a sickening sense of terror and failure.” Margaret screams and runs, trying to get someone to notice her. No one does. The last car rolls past “as if it enjoyed her discomfort.”
Find the same thing earlier
This is not the first time. In paragraph 2, none of the workers “had come to help her off the train.” In paragraph 8, the passengers sit “comfortable and safe inside, unconscious of her need.” That means they don’t know she needs help. Paragraph 9 is one more time when nobody comes. She will have to count on herself.
Check each choice
- A fits. Her cries go unanswered, just as before. She cannot rely on anyone else.
- B does not fit. Impractical means not sensible or workable. Her screaming fails, but she never decides that trying to change things is pointless. In paragraph 14 she “picked up her baggage” and set off again.
- C does not fit. She feels “failure,” but she never blames herself.
- D does not fit. The paragraph shows terror at being ignored, not frustration about having no control over her surroundings.
Choose the answer
Paragraph 9 adds one more moment where no one helps Margaret. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong choice, because paragraph 9 calls her screaming “useless.” But one failed moment does not mean she gives up. Soon she takes her bags and walks toward the tall dark shape ahead. What stays true from paragraph 2 to paragraph 9 is that no one helps her. That is A.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 3 of 92
2026 Practice Test A English, question 19Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from A Voice in the Wilderness”.
Question
How does paragraph 11 contribute to the plot of the excerpt?
- AIt reveals that the reality of the situation is different from Margaret’s assumptions.
- BIt illustrates that Margaret’s main problem is her own imagination.
- CIt shows that Margaret is surprised by the unexpected adventure she is about to undertake.
- DIt provides insight into how Margaret reacts to stressful situations.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how paragraph 11 contributes to the plot of the excerpt.
A. CORRECT. In paragraph 5, Margaret assumes there is a station (“It was probably on the other [side], but she was standing too near the cars to see”), but in paragraph 11, the station that had been “so real” in Margaret’s mind actually does not exist.
B. Incorrect. Margaret’s main problem is not that her imagination has led her astray but rather that her inexperience with this train route has caused her to misinterpret the events that have occurred. Paragraph 11 reveals that she has been acting on faulty assumptions; however, her assumptions are somewhat justified by the events that have occurred.
C. Incorrect. While Margaret seems somewhat in awe of her surroundings in paragraph 12 and she “gasped” in paragraph 11, her exclamation is one of shock at the discovery, not surprise over an unexpected adventure.
D. Incorrect. While paragraph 11 describes how Margaret responds to the distressing situation that her actions and decisions have created, the paragraph does not offer insight into how Margaret generally responds to problems or conflicts.
Question analysis
This plot-structure question asks how paragraph 11 of A Voice in the Wilderness, a single exclaiming sentence that begins “She gasped,” contributes to the plot once Margaret is alone beside the track. Students relate the paragraph to what comes before and after it. Its archaic phrasing, with “lo!” and an inverted clause, makes the plain meaning harder to see.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining what a single paragraph adds to a plot is standard grade 7 structure work. Paragraph 11 is one short sentence, but its old-fashioned exclamation has to be linked to the paragraphs around it, which adds a step.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Evidence in several places moderate
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 981 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 58 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
Paragraph 11 is a single exclaiming sentence whose job is to overturn what Margaret, and the reader, have believed since she stepped down. Students who link it to her earlier guesses about a platform and a building see the reversal at once. Those who read it alone fasten on her gasp or on the words “so real to her mind,” and choose a reading about her character or her imagination rather than the plot.
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The assumption the paragraph overturns was built earlier: in paragraph 3 she wonders about a platform, and in paragraph 5 she decides the station is “probably on the other” side. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The choice about her imagination and the right one both describe a gap between what Margaret pictured and what is there; they differ on whether the fault lies in her mind or in the missing station. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
The paragraph announces its reversal in old-fashioned words, “lo! on this side and on that there was none,” which students unused to such phrasing may read past. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Translate paragraph 11 into plain modern English, reread the paragraphs just before and after it, and judge each choice by what this paragraph itself shows.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
The wrong answers, classified
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Seizes on “so real to her mind” and blames her imagination, though the station she expected is truly missing and the danger she faces is real.
C Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Hears surprise in “gasped” and “lo!” but takes it for eagerness about an adventure, when it is shock at finding no station on either side.
D Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Makes a general claim about how Margaret handles stress, which could fit almost any paragraph, while this one reports a single discovery that turns the plot.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how paragraph 11 moves the plot, the chain of events, forward. What changes for Margaret in this paragraph?
Read paragraph 11
Paragraph 11 is one sentence: “She gasped and looked about her for the station that but a short moment before had been so real to her mind; and, lo! on this side and on that there was none!”
Put it in plain words
“Lo!” is an old word that means “Look!” The words “on this side and on that there was none” mean there was no station on either side of the track. Earlier, in paragraph 5, she guessed the building “was probably on the other” side. An assumption is something you believe without checking. Now she sees that her assumption was wrong. There is no station at all.
Check each choice
- A fits. What she assumed, a station, is different from what is real, no station.
- B does not fit. Her imagination is not the problem. The missing station is a real problem.
- C does not fit. Her gasp is shock, not excitement about an adventure.
- D does not fit. She gasps, but the paragraph’s job is the discovery. It does not show how she usually handles stress.
Choose the answer
Paragraph 11 shows that the station Margaret counted on is not there. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong choice. Both A and B notice a gap between what Margaret pictured and what is there. But B blames her imagination. Her trouble is real: there is no station, and the train is gone. A says what the paragraph does. It shows the truth is different from what she assumed.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 4 of 92
2026 Practice Test A English, question 29Passage Excerpt from “The Spirit of the Herd”
Excerpt from “The Spirit of the Herd”
by Dallas Lore Sharp
In this excerpt, published in 1914, author and professor Dallas Lore Sharp describes a summer cattle roundup in Oregon. The heat and dust had been relentless for three days. The cowboys were exhausted, and the cattle were restless. The ranch boss, Wade, had led the drive to a watering place, only to find it empty.
Along with the wagon had come the fresh horses—one of them being Peroxide Jim, a supple, powerful, clean-limbed buckskin, a horse, I think, that had as fine and intelligent an animal-face as any creature I ever saw. Wade had been saving this horse for emergency work. And why should he not have been saved fresh for just such a need as this? Are there not superior horses as well as superior men—a Peroxide Jim to complement a Wade?
The horse knew the cattle business and knew his rider perfectly; and though there was nothing like sentiment about the boss of the P Ranch riders, his faith in Peroxide Jim was complete. . . .
The desert, where the herd was camped, was one of the highest of a series of tablelands, or benches; it lay as level as a floor, rimmed by sheer rock, from which there was a drop to the bench of sage below. The herd when overtaken by the dusk had been headed for a pass descending to the next lower bench, but was now halted within a mile of the rim rock on the east, where there was a perpendicular fall of about three hundred feet. . . .
In the taut silence of the stirless desert night, with the tension of the herd at the snapping-point, any quick, unwonted sight or sound would stampede them. The sneezing of a horse, the flare of a match, would be enough to send the whole four thousand headlong—blind, frenzied, trampling—till spent and scattered over the plain.
And so, as he rode, Wade began to sing. The rider ahead of him took up the air and passed it on until, above the stepping stir of the hoofs rose the faint voices of the men, and all the herd was bound about by the slow plaintive measures of some old song. It was not to soothe their savage breasts that the riders sang to the cattle, but rather to preempt the dreaded silence, to relieve the tension, and so to prevent the shock of any sudden startling noise.
So they sang and rode and the night wore on to one o’clock, when Wade, coming up on the rim-rock side, felt a cool breeze fan his face, and caught a breath of fresh, moist wind with the taste of water in it.
He checked his horse instantly, listening as the wind swept past him over the cattle. But they must already have smelled it, for they had ceased their milling, the whole herd standing motionless, the indistinct forms close to him in the dark showing their bald faces lifted to drink the sweet wet breath that came over the rim. Then they started on again, but faster, and with a rumbling now from their hoarse throats that tightened Wade’s grip on the reins.
The sound seemed to come out of the earth, a low, rumbling mumble, as dark as the night and as wide as the plain, a thick, inarticulate bellow that stood every rider stiff in his stirrups. . . .
Then the breeze caught the dust and carried it back from the gray-coated, ghostly shapes, and Wade saw that the animals were still moving in a circle. He must keep them going. He touched his horse to ride on with them, when across the black sky flashed a vivid streak of lightning.
There was a snort from the steers, a quick clap of horns and hoofs from far within the herd, a tremor of the plain, a roar, a surging mass—and Wade was riding the flank of a wild stampede. Before him, behind him, beside him, pressing hard upon his horse, galloped the frenzied steers, and beyond them a multitude borne on, and bearing him on, by the heave of the galloping herd.
Wade was riding for his life. He knew it. His horse knew it. He was riding to turn the herd, too, back from the rim, as the horse also knew. The cattle were after water—water-mad—ready to go over the precipice to get it, carrying horse and rider with them. Wade was the only rider between the herd and the rim. It was black as death. He could see nothing in the sage, could scarcely discern the pounding, panting shadows at his side. He knew that he was being borne toward the rim, how fast he could not tell, but he knew by the swish of the brush against his tapaderos and the plunging of the horse that the ground was growing stonier, that they were nearing the rocks.
To outrun the herd was his only chance for life. If he could come up with the leaders he might not only escape, but even stand a chance of heading them off upon the plain and saving the herd. There were cattle still ahead of him; how many, what part of them all, he could not make out in the dark. But the horse knew. The reins hung on his straight neck, where his rider had dropped them, as, yelling and firing over the wild herd, he had given this horse the race to win, to lose.
They were riding the rim. Close on their left bore down the flank of the herd, and on their right, under their very feet, was a precipice, so close that they felt its blackness—its three hundred feet of fall! . . .
. . . Then Wade found himself racing neck and neck with a big white steer, which the horse, with marvelous instinct, seemed to pick out from a bunch, and to cling to, forcing him gradually ahead, till, cutting him free from the bunch entirely, he bore him off into the swishing sage.
The steers coming on close behind followed their leader, and in, after them, swung others. The tide was turning from the rim. More and more were veering, and within a short time the whole herd, bearing off from the cliffs, was pounding over the open plains.
Whose race was it? It was Peroxide Jim’s, according to Wade, for not by word or by touch of hand or knee had the horse been directed in the run. From the flash of the lightning the horse had taken the bit, had covered an indescribably perilous path at top speed, had outrun the herd and turned it from the edge of the rim rock, without a false step or a tremor of fear.
From “The Spirit of the Herd” by Dallas Lore Sharp—Public Domain
tablelands: plateaus, flat areas of land sharply elevated from the surrounding area
tapaderos: leather covers for stirrups
Question
Which sentence from the excerpt best explains why Wade reserved Peroxide Jim for “emergency work” (paragraph 1)?
- A“Are there not superior horses as well as superior men—a Peroxide Jim to complement a Wade?” (paragraph 1)
- B“Before him, behind him, beside him, pressing hard upon his horse, galloped the frenzied steers, and beyond them a multitude borne on, and bearing him on, by the heave of the galloping herd.” (paragraph 10)
- C“He knew that he was being borne toward the rim, how fast he could not tell, but he knew by the swish of the brush against his tapaderos and the plunging of the horse that the ground was growing stonier, that they were nearing the rocks.” (paragraph 11)
- D“From the flash of the lightning the horse had taken the bit, had covered an indescribably perilous path at top speed, had outrun the herd and turned it from the edge of the rim rock, without a false step or a tremor of fear.” (paragraph 16)
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks which sentence from the excerpt best explains why Wade reserved Peroxide Jim for “emergency work” (paragraph 1).
A. Incorrect. While the sentence from paragraph 1 refers to Peroxide Jim as being a superior horse, it does not tell why he would be useful in an emergency. The mention of Peroxide Jim’s superiority does not describe the attributes that would make him an appealing choice for use in an emergency.
B. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 10 does not describe the actions of Peroxide Jim. The sentence describes what Wade and the horse were experiencing, but it does not include any reference to how Peroxide Jim was responding to the situation.
C. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 11 describes Wade’s experiences and does not focus on the actions of Peroxide Jim. It reveals Wade’s awareness of the danger he was in, but the only reference to Peroxide Jim in this sentence is the description of the horse having to work harder to run on the stonier ground as they neared the edge: from “the plunging of the horse,” Wade knew “that the ground was growing stonier, that they were nearing the rocks.” This quotation does not show that Peroxide Jim was the right horse to use for emergency work because it does not indicate, at this point in the text, that he was responding in a way that saved the herd or Wade.
D. CORRECT. The sentence from paragraph 16 describes Peroxide Jim’s high level of skill and ability to perform in a life-and-death situation. Not only did Peroxide Jim recognize the emergency immediately (“From the flash of the lightning the horse had taken the bit”), but the horse also proved to have the physical capability (“had covered an indescribably perilous path at top speed, had outrun the herd and turned it from the edge of the rim rock”) and the mental toughness (“without a false step or a tremor of fear”) required to respond appropriately to the dangerous situation.
Question analysis
This evidence question on Dallas Lore Sharp’s “The Spirit of the Herd,” a 1914 account of a night stampede on an Oregon cattle drive, asks which sentence best explains why the ranch boss Wade kept his horse Peroxide Jim for “emergency work.” The four quoted sentences come from different parts of the excerpt and are long, so the choice takes careful reading.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Finding the sentence that best explains a detail is regular grade 7 evidence work. The four quotations, though, are long sentences from across a dense excerpt written in 1914, so the reading load is heavier than usual.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- Evidence in several places moderate
- A lot to read minor
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 1160 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 160 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
The question links the start of the excerpt to its end, and the nearest quotation is the most tempting: the narrator’s rhetorical question about “superior horses” sits beside the phrase and seems to explain it. It praises the horse without showing what he can do. The two stampede sentences show the emergency itself, so the point goes to students who look for the horse acting on his own and find it in the final paragraph.
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The phrase “emergency work” is in paragraph 1, but the proof of the horse’s worth comes only at the very end, in paragraph 16, after the stampede has been turned. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
A lot to read minor Understanding the question
Three of the quotations run 33 to 46 words, and two of them describe the stampede in vivid detail without saying what the horse does, so sorting them takes time. (Kintsch, 1998; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
Students must decide what an emergency horse needs, speed, nerve and judgment without a rider’s guidance, before the last sentence reads as an answer to paragraph 1. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Decide what a horse saved for emergencies would need to be able to do, then pick the quotation that gives the clearest proof that Peroxide Jim can do it.
Traps
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
The wrong answers, classified
A Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Stays beside the phrase in paragraph 1 and accepts the claim that Peroxide Jim is “superior,” which praises him but gives no sign of what makes him useful in a crisis.
B True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Picks the most vivid picture of the stampede, which shows the emergency itself but says nothing about how Peroxide Jim handles it.
C Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Notices “the plunging of the horse” at a tense moment, but the sentence is about Wade sensing the rocks ahead, not about the horse meeting the danger.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks for evidence. In paragraph 1, Wade was saving Peroxide Jim for “emergency work.” Which sentence best explains why? You need a sentence that shows what this horse can do when something goes wrong.
Decide what to look for
An emergency is a sudden, dangerous event. A horse saved for one should be fast, steady and smart. It should act quickly when things go wrong. So look for the sentence that shows the horse himself doing that.
Read the last sentence of the excerpt
Paragraph 16 says “From the flash of the lightning the horse had taken the bit, had covered an indescribably perilous path at top speed, had outrun the herd and turned it from the edge of the rim rock, without a false step or a tremor of fear.”
Put the sentence in plain words
The bit is the metal bar in a horse’s mouth that the reins attach to. A horse that “had taken the bit” runs on its own. Perilous means dangerous. A tremor is a small shake. So the moment the stampede began, the horse took charge. He raced along a dangerous path, got ahead of the herd and turned it from the cliff. He never stumbled or showed fear.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. It calls him “superior,” but it shows no skill.
- B does not fit. It shows the stampede, but not how the horse handles it.
- C does not fit. It is about Wade sensing the rocks ahead.
- D fits. It shows the horse saving the herd in a real emergency.
Watch out: A sits right next to “emergency work” in paragraph 1, so it seems to explain it. But praise is not proof.
Choose the answer
The last sentence shows exactly why the horse was worth saving for emergencies. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong choice. It sits beside the words “emergency work” and praises the horse. But calling a horse “superior” does not say what it can do. D shows the horse in action: fast, sure-footed and fearless in a real emergency. That explains why Wade saved him.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “The Spirit of the Herd”” as printed (page 41)
Question 5 of 92
2026 Practice Test A English, question 31Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “The Spirit of the Herd””.
Question
How does paragraph 3 convey the effect of the setting on the cattle drive?
- AIt shows how the growing darkness created challenges for the riders in getting the herd to move.
- BIt describes how the changing elevation contributed to the dangerousness of the environment.
- CIt describes how the desert created an uncomfortable feeling of isolation for the riders and the cattle.
- DIt shows how the steep terrain made it difficult for the cattle to keep moving forward.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks how paragraph 3 conveys the effect of the setting on the cattle drive.
A. Incorrect. The riders were not trying to move the herd through the darkness. Instead, the reference to the growing darkness (“overtaken by the dusk”) indicates that the riders had halted the animals for the night because moving the herd across the desert in the darkness would have been much too dangerous because of the sheer drop-off at the edge of the tableland. The riders needed the daylight to navigate the herd safely through the “pass descending to the next lower bench.”
B. CORRECT. Paragraph 3 describes the land where the herd was as being “as level as a floor” but “rimmed by sheer rock, from which there was a drop to the bench of sage below.” The drop was “a perpendicular fall of about three hundred feet”—any animal or person could fall over that edge. It was the change in height, from flat tableland to sheer drop-off, that made the terrain so dangerous.
C. Incorrect. The use of the word “desert” in the first sentence of the paragraph does not highlight the isolation of the setting or indicate that the riders and the herd were uncomfortable being alone. Instead, the word merely establishes the setting where the action occurred: “it lay as level as a floor, rimmed by sheer rock, from which there was a drop to the bench of sage below.”
D. Incorrect. The excerpt does not indicate that the steep terrain made it difficult for the herd to move forward. The herd was not expected to navigate the steep terrain. Instead, the steep terrain presented a danger to the herd that must be avoided. The riders intended to move the herd safely through passes that descended gradually to lower elevations.
Question analysis
This setting question on “The Spirit of the Herd” asks how paragraph 3, which describes the high desert where the herd has stopped for the night, conveys the setting’s effect on the cattle drive. Students must understand unusual landform words, one explained in a footnote, and work out what the land means for the herd. Several choices name a real feature of the scene.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 students analyze how setting affects a story, usually from plainly worded description. This paragraph relies on terms such as tablelands, benches and rim rock, and never names the effect, so students must work it out from the description.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Hard words moderate
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 1160 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 76 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
Paragraph 3 reads like a surveyor’s report, flat land ending in a sheer drop, with no word of fear. Students must turn its landforms into a picture and see that a herd camped a mile from a three-hundred-foot fall is in danger. The strongest wrong answer gets the cliff right but makes it a barrier to the drive, and others seize on the dusk or on the loneliness a desert suggests.
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The choice about steep terrain blocking the herd and the right one both rest on the drop at the rim; they differ only in its effect, a hazard to avoid or an obstacle to movement. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Hard words moderate Understanding the question
The paragraph’s landforms, “tablelands, or benches,” “rim rock,” a “pass descending to the next lower bench” and a “perpendicular fall,” must be pictured before the danger is clear. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The paragraph never calls the drop dangerous; students must infer it from “sheer rock” and “about three hundred feet,” a danger that becomes real only when the herd stampedes toward the rim. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Make a quick sketch of the land paragraph 3 describes and mark where the herd is halted, then ask what that setting means for the drive and test each choice against it.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
The wrong answers, classified
A Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Turns “overtaken by the dusk” into a struggle to get the herd moving, though the herd was halted for the night and the paragraph stresses the drop, not darkness.
C Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Assumes a desert must feel lonely, a common association, though the paragraph uses “desert” only to place the herd on a level plain and says nothing of isolation.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Rightly notices the sheer drop but makes it an obstacle to forward movement, when the herd was headed for a pass and the cliff was a hazard to avoid.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks about setting, the place and time of a story. How does the land in paragraph 3 affect the cattle drive? A cattle drive is a trip where riders move a large herd of cattle across the land.
Read paragraph 3
The herd is camped on high, flat land “rimmed by sheer rock, from which there was a drop to the bench of sage below.” The herd “was now halted within a mile of the rim rock on the east, where there was a perpendicular fall of about three hundred feet.”
Picture the land
The note says tablelands are “flat areas of land sharply elevated from the surrounding area.” A bench is another name for one. Picture giant steps. The herd is on a high step. Its edge is sheer rock, a straight drop. Perpendicular means straight up and down. So the herd has stopped within a mile of a cliff about 300 feet high.
Work out the effect
Elevation is how high the land is. Here the elevation changes suddenly, from flat ground to a steep cliff. A scared herd could run right over the edge. That makes the place dangerous. Later, this danger comes true when the stampede races toward the rim.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. The herd was halted for the night. The riders were not trying to move it.
- B fits. The sudden drop makes the place dangerous.
- C does not fit. The paragraph says nothing about feeling lonely.
- D does not fit. The herd was headed for a pass, an easier way down. The cliff was a danger to avoid.
Choose the answer
The change in height, from flat land to a sheer drop, makes the setting dangerous. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest wrong choice, because it also points to the steep drop. But the herd was not trying to climb down the cliff. It was headed for a pass and had stopped for the night. The drop matters because the herd could fall over it. That danger is what B describes.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 6 of 92
2026 Practice Test A English, question 34Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “The Spirit of the Herd””.
Question
How do the details in paragraphs 14–16 help convey a central idea of the excerpt?
- AThey highlight Peroxide Jim’s natural ability to control the herd.
- BThey emphasize the danger of the situation from which Peroxide Jim rescued the herd.
- CThey show that Peroxide Jim’s physical strength allowed him to force the herd to turn.
- DThey indicate that Peroxide Jim anticipated the herd’s stampede before the men did.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how the details in paragraphs 14–16 help convey a central idea of the excerpt.
A. CORRECT. Paragraphs 14–16 describe how Peroxide Jim’s “marvelous instinct” headed off the herd and drove it away from the cliff. Wade acknowledged that without his instruction, Peroxide Jim knew to find the leader of the herd, cut him off from the rest of the herd, and then lead him to safety, confident that the remainder of the herd would follow. Paragraph 16 confirms this: “Whose race was it? It was Peroxide Jim’s, according to Wade, for not by word or by touch of hand or knee had the horse been directed in the run.” This reinforces a central idea of the excerpt regarding the horse’s amazing intellect and ability.
B. Incorrect. Although paragraphs 14–16 mention the “rim,” the “cliffs,” and the “indescribably perilous path,” these details are not the focus of the paragraphs. They are descriptions of the setting where Peroxide Jim’s able and effective actions saved the stampeding herd, and it is these actions that are the central idea being conveyed.
C. Incorrect. Although Peroxide Jim is called “powerful” in paragraph 1, his physical strength is neither a central idea of the excerpt nor the focus of paragraphs 14–16. His success at turning the herd was attributed to his intellect and instinct, not his physical strength.
D. Incorrect. The excerpt does not suggest that Peroxide Jim anticipated the herd’s stampede before the men did. In fact, the excerpt indicates that Wade led the men in singing to cover sudden noises that might cause the herd to stampede, indicating that Wade was alert to that possibility. Paragraph 7 also indicates that Wade anticipated the stampede, as he “checked his horse instantly” and “tightened [his] grip on the reins” as soon as he smelled water on the wind and heard the low rumbling of the herd that preceded the lightning strike. The narrator notes Wade’s actions well before the horse’s actions. Paragraphs 14–16 describe how Peroxide Jim acted after the stampede began.
Question analysis
This central-idea question asks how the details in the last three paragraphs of “The Spirit of the Herd,” where the stampede is finally turned away from the cliff, help convey a central idea. Students must decide what those details mainly show about Peroxide Jim. Several choices touch on something real in the story, so the paragraphs’ main emphasis decides it.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Linking a passage’s final paragraphs to its central idea is a familiar grade 7 task. Paragraphs 14–16 are short and vivid, but several choices mention something those paragraphs touch on, so students must judge what the details mainly emphasize.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what moderate
- The right answer is reworded minor
- Complex sentences minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 1160 words; question and choices: about grade 8, 66 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- Details in the explanation that are not in the excerpt were corrected.
- 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
The three paragraphs mix danger with skill, so a choice about danger can quote them and still miss what they emphasize. The detail that carries the central idea is that no word or touch directed the horse: he picked out the lead steer himself and the herd followed. Students who remember that Peroxide Jim was called “powerful” credit his strength, and a few reverse the order of events, putting his reaction before Wade’s.
How, not what moderate Working it out
The question asks what the details in paragraphs 14–16 do, so students must see that the rim and the “perilous path” are background and the horse’s choices are the point. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
The right answer is reworded minor Choosing the answer
The right choice calls the horse’s skill a “natural ability,” a plain paraphrase of “marvelous instinct,” while a wrong choice repeats the danger words the paragraphs use. (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
Paragraph 14 tells how the horse turns the herd in one 50-word sentence full of commas, “which the horse, with marvelous instinct, seemed to pick out from a bunch, and to cling to.” (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Strategy: Note what paragraphs 14–16 mostly focus on, then test each choice by asking whether it names that focus or only a detail mentioned along the way.
Traps
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Reversed relationship: Cause and effect, or the order of events, turned around.
The wrong answers, classified
B True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Notices the “rim,” the “cliffs” and the “indescribably perilous path,” but these details set the scene; the paragraphs dwell on how the horse turned the herd.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Gets right that the horse turned the herd, perhaps recalling “powerful” from paragraph 1, but the paragraphs credit his “marvelous instinct,” not his strength.
D Reversed relationship (King et al., 2004)
Puts the horse’s reaction before the men’s, but Wade sensed trouble in paragraph 7 when the wind changed, and the horse took the bit only at the lightning.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The handbook’s explanation of Option D says Wade reacted “as soon as he smelled the rain and heard the low rumble of thunder that preceded the lightning strike.” The excerpt has no rain and no thunder. In paragraph 6 Wade catches “a breath of fresh, moist wind with the taste of water in it,” and in paragraph 7 the rumbling comes “from their hoarse throats,” the cattle’s; that rumbling is what “tightened Wade’s grip on the reins.” The site now says “as soon as he smelled water on the wind and heard the low rumbling of the herd that preceded the lightning strike.”
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how the details in paragraphs 14 to 16 help show a central idea, a main idea of the excerpt. What do these last three paragraphs mostly focus on?
Read paragraphs 14 to 16
In paragraph 14, the horse, “with marvelous instinct, seemed to pick out from a bunch” a big white steer. Paragraph 15 says “The steers coming on close behind followed their leader.” Paragraph 16 says the race was the horse’s, “for not by word or by touch of hand or knee had the horse been directed in the run.”
Work out what the details show
An instinct is a natural sense of what to do, without being taught or told. A steer is one of the cattle. The horse picked out one big steer and pushed it off into the sage, away from the cliff. The rest followed it as their leader. No one guided the horse. So the horse controlled the whole herd using his own natural skill.
Check each choice
- A fits. The details show the horse’s natural ability to control the herd.
- B does not fit. The “rim” and the “cliffs” set the scene. The focus is how the horse turned the herd.
- C does not fit. The horse does not overpower the herd. He picks the leader, and the others follow.
- D does not fit. In paragraph 7, Wade sensed trouble first. The cattle’s rumbling “tightened Wade’s grip on the reins.” The horse took charge only “From the flash of the lightning.”
Choose the answer
The last three paragraphs show the horse’s natural skill at turning the herd. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong choice, because the paragraphs do mention the rim and a “perilous,” or dangerous, path. But the danger is the background. The paragraphs mostly show what the horse did: he chose the lead steer and turned the herd with no one guiding him. That natural skill is A.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 7 of 92
2026 Practice Test A English, question 40Passage Massachusetts: Lowell National Historical Park
Massachusetts: Lowell National Historical Park
During the first half of the 19th century, Lowell, Massachusetts, quickly transformed itself from a farm town to a bustling industrial city. In time, Lowell became a model of industry, gaining global recognition for its state-of-the-art technology, innovative canal and dam system, mill architecture, boardinghouses, churches, and ethnic neighborhoods. Young Yankee women, immigrant families, and European tourists all flocked to Lowell to find work at one of the many textile mills, or visit the industrious city that was becoming a popular tourist destination. As one Scottish traveler observed during his visit to America, “Niagara and Lowell are the two objects I will longest remember in my American journey, the one the glory of American scenery, the other of American industry.” Today, Lowell National Historical Park welcomes visitors to enjoy the sights of Lowell and learn about the history of one of America’s most significant industrial cities.
The Boston merchants who founded Lowell in 1821 and named it after Francis Cabot Lowell chose to locate the town along Massachusetts’s Merrimack River to take advantage of the kinetic energy offered by the Pawtucket waterfalls. Over six miles of canals powered the waterwheels of Lowell’s mills, whose massive five- and six-story brick buildings dominated the city’s landscape. . . . The most recognized of these buildings are the Lowell Manufacturing Company chartered in 1821, the Suffolk or Wannalancit Mill completed around the 1880s, the Boott Mill Company established in 1835, and the Boott Mill Boardinghouse that opened in 1838. By the 1850s, 40 textile mills employing over 10,000 workers stretched for about a mile along the river. . . .
The city’s female workforce was significant in the history of Lowell. From the early to mid-1800s, women left the constricted lifestyle of small rural towns and rural areas for independent industrial city life. Most were young single Yankee girls, who were tired of the limited opportunities offered by their domestic work. Women found that Lowell’s mills offered monthly wages for their services and provided them room and board. Although these women gained economic independence in Lowell, the mill boardinghouse keepers constantly supervised their social activities, for which they hardly had any time, considering their daily 12- to 14-hour work schedules. At the end of the day, the factory bell signaled the “mill girls” to return to their boardinghouses. They were expected to adhere to the strict code of conduct respecting curfew and attending church.
Yankee “mill girls” continued to dominate the Lowell workforce until the 1840s, when the city began to find it difficult to compete with the growing industrial development in other New England communities. As profits fell, the mill industry cut wages. These wage cuts, deteriorating working conditions, and long workdays led the “mill girls” to protest and organize strikes. When their demands went unheard, the women left Lowell, and immigrant groups replaced them in the workforce. Despite the low wages and unhealthy work conditions, immigrants were eager to find work.
The immigrants replacing the Yankee “mill girls” during the 1840s were predominantly Irish Catholics, who traveled to America during the Great Potato Famine. Although Lowell received an influx of Irish families during this time, the Irish were a part of the city’s history from its birth, and before the “mill girls” arrived, they built Lowell’s historic canals, mills, and boardinghouses. Initially, Lowell’s Protestant community was slow to welcome Irish immigrants, but the hostility between Yankee Protestants and Irish Catholics eventually disappeared. Irish immigrants dominated the industrial scene until the Civil War, when other immigrant groups began to work in the city mills.
Like the Irish, the French-Canadians, Greeks, Poles, Portuguese, Russian Jews, and Armenians who came to work in Lowell’s mills faced long work hours, low wages, and poor living conditions in the city’s crowded tenements. By the time Lowell’s industry declined, the city had become an ethnic melting pot, where each group claimed its own distinct neighborhood, like the Irish immigrants’ “New Dublin” or “Acre,” and the French-Canadians’ “Little Canada.” The city officially began to close down its mills in the 1920s and ’30s after Lowell’s outdated mills could no longer compete against the state-of-the-art cotton mills in other communities and working conditions continued to decline as Lowell’s companies stopped reinvesting in their mills. . . . Despite a brief resurgence during World War II, the city shut down its last surviving mill by the mid-1950s.
From “Massachusetts: Lowell National Historical Park”—Public Domain/National Park Service
Yankee: native to New England
Niagara: a town in northwestern New York State well known as the location of Niagara Falls, a series of waterfalls on the Canadian border
domestic work: household duties like cooking and cleaning
Question
Read this sentence from paragraph 5.
Although Lowell received an influx of Irish families during this time, the Irish were a part of the city’s history from its birth, and before the “mill girls” arrived, they built Lowell’s historic canals, mills, and boardinghouses.
How does this sentence contribute to the development of ideas in the passage?
- AIt implies that Lowell was founded by early Irish immigrants.
- BIt emphasizes the important role Irish immigrants played in Lowell’s history.
- CIt suggests that the new Irish immigrants were readily accepted into the community.
- DIt highlights the working relationship between the mill girls and the new Irish immigrants.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks how the sentence in paragraph 5 contributes to the development of ideas in the passage.
A. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 5 does not imply that Lowell was founded by early Irish immigrants. The sentence explains how Irish immigrants had been settling in Lowell since the city was established and that they contributed to the construction of the city, which allowed it to become an industrial center several decades later.
B. CORRECT. The sentence from paragraph 5 shows that early Irish immigrants were critical to the success of Lowell as an industrial city. This information supports the development of the idea that the work of Irish immigrants and immigrants from other places is an important element in the historical significance of industry in Lowell.
C. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 5 does not suggest that new Irish immigrants were readily accepted into the community. Paragraph 5 states that “initially, Lowell’s Protestant community was slow to welcome Irish immigrants, but the hostility between Yankee Protestants and Irish Catholics eventually disappeared.”
D. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 5 does not highlight the relationship between the mill girls and the new Irish immigrants. Paragraph 4 explains how the mill girls left Lowell, and paragraph 5 states that the mill girls were replaced by “predominantly Irish Catholics, who traveled to America during the Great Potato Famine” but does not discuss a relationship between them.
Question analysis
This question quotes a sentence from paragraph 5 of the Lowell article about Irish families, who arrived in large numbers in the 1840s but had been part of the city since its birth. Students explain how the sentence contributes to the development of the passage's ideas, and because it packs several groups and periods into one line, they must keep straight who did what and when.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how one sentence develops a passage's ideas is a core grade 7 skill. The sentence is long but its meaning is direct, and the text around it settles most of the choices, so the demand is typical.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Complex sentences minor
- Evidence in several places minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 15, 764 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 103 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
Once the long sentence is untangled, its point is plain: the Irish were in Lowell from the start and built its canals, mills and boardinghouses. The likeliest slip is reading “from its birth” as founding the city, which paragraph 2 credits to Boston merchants. The other wrong choices invent a welcome or a partnership that the surrounding sentences contradict or never mention, so a quick check of paragraph 5 settles them.
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
The 37-word sentence moves through three times at once, the influx “during this time,” the city's birth and the years before the mill girls arrived, so who did what and when must be sorted out. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
Ruling out the founding choice needs paragraph 2's “Boston merchants who founded Lowell,” and ruling out a warm welcome needs the next sentence's “slow to welcome Irish immigrants.” (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Put the quoted sentence into your own words, then check each choice against the sentences around it in paragraph 5 and against what earlier paragraphs say about the city's beginnings.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
A Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Reads “part of the city's history from its birth” and building the canals as founding the city, though paragraph 2 says Boston merchants founded Lowell in 1821.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Remembers that the hostility toward Irish Catholics “eventually disappeared” and overlooks “Initially, … slow to welcome,” turning a gradual change into a ready acceptance.
D Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Sees the Irish and the mill girls named in one sentence and assumes they worked side by side, a relationship the passage never describes; the Irish later replaced them.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This structure question asks what one sentence adds to the passage’s ideas. First you need to understand the sentence. It is long and jumps between three times, so take it apart piece by piece.
Break the sentence into parts
The sentence is in paragraph 5. Here are its three parts:
- “Although Lowell received an influx of Irish families during this time”: an influx is a big wave of people arriving, and “this time” means the 1840s.
- “the Irish were a part of the city’s history from its birth”: its birth means the city’s very beginning.
- “they built Lowell’s historic canals, mills, and boardinghouses”: this happened before the mill girls came.
Say it in your own words
Put together, the sentence says: Many Irish families came in the 1840s, but the Irish had been in Lowell from the start. They built its canals, mills and boardinghouses. Without those canals and mills, there would be no industrial city. So the sentence shows how much the Irish mattered to Lowell’s story.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. Being there “from its birth” is not the same as founding the city. Paragraph 2 names the founders: “The Boston merchants who founded Lowell in 1821.”
- B is right. The Irish were there from the start and built the city’s mills and canals. That is an important role.
- C is wrong. The very next sentence says “Lowell’s Protestant community was slow to welcome Irish immigrants.” So they were not readily, or easily, accepted.
- D is wrong. The passage never says the Irish and the mill girls worked together. Later, the Irish replaced them.
Watch out: “From its birth” can sound like they started the city, which leads to A. Check paragraph 2 to see who founded Lowell.
Choose the answer
The sentence makes clear that the Irish helped build Lowell from its first days. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong answer, because the sentence links the Irish to the city’s “birth.” But being part of a city from the start is different from founding it. Boston merchants founded Lowell. The Irish built its canals and mills. B fits, because it names that important role without stretching it.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Massachusetts: Lowell National Historical Park” as printed (page 50)
Question 8 of 92
2026 Practice Test A English, question 41Uses the passage above: “Massachusetts: Lowell National Historical Park”.
Question
Which sentence best summarizes the mill girls’ experience as the dominant workforce in Lowell?
- AThe mill girls were eager to leave their domestic duties and small towns behind, so they went to work in the mills of Lowell.
- BOriginally, the mill girls were satisfied to work in Lowell, but as they left their jobs at the Lowell mills, immigrants arrived to fill the empty positions.
- CYoung women left home to work in the Lowell mills, but the mill girls soon became dissatisfied with the working conditions and rigid boardinghouse rules.
- DThe mill girls embraced city life when they came to work in Lowell’s mills, but when their protests about unfavorable working conditions went unanswered, they left.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks for the sentence that best summarizes the mill girls’ time as the dominant workforce in Lowell.
A. Incorrect. While the passage explains that mill girls were initially eager to leave the domestic duties of life in rural areas, the summary sentence does not address the details about the mill girls’ time working in the mills or the changes that led the mill girls to leave the industry.
B. Incorrect. Mill girls initially found satisfaction in the mill work and lifestyle, and when they did leave, immigrants filled the empty jobs. This summary sentence, however, does not address the details about the mill girls’ time as the primary workforce in Lowell or the circumstances that led them to leave their jobs in the mid-1800s.
C. Incorrect. Mill girls did leave home to work in the Lowell mills, and they did grow dissatisfied over time, but this summary sentence does not include details about the mill girls’ actions to improve the working conditions.
D. CORRECT. This sentence summary best captures the mill girls’ experience as outlined in paragraphs 3 and 4. The sentence concisely summarizes both the women’s initial excitement about the opportunity to live independently (“Women found that Lowell’s mills offered monthly wages for their services and provided them room and board” [paragraph 3]) and their eventual inability to secure better working conditions (“When their demands went unheard, the women left Lowell, and immigrant groups replaced them in the workforce” [paragraph 4]).
Question analysis
This summary question asks which sentence best sums up the experience of the Yankee mill girls during the years they were Lowell's main workforce. Students must pull together the account spread over paragraphs 3 and 4, and every choice is a two-part sentence that sounds accurate, so each must be checked for what it includes, what it leaves out and what it gets slightly wrong.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Summarizing part of a text is a grade 7 standard, usually tested with one clearly complete choice. Here all four summaries are long, two-part and largely accurate, so ranking them by completeness and precision asks more than typical grade 7 work.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- Every choice must be checked moderate
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Evidence in several places minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 15, 764 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 116 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
This is a completeness question: every summary is built from true pieces of paragraphs 3 and 4, and the right one is the only one that runs from arrival to departure with the cause in between. Students who stop at dissatisfaction feel they have the whole arc, because the turn against working conditions is the story's middle. Writing a one-line summary first, with a beginning, a turning point and an end, makes the gaps in the others easy to see.
Every choice must be checked moderate Choosing the answer
All four summaries are two-part sentences of 24 to 27 words that sound accurate, so each has to be checked for what it leaves out: the arrival, the wage cuts and protests, or the departure. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The dissatisfaction summary shares the key's shape, women coming to the mills and then turning against their working conditions; it differs only in the ending, where the key has unanswered protests and the women leaving. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
The mill girls' story runs from paragraph 3, on why they came and how they lived, to paragraph 4, on wage cuts, strikes and their departure in the 1840s. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Write your own one-sentence summary of paragraphs 3 and 4 before reading the choices, then compare each choice with it claim by claim, including its words about timing and cause.
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.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Covers only why the women came, leaving domestic work and small towns behind, and stops before their years as the workforce, the wage cuts and their leaving.
B Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Gets the start and the replacement by immigrants right but drops the wage cuts, protests and strikes that paragraph 4 gives as the reason the women left.
C Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Keeps the arrival and the growing discontent, adding the minor boardinghouse rules, but leaves out the protests and the women leaving, and “soon” skips the years before the 1840s wage cuts.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This question asks for the best summary. A summary retells the main events in a few words. It covers the beginning, the middle and the end. Here you sum up the mill girls’ time as Lowell’s main workforce. Their story is in paragraphs 3 and 4.
Find the beginning of their story
Paragraph 3 says the women came for “independent industrial city life.” They found that the mills “offered monthly wages for their services and provided them room and board.” Room and board means a place to live and meals. So at first, they were glad to come. Their days were long, though, and the rules were strict.
Find the middle and the end
Paragraph 4 gives the turning point. In the 1840s, profits fell and the mills cut wages. “These wage cuts, deteriorating working conditions, and long workdays” led the women to protest and strike. Deteriorating means getting worse. Then comes the end: “When their demands went unheard, the women left Lowell.”
Check each choice
- A is wrong. It tells only why they came. It stops before their years at work and their leaving.
- B is wrong. It has the start and the end. But it skips the middle: the wage cuts and protests that made them leave.
- C is wrong. It has the start and the unhappy middle, but no protests and no leaving. Also, “soon” is off, since the trouble came years later, in the 1840s.
- D is right. It covers all three parts: they embraced city life, protested bad conditions, and left when no one listened. Embraced means happily welcomed.
Watch out: C feels complete because it ends with the women unhappy. But their story doesn’t end there. They protested, and then they left.
Choose the answer
Only one summary runs from the mill girls’ arrival to their leaving, with the cause in between. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong answer. Like D, it starts with the women coming to the mills and then growing unhappy. But it stops there. It leaves out the protests and the women leaving Lowell, which is how their time as the main workforce ended. D tells the whole story.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 9 of 92
2026 Practice Test A English, question 42Uses the passage above: “Massachusetts: Lowell National Historical Park”.
Question
The reason Lowell lost its status as an industrial leader is best illustrated through the
- Adescription of poor living and working conditions.
- Bexplanation for why some immigrant groups struggled to live together.
- Ccomparison with other mills that used modern methods.
- Dinformation about the mills opening temporarily during World War II.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks for the reason that best illustrates why Lowell lost its status as an industrial leader.
A. Incorrect. While the passage discusses the “long work hours, low wages, and poor living conditions in the city’s crowded tenements” (paragraph 6) in Lowell, these details highlight the living and working conditions of immigrant groups. The author does not state that poor living and working conditions are the reason Lowell lost its status as a “model of industry.”
B. Incorrect. Paragraph 5 in the passage acknowledges that there was some tension between the different ethnic and religious groups in Lowell, but this idea is not what led to Lowell’s decline as a “model of industry.”
C. CORRECT. When Lowell was initially established, the mills in the city thrived because of their advanced manufacturing methods (“gaining global recognition for its state-of-the-art technology, innovative canal and dam system, [and] mill architecture” [paragraph 1]). However, manufacturing technology changed and improved over time, and many mill owners chose to close the mills rather than modernize them, resulting in Lowell’s loss of status as a “model of industry” (“The city officially began to close down its mills in the 1920s and ’30s after Lowell’s outdated mills could no longer compete against the state-of-the-art cotton mills in other communities” [paragraph 6]).
D. Incorrect. The details about the temporary revival of the mills during World War II do not show why Lowell is no longer considered a “model of industry.” The mills were used briefly during wartime because of an increased need for supplies, but this use of the mills was short-lived.
Question analysis
Why did Lowell lose its place as an industrial leader, a decline that ended with its last mill closing by the mid-1950s? This evidence question asks which part of the article best illustrates the reason, so students must find where the passage explains the cause and match it to a choice worded in general terms, while other late details compete for attention.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Using a text to explain a cause is typical grade 7 work. The reason is stated directly near the end of the passage, but the choices name it in abstract terms, so a careful match is needed, as in ordinary grade 7 reading.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- The right answer is reworded moderate
- Complex sentences minor
- Evidence in several places minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 15, 764 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 50 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
The reason is stated, but in a sentence that pairs it with worsening working conditions, and conditions get far more space in the passage, from paragraph 4's wage cuts to paragraph 6's crowded tenements. Students who match the choices to familiar words land on the conditions, which the passage presents as a result of companies not reinvesting. The key has to be recognized in new wording, as a comparison with modern mills elsewhere.
The right answer is reworded moderate Choosing the answer
The key's “comparison with other mills that used modern methods” rewords “could no longer compete against the state-of-the-art cotton mills,” while wrong choices repeat the text's “poor living conditions,” “working conditions” and “World War II.” (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
The 47-word sentence that gives the reason joins two clauses under one “after,” outdated mills that “could no longer compete” and working conditions that “continued to decline,” so both can look like causes. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
The cause echoes earlier hints, paragraph 1's “state-of-the-art technology” and paragraph 4's trouble competing with “other New England communities,” which confirm that competition is the passage's explanation. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Find the sentence that tells why Lowell's mills shut down, restate the cause in your own words, then choose the description that matches that cause rather than a detail that merely appears nearby.
Traps
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Finds the sentence about the closings but takes its declining working conditions as the reason, though they follow from companies no longer reinvesting, the same neglect that left the mills outdated.
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Recasts paragraph 5's hostility between Yankee Protestants and Irish Catholics, which “eventually disappeared,” as a struggle among immigrant groups, though the passage never ties it to the decline.
D True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Picks the World War II detail because it belongs to the mills' last years, but a “brief resurgence” describes a short revival, not why Lowell fell behind.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This evidence question asks why Lowell lost its place as an industrial leader. First find where the passage gives the reason. Then pick the choice that matches it, even if it uses different words.
Find the reason in paragraph 6
Look near the end of the passage, where the mills close. Paragraph 6 says the city began to close its mills “after Lowell’s outdated mills could no longer compete against the state-of-the-art cotton mills in other communities.” This is the reason the passage gives.
Put the reason in plain words
Outdated means old-fashioned. State-of-the-art means the newest and best. To compete is to keep up with rivals. So mills in other places had newer machines, and Lowell’s old mills couldn’t keep up. That is a comparison: Lowell’s mills next to more modern mills elsewhere. It is a big change, too. In paragraph 1, Lowell was famous for its own “state-of-the-art technology.”
Rule out the working conditions
Choice A is the hard one to rule out. The same sentence says working conditions got worse “as Lowell’s companies stopped reinvesting in their mills.” Reinvesting means putting money back in, for repairs and new machines. Mills that get no new money also fall out of date. So the worse conditions came along with the decline. Falling behind modern mills elsewhere is what cost Lowell its lead. The passage’s longer descriptions of poor conditions, in paragraphs 4 and 6, tell how hard life was for workers. They don’t explain why the mills closed.
Check the other choices
- B is wrong. The passage tells of tension between Yankee Protestants and Irish Catholics, which “eventually disappeared.” It never links this to the mills closing.
- C is right. It matches the reason: Lowell’s mills fell behind more modern mills.
- D is wrong. The World War II “brief resurgence” was a short comeback. It doesn’t explain why Lowell fell behind.
Watch out: A repeats words from the passage, so it feels safe. But matching the words is not the same as matching the reason.
Choose the answer
The passage says Lowell’s outdated mills could not keep up with modern mills in other places. Choice C names that comparison. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong answer, because the closing sentence also says “working conditions continued to decline.” But the passage ties that to the companies no longer spending on their mills. A leader loses its place when others get ahead. C names that: other mills used modern methods, and Lowell’s did not.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 10 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 9Passage A Miracle Mile
A Miracle Mile
In the 1950s people compared running one mile in four minutes to scaling Mount Everest and nicknamed the feat a “dream mile.” Although such an accomplishment was considered humanly impossible, several elite runners aimed to break that supposedly impenetrable barrier. One of them was a twenty-five-year-old medical student named Roger Bannister.
Roger Bannister had tasted failure during the 1952 Olympics. There, he was favored to win the 1,500-meter competition, a distance slightly shorter than a mile, but he finished in a dismal fourth place instead. Bannister’s performance was a disappointment for him and his country, Great Britain. Determined to redeem himself, Bannister postponed his plans to retire from racing and focused on the ultimate prize—breaking the four-minute-mile barrier.
Bannister attacked the elusive milestone with a positive attitude and logical planning. The amateur athlete decided to use intensive interval training to develop endurance and speed. For these workouts, Bannister ran an interval of ten consecutive laps on a quarter-mile track, aiming for sixty seconds each lap. In between intervals, he let his body recover for two minutes.
By early 1954, Bannister had succeeded in lowering his quarter-mile pace to sixty-one seconds, but he had to shave off at least one more second in order to reach his target. Frustrated by the plateau he had reached, Bannister took a break from training and went mountain climbing for three days. The rest from running permitted his muscles to recuperate and left him feeling refreshed. When Bannister returned to the track, he completed ten quarter-mile-long intervals at fifty-nine seconds each. He finally felt prepared to attempt to break the world record.
As a member of the Amateur Athletic Association (AAA), Bannister joined the AAA team for a track meet against Oxford University. The event took place on a cinder track in Oxford on May 6, 1954. Bannister and his two AAA teammates, Chris Chataway and Chris Brasher, were close friends and frequent running partners. Chataway and Brasher agreed to help Bannister accomplish his goal by being his “rabbits.”
In track and field, rabbits are runners who enter the race solely to pace a teammate for a segment of the course. Typically, a runner settles in behind the rabbit and allows the rabbit to set an appropriate tempo. Additionally, by running behind the rabbit, the runner conserves about 15 percent of his or her effort. When the starting pistol fired, Brasher pounced into the lead, and Bannister followed behind his first rabbit.
Propelled by the excitement, Bannister lost his instinctive feel for his pace and shouted “Faster!” at Brasher. Brasher, however, remained composed and maintained his current steady but grueling pace, completing the first two laps in a desirable one minute and fifty-eight seconds. Then Chataway surged forward, leading Bannister at this same punishing rate for another lap and a half. At the beginning of the back straightaway of the track, Bannister bolted past Chataway. Bannister said, “I felt that the moment of a lifetime had come. There was no pain, only a great unity of movement and aim.” Bannister crossed the finish line in 3 minutes 59.4 seconds. The ecstatic crowd erupted the moment the timekeeper announced the word “three.”
Soon after Bannister’s achievement, four other athletes matched his performance. A new mindset had taken root among runners. Over the years, the record continued to fall. However, the current record, 3 minutes 43.13 seconds, has stood unbroken since 1999. Some question whether this record represents the limits of human ability. But perhaps there is another Bannister, an athlete who, with willpower and dedication, will accomplish the miraculous.
Question
Read these sentences from paragraph 7.
Bannister said, “I felt that the moment of a lifetime had come. There was no pain, only a great unity of movement and aim.”
The sentences contribute to the development of ideas in the passage by showing that Bannister
- Aknew that he was about to achieve the goal he had worked toward.
- Bwas no longer experiencing personal disappointment from his past failure in the Olympics.
- Cfelt grateful to his teammates for helping him take the lead.
- Dwas satisfied that his training had helped him perfect his running technique.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how the sentences from paragraph 7 contribute to the development of ideas in the passage.
A. CORRECT. The sentences from paragraph 7 show that toward the end of the race, Bannister knew that the goal of breaking the four-minute-mile barrier was within his grasp and that he had the focus necessary to achieve it. The sentence following Bannister’s quotation states that he did indeed meet his goal, crossing “the finish line in 3 minutes 59.4 seconds” (paragraph 7).
B. Incorrect. The feelings Bannister expressed in the sentences from paragraph 7 did not erase those feelings related to his loss at the 1952 Olympics, which were what drove him to the achievement he was about to make.
C. Incorrect. While the quotation states that Bannister felt “unity,” this pertains to his running, not to his work with the team. The sentences from paragraph 7 capture Bannister’s focus on his chance to break the barrier and what he was feeling at that moment.
D. Incorrect. The sentences from paragraph 7 express Bannister’s realization that he was on the verge of reaching a goal. The sentences show that in the seconds before crossing the finish line, Bannister was fully focused on the end goal and was not thinking about his training or his running technique.
Question analysis
This question quotes Roger Bannister’s own words from his famous race, “I felt that the moment of a lifetime had come,” and asks how they contribute to the development of ideas in “A Miracle Mile.” Students interpret an athlete’s description of a feeling and decide what it shows about him. Each choice links the quotation to a different part of his story.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining what a quoted sentence adds to a passage is everyday grade 7 work, and these two sentences are short. Their abstract phrase “a great unity of movement and aim” takes some interpreting, which keeps the demand typical rather than light.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Figurative or literary language minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 587 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 93 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
Bannister’s words describe a feeling, and each choice explains it by a different part of his story. The right reading comes from where the quotation sits: on the back straight, seconds from the finish, so “the moment of a lifetime” is the record within reach. Students who take “unity of movement” as polished form, or “no pain” as the end of his Olympic hurt, tie the quotation to his training or his past instead of to this race.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The quotation never names the record; students must link “the moment of a lifetime had come” to the four-minute goal and to the finish in 3 minutes 59.4 seconds reported right after it. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Figurative or literary language minor Understanding the question
“A great unity of movement and aim” is abstract, and “There was no pain” can be heard as emotional relief, so the words invite readings about technique, teamwork or old disappointment. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Read the quotation together with the sentences around it in paragraph 7, put Bannister’s state of mind into your own words, and test each choice against what the quotation itself says.
Traps
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Dictionary meaning, not meaning here: A common meaning of the word that does not fit its use in this text.
The wrong answers, classified
B Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Hears “There was no pain” as the end of the hurt from his 1952 fourth place, but the pain meant is the strain of the race, and the quotation never looks back.
C Dictionary meaning, not meaning here (Perfetti, 2007)
Takes “unity” in its everyday sense of people pulling together and credits his rabbits, though the unity is of his own “movement and aim,” just after he passed Chataway to run alone.
D Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Brings in the training of paragraphs 3 and 4 and reads “unity of movement” as perfected technique, but the quotation records a feeling during the race, not a verdict on his preparation.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what Bannister’s words show about him at that moment in the race. To answer, you need to know where the quotation comes. So read the sentences just before it and just after it.
Find where the quotation comes
Paragraph 7 tells the story of the race. Just before the quotation, “Bannister bolted past Chataway.” Bolted means ran off suddenly and fast. Chataway was his second rabbit, a teammate who set the pace. Now Bannister was in front, near the end. Just after the quotation, “Bannister crossed the finish line in 3 minutes 59.4 seconds.” That is under four minutes.
Put his words in your own words
He says “I felt that the moment of a lifetime had come.” The moment of a lifetime is the most important moment a person ever has. For Bannister, that was breaking the four-minute mile. “A great unity of movement and aim” means his body and his goal were working as one. He could feel that he was about to do it.
Check each choice
- A fits. He senses that his big goal is about to happen.
- B does not fit. “There was no pain” means he felt no strain in the race. He is not thinking back to 1952.
- C does not fit. The unity is of his own “movement and aim,” not of his team. He had just passed Chataway to run alone.
- D does not fit. The words describe a feeling during the race. They say nothing about his training or his technique, which means his way of running.
Watch out: D is tempting because “unity of movement” sounds like perfect running form. But Bannister is not judging his training here. He is feeling the big moment arrive.
Choose the answer
The quotation shows Bannister sensing that his goal was near, and the next sentence shows he reached it. So the answer is A, “knew that he was about to achieve the goal he had worked toward.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest wrong choice. His training did help him, and he was running well. But the quotation is about a feeling: “the moment of a lifetime had come.” It looks ahead to the finish, not back at his practice. A matches that feeling of a goal about to be reached.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “A Miracle Mile” as printed (page 13)
Question 11 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 10Uses the passage above: “A Miracle Mile”.
Question
Which sentence best supports the idea that Bannister needed an alternative to “logical planning” (paragraph 3) in order to accomplish his goal?
- A“Bannister’s performance was a disappointment for him and his country, Great Britain.” (paragraph 2)
- B“The amateur athlete decided to use intensive interval training to develop endurance and speed.” (paragraph 3)
- C“For these workouts, Bannister ran an interval of ten consecutive laps on a quarter-mile track, aiming for sixty seconds each lap.” (paragraph 3)
- D“Frustrated by the plateau he had reached, Bannister took a break from training and went mountain climbing for three days.” (paragraph 4)
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks which sentence best supports the idea that Bannister needed an alternative to “logical planning” (paragraph 3) in order to accomplish his goal.
A. Incorrect. The outcome of the 1952 Olympics, referenced in the sentence from paragraph 2, is what prompted Bannister to seek a new goal: “Determined to redeem himself, Bannister . . . focused on the ultimate prize—breaking the four-minute-mile barrier” (paragraph 2).
B. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 3 does not show an alternative to Bannister’s training plan to “develop endurance and speed” (paragraph 3) and his focus on using logical planning in order to accomplish his goal.
C. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 3 focuses on details of his training plan, explaining the “intensive interval training” (paragraph 3) that Bannister used to build his endurance and speed, not an alternative form of preparation.
D. CORRECT. The sentence from paragraph 4 explains that Bannister reached a point where he could not improve his time despite the strict training plan he had created. Taking a break from his training to spend time mountain climbing “permitted his muscles to recuperate and left him feeling refreshed” (paragraph 4).
Question analysis
This textual evidence question on “A Miracle Mile” asks which sentence best supports the idea that Roger Bannister needed an alternative to the “logical planning” described in paragraph 3. Students must understand what his plan was before they can recognize a departure from it. The four sentences come from paragraphs 2 to 4, which cover his Olympic loss and his training.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Matching a sentence to an idea is standard grade 7 evidence work, and the four sentences come from three short, plain paragraphs. The idea itself is worded abstractly, so students must first decide what an alternative to “logical planning” would look like.
- 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
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 587 words; question and choices: about grade 12, 92 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A wrong paragraph number in the explanation was corrected.
- 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
The question turns on one decision: the interval training is the logical plan, so a sentence describing it cannot show an alternative to it. Once that is settled, three days of mountain climbing stand out as the only break from the plan. Students lose the point when they read “alternative” loosely and pick the sentence that introduces the training, or when they treat the Olympic disappointment as the moment his methods had to change.
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The stem never says what the “logical planning” was; students must see that it is the interval training of paragraph 3, so the alternative has to be a step away from that training. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
The stem points to paragraph 3, where two of the four sentences sit, but the departure from the plan comes in paragraph 4, after Bannister stalls at sixty-one seconds a lap. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: First reread paragraph 3 to see what Bannister’s “logical planning” was, then ask of each sentence whether it shows that plan or something different from it.
Traps
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
The wrong answers, classified
A True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Picks the 1952 disappointment, an accurate sentence that explains why Bannister took up the goal, but it comes before the plan and shows no step away from it.
B Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Takes the decision to use intensive interval training as the alternative, missing that this training is the logical plan itself, so the sentence shows the plan, not a departure from it.
C Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Chooses the workout details, ten laps aimed at sixty seconds each, which spell out the plan’s routine rather than any change to it.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The DOE’s explanation of Option C begins “The sentence from paragraph 4 focuses on details of his training plan.” Option C quotes a sentence from paragraph 3 (“For these workouts, Bannister ran an interval of ten consecutive laps on a quarter-mile track, aiming for sixty seconds each lap”) and labels it “(paragraph 3),” and the explanation goes on to describe the “intensive interval training” of paragraph 3. The site now says “The sentence from paragraph 3.” The DOE’s 2021–2022 guide, where this question first appeared, has the same slip.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks for evidence: the sentence that best supports an idea. The idea is that Bannister needed an alternative to his “logical planning.” An alternative is a different way of doing something. So first find out what his plan was. Then look for a sentence where he steps away from it.
Find the logical plan in paragraph 3
Paragraph 3 says “Bannister attacked the elusive milestone with a positive attitude and logical planning.” The next sentence tells what the plan was: “The amateur athlete decided to use intensive interval training to develop endurance and speed.” Interval training means running hard for a set stretch, resting, then running hard again.
Find where the plan stopped working
Paragraph 4 says he got down to sixty-one seconds a lap, but he needed sixty. Then “Frustrated by the plateau he had reached, Bannister took a break from training and went mountain climbing for three days.” A plateau is a point where you stop getting better. Climbing was not part of his plan. Afterward, he ran each lap in fifty-nine seconds.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. It is from paragraph 2. It tells why he chose the goal, before he had any plan.
- B does not fit. Interval training is the logical plan, not an alternative to it.
- C does not fit. It is from paragraph 3. It gives details of the same plan: ten laps, sixty seconds each.
- D fits. He stops training, does something else, and it works.
Watch out: B is tempting because it describes a choice Bannister made. But that choice was the plan itself.
Choose the answer
Only D shows Bannister trying something outside his plan. So the answer is D, “Frustrated by the plateau he had reached, Bannister took a break from training and went mountain climbing for three days.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong choice. It names a decision Bannister made. But that decision, interval training, was his logical plan. The question asks for a step away from the plan. Only D shows him leaving training behind. The rest “permitted his muscles to recuperate,” which means recover.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 12 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 11Uses the passage above: “A Miracle Mile”.
Question
Which sentence from the passage indicates that Bannister nearly made a mistake that would have cost him the world record?
- A“By early 1954, Bannister had succeeded in lowering his quarter-mile pace to sixty-one seconds, but he had to shave off at least one more second in order to reach his target.” (paragraph 4)
- B“When the starting pistol fired, Brasher pounced into the lead, and Bannister followed behind his first rabbit.” (paragraph 6)
- C“Propelled by the excitement, Bannister lost his instinctive feel for his pace and shouted ‘Faster!’ at Brasher.” (paragraph 7)
- D“At the beginning of the back straightaway of the track, Bannister bolted past Chataway.” (paragraph 7)
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks which sentence indicates that Bannister nearly made a mistake that would have cost him the world record.
A. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 4 describes a challenge Bannister faced during his training period, when he used “intensive interval training to develop endurance and speed” (paragraph 3). Bannister ran laps on a “quarter-mile track” (paragraph 3) and was able to control his pace at this time—unlike during the actual race to break the record.
B. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 6 describes the start of the race and Brasher’s role as “first rabbit” for Bannister. Bannister was behind Brasher, following their plan for breaking the record.
C. CORRECT. If Bannister had begun running faster than the “steady but grueling pace” (paragraph 7) set by his “rabbit,” he would likely not have had enough energy to finish the race. As paragraph 6 notes, “the runner conserves about 15 percent of his or her effort” by allowing the rabbit to set the pace. Bannister had “lost his instinctive feel for his pace” (paragraph 7) in the excitement of the race. If he had given in to his impulse to run faster and bypassed the rabbit at that point in the race, it would have cost him energy, and, in turn, the record.
D. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 7 describes how Bannister leaped ahead of Chataway, his second “rabbit,” at the appropriate time in the effort to break the record. Chataway had “surged forward, leading Bannister at this same punishing rate for another lap and a half” (paragraph 7) before Bannister moved past him.
Question analysis
This textual evidence question asks which sentence from “A Miracle Mile” shows that Roger Bannister nearly made a mistake that could have cost him the world record. The passage never says outright that he slipped, so students must use what it explains about running a race to judge which moment was a real danger. The four choices span both his training and the race itself.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Grade 7 evidence questions usually match a sentence to an idea the text states. This mistake is never named as one, so students must infer which moment put the record at risk, a typical grade 7 inference within a short, clear passage.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Evidence in several places minor
- Every choice must be checked minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 587 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 102 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
The near mistake is easy to miss because it never happens: Brasher ignores the shout, and the race goes on at the planned pace. Students must see that losing his feel for the pace put the record at risk, using what paragraph 6 explains about rabbits. The sudden surge past Chataway sounds rash and the training plateau sounds like a near failure, so students who look for drama or for falling short land on the wrong moment.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The passage never calls the shout of “Faster!” a mistake; students must infer it from “lost his instinctive feel for his pace” and from Brasher’s refusal to change his steady pace. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
Why running faster would have cost the record is explained a paragraph earlier, in paragraph 6, where following a rabbit saves a runner about 15 percent of his or her effort. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Every choice must be checked minor Choosing the answer
Each sentence shows a setback or a bold move, from the training plateau to the final surge, so each has to be judged against the idea of a near mistake. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Strategy: For each quoted sentence, ask whether it shows Bannister doing something that could have hurt his chances, and use what the passage explains about racing to judge how serious it was.
Traps
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
The wrong answers, classified
A Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Takes the 1954 plateau, one second short of the target pace, as the near miss, but it was a setback in training that rest overcame, not a mistake.
B Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Assumes that trailing at the start is a racing error, but paragraph 6 explains that a runner behind a rabbit saves about 15 percent of his or her effort.
D Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads “bolted” as a reckless burst, but Bannister passed Chataway only after his rabbits had paced him for three and a half laps, and the move won him the record.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks for a sentence that shows a near mistake. That is something that almost went wrong. It would have cost Bannister the record. So look for a moment when he did something that could have ruined the race.
Learn how a rabbit helps
Paragraph 6 explains rabbits. They are teammates who run in front to set the speed. It says “Typically, a runner settles in behind the rabbit and allows the rabbit to set an appropriate tempo.” Tempo means speed. Also, “by running behind the rabbit, the runner conserves about 15 percent of his or her effort.” Conserves means saves.
Find the moment that went wrong
Paragraph 7 begins “Propelled by the excitement, Bannister lost his instinctive feel for his pace and shouted” at Brasher to go faster. He lost his natural sense of how fast to run. If Brasher had sped up, Bannister could have used up his energy too soon. But Brasher “remained composed,” which means calm. He kept the steady pace, and that saved the race.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. The training plateau was a setback, not a mistake. A rest fixed it.
- B does not fit. Following a rabbit was the plan. Paragraph 6 shows that it saves effort.
- C fits. Bannister wanted to go faster too early, which could have worn him out.
- D does not fit. Passing Chataway near the end was the right move. It won him the record.
Watch out: D is tempting because “bolted” sounds wild. But he waited until his rabbits had paced him for three and a half laps.
Choose the answer
Only C shows Bannister almost doing something that could have cost him the record. So the answer is C, “Propelled by the excitement, Bannister lost his instinctive feel for his pace and shouted ‘Faster!’ at Brasher.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest wrong choice, since bolting past Chataway was a bold, sudden move. But it came at the right time, and it led to the record. In C, Bannister lost his sense of pace and wanted to speed up too early. Only his rabbit’s calm saved him. That is a near mistake.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 13 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 12Uses the passage above: “A Miracle Mile”.
Question
Bannister’s loss in the 1952 Olympics influenced his decision to pursue breaking the four-minute-mile barrier by
- Aallowing him to recognize his weaknesses and improve his running ability.
- Bprompting him to take a different approach to his regular training.
- Cmotivating him to prove to himself that he could set and achieve a goal.
- Dgiving him the opportunity to reach a goal no runner had ever accomplished.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how Bannister’s loss in the 1952 Olympics influenced his decision to pursue breaking the four-minute-mile barrier.
A. Incorrect. While Bannister recognized the weaknesses that led to his poor performance in the Olympics and worked “to develop endurance and speed” (paragraph 3), the loss made him “determined to redeem himself” (paragraph 2). The desire for redemption influenced Bannister to focus specifically on running a mile in under four minutes, rather than on winning other races or training for other distances.
B. Incorrect. Although Bannister developed an “intensive interval training” plan to improve his “endurance and speed” (paragraph 3), he applied a different approach only after his progress toward a four-minute mile reached a “plateau” (paragraph 4) in 1954. It was his desire to “shave off at least one more second in order to reach his target” (paragraph 4) that prompted him to take a break from interval training and go mountain climbing for three days.
C. CORRECT. Bannister sought to redeem himself after “he finished in a dismal fourth place” at the Olympics (paragraph 2). He thought that his performance “was a disappointment for him and his country, Great Britain,” and he responded by setting a goal to successfully conquer the four-minute mile, which was considered the “ultimate prize” (paragraph 2).
D. Incorrect. Bannister’s loss at the 1952 Olympics motivated him to change his training focus to reaching the “ultimate prize” (paragraph 2) of breaking the four-minute-mile barrier, which no other runner had accomplished. His loss at the Olympics did not present him with a specific opportunity to reach this goal.
Question analysis
This cause-and-effect question on “A Miracle Mile” asks how Roger Bannister’s disappointing finish at the 1952 Olympics shaped his decision to chase the four-minute mile. Students trace how one event led to a choice. The passage gives the reason in a single phrase, and the choices restate it alongside effects that sound believable for any athlete after a loss.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how one event influenced a person’s decision is standard grade 7 work, and the cause is set out in one short paragraph. The choices put the passage’s ideas in new words, so students must match meaning rather than phrases.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- The right answer is reworded moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 587 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 64 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
The answer sits in a single phrase, but the choices compete with stories that fit any athlete after a loss, such as learning from weaknesses or changing a routine. Both sound right because Bannister did train hard afterward, yet the passage ties the loss only to his wish to redeem himself, and the change of routine comes later, from the 1954 plateau. Students who keep to the question’s focus, the decision to chase the record, find a motive rather than a method.
The right answer is reworded moderate Choosing the answer
Paragraph 2 says the loss left Bannister “determined to redeem himself”; the right choice recasts this as proving to himself he could set and reach a goal, while a wrong one reuses the passage’s word “training.” (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
“Redeem himself,” to make up for a failure, is the key phrase, and a student unsure of it may not see that the loss gave him a reason rather than a lesson. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Find the sentence in paragraph 2 that tells how Bannister responded to the 1952 loss, restate it in your own words, and compare each choice with your restatement.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Supplies a familiar sports lesson, that a loss shows an athlete what to fix, but paragraph 2 makes the loss a reason to redeem himself and names no weaknesses.
B Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Borrows the change of routine from paragraph 4, where the 1954 plateau, not the Olympic loss, sent Bannister off to climb mountains for three days.
D Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Gets right that no runner had yet broken four minutes, but the loss opened no door for him; finishing fourth gave him a motive, not a chance.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks about cause and effect. The cause is Bannister’s loss at the 1952 Olympics. The effect is his decision to chase the four-minute mile. You need to find how the first led to the second.
Read paragraph 2
Paragraph 2 says he “finished in a dismal fourth place instead.” Dismal means very disappointing. Then it says “Bannister’s performance was a disappointment for him and his country, Great Britain. Determined to redeem himself, Bannister postponed his plans to retire from racing and focused on the ultimate prize.” The prize was breaking the four-minute mile.
Understand what redeem himself means
To redeem yourself means to make up for a failure. You show that you are better than your worst moment. Bannister had let himself down. So he set a huge new goal to prove what he could do. The loss gave him a reason to try, which is a motive.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. Paragraph 2 never names any weaknesses he found.
- B does not fit. He changed his routine in paragraph 4, in 1954. That was because of a plateau, not the Olympic loss.
- C fits. He wanted to make up for the loss by reaching a big goal.
- D does not fit. Losing did not give him a chance at the record. It gave him a reason.
Watch out: A sounds like a common sports lesson: losing shows you what to fix. But the passage does not say that.
Choose the answer
The loss made Bannister “determined to redeem himself” with a new goal. So the answer is C, “motivating him to prove to himself that he could set and achieve a goal.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong choice. Athletes often learn from a loss, so it sounds right. But paragraph 2 never says what Bannister was bad at. It says the loss made him “determined to redeem himself.” That is about motivation, so C fits better.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 14 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 13Uses the passage above: “A Miracle Mile”.
Question
How did interval training affect Bannister’s performance?
- AIt helped him learn how to moderate his pace while running.
- BIt helped him conserve effort when running with teammates.
- CIt helped him improve his pace and stamina while running.
- DIt helped him decrease his recovery time after an intense run.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how interval training affected Bannister’s performance.
A. Incorrect. The moderation of his pace was achieved through the use of “rabbits,” described in paragraph 6, more than through his method of interval training.
B. Incorrect. Bannister worked individually during the interval training period and then paced himself with a two-person team of “rabbits,” which were introduced in paragraph 5 and explained in paragraph 6. It was the use of “rabbits” during the race that helped him conserve some of his effort, not the interval training.
C. CORRECT. As paragraph 3 states, the goal of Bannister’s training program was to “develop endurance and speed,” which are synonyms of the words “stamina” and “pace.”
D. Incorrect. Although Bannister “let his body recover for two minutes” (paragraph 3) during interval training, this was not the primary effect of the training on Bannister’s performance. Instead, interval training allowed him to develop greater endurance and speed.
Question analysis
This question asks how interval training affected Roger Bannister’s performance as he prepared to run a mile in under four minutes, according to “A Miracle Mile.” It tests finding a detail the passage states and recognizing it in a choice that may use different words. The passage describes several parts of his preparation and race, so students must keep track of which one the question is about.
- Grade level
- Grade 6 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Below grade 7 Below typical grade 7 demand: the passage states the purpose of the training in a single sentence. A grade 7 student only needs to locate it and compare the choices with it, without inferring anything.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 1, recall and reproduction · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 587 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 48 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- The DOE’s 2026 explanations appendix skips this question; the explanation and answer key here are the DOE’s own, from its 2021–2022 guide (question 40), relettered.
- 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
Paragraph 3 states what the training was for, so the task is to match that sentence and ignore details from elsewhere. The rabbits of paragraph 6, who set Bannister’s tempo and save his effort, supply two tempting effects that belong to the race, not the workouts. The two-minute rests sit in the training paragraph itself, so a student skimming for “recover” can mistake part of the method for its result.
A very close wrong answer minor Choosing the answer
The choice about moderating his pace and the right one both concern pace; only the right one matches the training’s stated aim, to “develop endurance and speed.” (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
The right answer is reworded minor Choosing the answer
The right choice turns “endurance and speed” into stamina and pace, while two wrong ones reuse the passage’s own words, “conserves” effort from paragraph 6 and “recover” from paragraph 3. (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Strategy: Find the paragraph that introduces interval training, note what the training was meant to develop, and pick the choice that means the same thing.
Traps
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Word match: Repeats striking words or phrases from the text, so it looks supported, but its meaning does not fit the question.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Sees the sixty-second laps as practice in holding a pace, but the training aimed to build speed and endurance, and in the race his rabbits had to hold his tempo for him.
B Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Matches the saving of “about 15 percent of his or her effort,” which paragraph 6 credits to running behind a rabbit in the race, not to interval training.
D Word match (Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Spots “recover” in paragraph 3 and picks the choice about recovery time, though the two-minute rest is part of the workout, and nothing says it grew shorter.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation and answer key: The 2026 printable test includes this question (Passage Set 2, Item 6), but the explanations appendix skips it: it explains only five of the six questions on “A Miracle Mile.” The question is question 40 of the DOE’s NYC Guide to the SHSAT for 2022 Admissions (the 2021–2022 guide, page 165), with the same stem and options lettered E–H. The explanation is the guide’s (page 218) and its key is G; both are relettered E–H to A–D here, so the key is C.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what interval training did for Bannister’s running. So find the paragraph that first describes interval training. Look for what it was meant to build.
Find interval training in paragraph 3
Paragraph 3 says “The amateur athlete decided to use intensive interval training to develop endurance and speed.” In each workout he ran ten laps, aiming for sixty seconds a lap. Then he rested for two minutes and ran again. That is what an interval is here: a hard stretch of running between rests.
See what the training did
Endurance means being able to keep going for a long time. Another word for it is stamina. Speed is how fast you run, which is your pace. Paragraph 4 shows the result. By early 1954, he had lowered “his quarter-mile pace to sixty-one seconds.” He was getting faster.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. To moderate your pace means to keep it steady and not too fast. In the race, his rabbits did that for him. He even lost his feel for his pace.
- B does not fit. Saving effort came from running behind rabbits in the race (paragraph 6).
- C fits. Stamina and pace are other words for endurance and speed.
- D does not fit. He rested two minutes between runs. Nothing says that rest got shorter.
Watch out: D is tempting because paragraph 3 mentions rest: “he let his body recover for two minutes.” But the rest is part of the workout, not a result of it.
Choose the answer
Interval training built Bannister’s speed and endurance. So the answer is C, “It helped him improve his pace and stamina while running.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong choice, because it is also about pace. But the training aimed “to develop endurance and speed,” not to keep his pace in check. In the race, Bannister “lost his instinctive feel for his pace,” and Brasher had to keep it steady. C matches what the training was for.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 15 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 14Passage Excerpt from In Search of the Unknown
Excerpt from In Search of the Unknown
by Robert W. Chambers
It was at that time the policy of the trustees and officers of the Zoological Gardens neither to employ collectors nor to send out expeditions in search of specimens. The society decided to depend upon voluntary contributions, and I was always busy, part of the day, in dictating answers to correspondents who wrote offering their services as hunters of big game, collectors of all sorts of fauna, trappers, snarers, and also to those who offered specimens for sale, usually at exorbitant rates.
To the proprietors of . . . mangy lynxes, moth-eaten coyotes, and dancing bears I returned courteous but uncompromising refusals—of course, first submitting all such letters, together with my replies, to Professor Farrago.
One day towards the end of May, however, just as I was leaving Bronx Park to return to town, Professor Lesard, of the reptilian department, called out to me that Professor Farrago wanted to see me a moment; so I . . . retraced my steps to the temporary, wooden building occupied by Professor Farrago, general superintendent of the Zoological Gardens. The professor, who was sitting at his desk before a pile of letters and replies submitted for approval by me, pushed his glasses down and looked over them at me with a whimsical smile that suggested amusement, impatience, annoyance, and perhaps a faint trace of apology.
“Now, here’s a letter,” he said, with a deliberate gesture towards a sheet of paper impaled on a file—“a letter that I suppose you remember.” He disengaged the sheet of paper and handed it to me.
“Oh yes,” I replied, with a shrug; “of course the man is mistaken—or—”
“Or what?” demanded Professor Farrago, tranquilly, wiping his glasses.
“—Or a liar,” I replied.
After a silence he leaned back in his chair and bade me read the letter to him again, and I did so with a contemptuous tolerance for the writer, who must have been either a very innocent victim or a very stupid swindler. I said as much to Professor Farrago, but, to my surprise, he appeared to waver.
“I suppose,” he said, with his near-sighted, embarrassed smile, “that nine hundred and ninety-nine men in a thousand would throw that letter aside and condemn the writer as a liar or a fool?”
“In my opinion,” said I, “he’s one or the other.”
“He isn’t—in mine,” said the professor, placidly.
“What!” I exclaimed. “Here is a man living all alone on a strip of rock and sand between the wilderness and the sea, who wants you to send somebody to take charge of a bird that doesn’t exist!”
“How do you know,” asked Professor Farrago, “that the bird in question does not exist?”
“It is generally accepted,” I replied, sarcastically, “that the great auk has been extinct for years. Therefore I may be pardoned for doubting that our correspondent possesses a pair of them alive.”
“Oh, you young fellows,” said the professor, smiling wearily, “you embark on a theory for destinations that don’t exist.”
He leaned back in his chair, his amused eyes searching space for the imagery that made him smile.
“Like swimming squirrels, you navigate with the help of Heaven and a stiff breeze, but you never land where you hope to—do you?”
Rather red in the face, I said: “Don’t you believe the great auk to be extinct?”
“Audubon saw the great auk.”
“Who has seen a single specimen since?”
“Nobody—except our correspondent here,” he replied, laughing.
I laughed, too, considering the interview at an end, but the professor went on, coolly:
“Whatever it is that our correspondent has—and I am daring to believe that it is the great auk itself—I want you to secure it for the society.”
When my astonishment subsided my first conscious sentiment was one of pity. Clearly, Professor Farrago was on the verge of dotage—ah, what a loss to the world!
I believe now that Professor Farrago perfectly interpreted my thoughts, but he betrayed neither resentment nor impatience. I drew a chair up beside his desk—there was nothing to do but to obey, and this fool’s errand was none of my conceiving.
Together we made out a list of articles necessary for me and itemized the expenses I might incur, and I set a date for my return, allowing no margin for a successful termination to the expedition.
“Never mind that,” said the professor. “What I want you to do is to get those birds here safely. Now, how many men will you take?”
“None,” I replied, bluntly; “it’s a useless expense, unless there is something to bring back. If there is I’ll wire you, you may be sure.”
“Very well,” said Professor Farrago, good-humoredly, “you shall have all the assistance you may require. Can you leave to-night?”
The old gentleman was certainly prompt. I nodded, half-sulkily, aware of his amusement.
“So,” I said, picking up my hat, “I am to start north to find a place called Black Harbor, where there is a man named Halyard who possesses, among other household utensils, two extinct great auks—”
We were both laughing by this time. I asked him why on earth he credited the assertion of a man he had never before heard of.
“I suppose,” he replied, with the same half-apologetic, half-humorous smile, “it is instinct. I feel, somehow, that this man Halyard has got an auk—perhaps two. I can’t get away from the idea that we are on the eve of acquiring the rarest of living creatures. It’s odd for a scientist to talk as I do; doubtless you’re shocked—admit it, now!”
But I was not shocked; on the contrary, I was conscious that the same strange hope that Professor Farrago cherished was beginning, in spite of me, to stir my pulses, too.
“If he has—” I began, then stopped.
The professor and I looked hard at each other in silence.
“Go on,” he said, encouragingly.
But I had nothing more to say, for the prospect of beholding with my own eyes a living specimen of the great auk produced a series of conflicting emotions within me which rendered speech profanely superfluous.
From IN SEARCH OF THE UNKNOWN by Robert W. Chambers—Public Domain
Audubon: John James Audubon, an ornithologist and artist who created scientific illustrations of birds
dotage: a loss of reasoning brought about by old age
Question
Read paragraph 2 from the excerpt.
To the proprietors of . . . mangy lynxes, moth-eaten coyotes, and dancing bears I returned courteous but uncompromising refusals—of course, first submitting all such letters, together with my replies, to Professor Farrago.
This paragraph helps develop the plot by establishing that the narrator
- Adislikes writing refusal letters for the animals offered to the zoological society.
- Battempts to predict what the professor would say in the refusal letters.
- Cbelieves that many of the animals offered are not acceptable for the zoological society.
- Dresents the professor’s insistence on reviewing the refusal letters.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how paragraph 2 helps develop the plot.
A. Incorrect. As paragraph 1 indicates, writing such letters is one of the main parts of the narrator’s job (“and I was always busy, part of the day, in dictating answers to correspondents”), and he shows no indication of disliking this work. The letters are to inform people whether the zoo will accept their animals.
B. Incorrect. Paragraph 2 indicates that the narrator offers his letters to the professor merely for official approval. At the start of the excerpt, the narrator is confident in his reply and does not anticipate that his response will differ from that of the professor, so he has no need to “predict what the professor would say.”
C. CORRECT. The phrase “uncompromising refusals” in paragraph 2 indicates the confidence that the narrator initially has in his belief that the animals described in the letters are not of value to the society. This confidence is badly shaken as the plot unfolds, as when Professor Farrago states that “ ‘I am daring to believe that it is the great auk itself’ ” (paragraph 23). The narrator’s transition from an attitude of dismissive doubt to one of budding hopefulness is a major part of the plot (“But I was not shocked; on the contrary, I was conscious that the same strange hope that Professor Farrago cherished was beginning, in spite of me, to stir my pulses, too” [paragraph 34]).
D. Incorrect. The narrator does not resent the professor’s review of the letters; instead, the phrase “of course” in paragraph 2 shows that he expects to submit the letters to the professor as part of his job.
Question analysis
In this plot question on an excerpt from Robert W. Chambers’s novel In Search of the Unknown, students read paragraph 2, in which a zoo employee describes answering people who offer animals for sale. The question asks what the paragraph establishes about the narrator. Its old-fashioned vocabulary and its long, dash-broken sentence make the narrator’s attitude harder to pin down.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how one paragraph develops a plot is regular grade 7 work, and this one is quoted in full. Its early-1900s wording, with words such as “proprietors” and “uncompromising,” adds some load but no unusual reasoning.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Hard words moderate
- Complex sentences minor
- The right answer is reworded minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 1066 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 94 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
The paragraph’s attitude sits in its adjectives: lynxes that are “mangy,” coyotes that are “moth-eaten” and refusals that are “uncompromising.” Students who read that scorn as the narrator’s mood about his job, or who hear grumbling in “of course,” choose a feeling about the work instead of a judgment of the animals. The plot point is that the narrator starts out sure the offers are worthless, the confidence the great auk letter is about to test.
Hard words moderate Understanding the question
“Proprietors,” “uncompromising,” “mangy” and “moth-eaten” carry the meaning: the owners of shabby animals get firm refusals, and a student who misses these words cannot tell what the narrator thinks of the offers. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
The paragraph is one inverted sentence that opens with “To the proprietors of,” reaches “I returned” only midway and ends with a dash clause about the professor’s review. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
The right answer is reworded minor Choosing the answer
Three wrong choices repeat the paragraph’s “refusals” and “letters,” while the right one restates the scorn for the animals as a judgment that they do not suit the society. (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Strategy: Paraphrase paragraph 2 in plain modern words, noting what each descriptive word reveals about the narrator, then keep only a choice those words actually support.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Wrong tone or attitude: Misjudges the tone, attitude or point of view, such as reading admiration as criticism, or taking a character's or subject's feelings for the author's.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
A Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Moves the scorn of “mangy” and “moth-eaten” from the animals to the task, though the refusals are “courteous” and paragraph 1 presents answering letters as routine daily work.
B Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Builds a guessing game from his sending each reply to Professor Farrago, though he expects his refusals simply to be approved and nothing shows him second-guessing the professor.
D Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Hears irritation in the dash and “of course,” but the phrase marks the review as routine, and his clash with the professor begins only with the great auk letter.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what paragraph 2 tells you about the narrator, the person telling the story. It also asks how that sets up the plot, the chain of events in a story. The paragraph is one long, old-fashioned sentence. So put it in plain words first.
Put paragraph 2 in plain words
Proprietors are owners. People wrote offering animals to the zoo. The narrator lists some: “mangy lynxes, moth-eaten coyotes, and dancing bears.” Mangy means with patchy, sick-looking fur. Moth-eaten means old and worn out. He sent the owners “courteous but uncompromising refusals.” Courteous means polite. Uncompromising means firm, with no chance of changing his mind.
Decide what it shows about him
The words “mangy” and “moth-eaten” show what he thinks of the animals. To him, they are shabby and not good enough for the zoo. He turns them all down. This sets up the plot. When the letter about the great auk comes, he is ready to reject it too. That is where the story’s conflict begins.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. His refusals are polite, and paragraph 1 shows that answering letters is his everyday job. Nothing says he dislikes it.
- B does not fit. He sends his replies to the professor to be approved. He is not guessing what the professor would say.
- C fits. He judges that the animals offered are not good enough.
- D does not fit. “Of course” shows that the review is normal. He does not resent it, or feel bitter about it.
Watch out: A is tempting because the narrator sounds scornful. But his scorn is for the animals, not for the job.
Choose the answer
Paragraph 2 shows the narrator turning down animals he thinks are unfit. So the answer is C, “believes that many of the animals offered are not acceptable for the zoological society.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong choice. The narrator’s words do sound scornful. But the scorn is aimed at the animals, “mangy” and “moth-eaten,” not at the job of writing letters. His refusals are even “courteous.” C names his real judgment: these animals are not right for the zoo.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from In Search of the Unknown” as printed (page 21)
Question 16 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 16Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from In Search of the Unknown”.
Question
How does the exchange between the professor and the narrator in paragraphs 8–11 contribute to the development of the characters?
- AIt establishes the conflict between the professor and the narrator concerning the validity of the letter.
- BIt suggests a theme of collaboration because the narrator and the professor regularly work together.
- CIt reveals the characters’ traits by contrasting the narrator’s distrust with how easily the professor is deceived by what he reads.
- DIt hints that the resolution will involve the narrator accepting the professor’s opinion about the content of the letter.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how the exchange between the professor and the narrator in paragraphs 8–11 contributes to the development of the characters.
A. CORRECT. Paragraphs 8–11 help develop the characters by revealing the difference between the opinions of the narrator and the professor. The narrator believes without any doubts that Halyard, the man who wrote the letter about the auks, is either “ ‘a liar or a fool’ ” (paragraph 9), while the professor believes in the possibility that the writer of the letter could actually be telling the truth (“I said as much to Professor Farrago, but, to my surprise, he appeared to waver” [paragraph 8]).
B. Incorrect. In paragraph 8, the narrator reacts to the letter writer with “a contemptuous tolerance,” and he is shocked to learn that the professor actually agrees with the man (paragraph 11) whom the narrator has bluntly condemned as a liar or a fool (“ ‘In my opinion,’ said I, ‘he’s one or the other.’ ” [paragraph 10]). The exchange presents an emphatic disagreement between the narrator and the professor, and it does not show them working together in a collaborative manner.
C. Incorrect. Although the narrator initially distrusts the contents of the letter and shows “contemptuous tolerance for the writer” (paragraph 8), the excerpt portrays the professor as experienced and intelligent, not as one who is easily deceived.
D. Incorrect. While the narrator does begin to consider the professor’s perspective at the end of the excerpt, paragraphs 8–11 primarily serve to establish the difference of opinion between the narrator and the professor about the writer of the letter.
Question analysis
This question on the excerpt from In Search of the Unknown asks how a short exchange in paragraphs 8–11, in which the narrator and Professor Farrago discuss a letter about a bird, contributes to the development of the two characters. Students must read what each man says and decide what the exchange adds. Some choices describe the pair accurately in part only.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 The task matches the grade 8 standard on how lines of dialogue reveal character, but the four paragraphs are short and the two speakers’ positions are stated outright, so the demand stays at a typical grade 7 level.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- How, not what minor
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 1066 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 90 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
The four paragraphs are short and the disagreement is plain, so most students see that the men differ about the letter. The difficulty lies in the wording of the choices. One describes the contrast in terms of character, which suits the stem, but calls the professor easily deceived, a judgment only the narrator holds. The right choice speaks of a conflict, which sounds like plot rather than character, so students must trust that the conflict is what reveals the two men.
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The choice that contrasts the narrator’s distrust with an easily deceived professor and the right one both set the men’s views of the letter against each other; they part on whether the professor is fooled. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
How, not what minor Working it out
The stem asks about the characters, while the right choice names a conflict over the letter, so students must see that the disagreement itself is what reveals each man. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The professor’s side is four words, “He isn’t—in mine,” and students must read them as openness to the letter’s truth, set against the narrator’s flat “one or the other.” (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Sum up in a phrase what each man says and does in paragraphs 8–11, then check every part of each choice against those four paragraphs, since a choice can describe one character correctly and the other not.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
The wrong answers, classified
B True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Rests on a true fact, that the narrator submits his work to the professor, but in paragraphs 8–11 the two disagree sharply and nothing shows them cooperating.
C Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Gets the narrator’s distrust right but adopts his view that the professor is gullible, though the professor only declines to call the writer a liar or a fool and stays calm.
D Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Knows that the narrator later comes to share the professor’s hope, in paragraph 34, but in paragraphs 8–11 he still insists the writer is “one or the other.”
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what paragraphs 8–11 show about the two characters. Look at what each man says about the letter. Then compare their views.
Find the narrator’s view
In paragraph 8, the narrator reads the letter with “a contemptuous tolerance for the writer.” Contemptuous means full of scorn. He thinks the writer is “either a very innocent victim or a very stupid swindler.” A swindler is a cheat. In paragraph 10, he says the writer is a liar or a fool: “he’s one or the other.”
Find the professor’s view
The professor does not agree. In paragraph 8, the narrator notices that “to my surprise, he appeared to waver.” To waver means to be unsure. In paragraph 11, the professor answers, “He isn’t—in mine.” He means that in his opinion the writer is not a liar or a fool. So the two men clash over whether the letter is true. A clash like this is a conflict.
Check each choice
- A fits. The two men disagree about whether the letter can be trusted. Validity means whether something is true.
- B does not fit. They do work together, but here they disagree.
- C does not fit. The narrator’s distrust is right, but the professor is not fooled. He calmly refuses to call the writer a liar.
- D does not fit. The narrator starts to hope later, in paragraph 34. In paragraphs 8–11 he does not budge.
Watch out: C is tempting because half of it is true. The narrator does distrust the letter. But the idea that the professor has been fooled is only the narrator’s view.
Choose the answer
Paragraphs 8–11 set the narrator’s scorn against the professor’s open mind. So the answer is A, “It establishes the conflict between the professor and the narrator concerning the validity of the letter.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong choice. It is right about the narrator’s distrust. But it speaks of “how easily the professor is deceived.” Deceived means tricked. The story never shows that. He stays calm and thinks for himself. A describes both men correctly: they disagree about the letter.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 17 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 17Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from In Search of the Unknown”.
Question
The professor’s observations in paragraphs 15–17 create tension in the excerpt by causing the narrator to feel
- Aflustered by the professor’s criticism of his logic.
- Bannoyed by the professor’s sarcasm about his inexperience.
- Cconfused by the professor’s lack of respect for his opinion.
- Dfrustrated by the professor’s lack of interest in his theory.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how the professor’s observations in paragraphs 15–17 create tension in the excerpt.
A. CORRECT. The professor criticizes “ ‘you young fellows’ ” (paragraph 15), suggesting that the ideas of young scientists like the narrator are unsupported (“ ‘like swimming squirrels’ ” [paragraph 17]) and inaccurate (“ ‘but you never land where you hope to—do you?’ ” [paragraph 17] and “ ‘you embark on a theory for destinations that don’t exist’ ” [paragraph 15]). The narrator then becomes “red in the face” (paragraph 18), indicating that the narrator is upset by the professor’s criticism, and asks the professor about the great auk in an attempt to defend himself.
B. Incorrect. While the narrator does experience a negative reaction to the professor’s words, the professor is being genuine, not sarcastic. In fact, the sarcasm comes from the narrator in paragraph 14 (“ ‘It is generally accepted,’ I replied, sarcastically, ‘that the great auk has been extinct for years. Therefore I may be pardoned for doubting that our correspondent possesses a pair of them alive’ ”), not from the professor.
C. Incorrect. The professor’s observations cause the narrator to blush with embarrassment (“rather red in the face” [paragraph 18]), but the narrator understands the point that the professor is making about the narrator’s acceptance of the idea that great auks do not exist. The narrator recognizes that the professor is criticizing his youthful ideas, not his opinion.
D. Incorrect. The professor shows amusement with the narrator’s perspective. The narrator is embarrassed and upset by the professor’s words, but the narrator does not display frustration with the professor’s lack of interest in a commonly held view of the existence of a certain species of bird.
Question analysis
In this question on In Search of the Unknown, Professor Farrago makes remarks about “you young fellows,” comparing them to swimming squirrels that never land where they hope. Students must decide how these remarks in paragraphs 15–17 make the narrator feel and so create tension. The comparison is odd and old-fashioned, and the four choices name similar negative feelings with different causes.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 students infer feelings from a character’s reactions, usually from plainly stated emotions. Here the cause is a puzzling figurative jab about “swimming squirrels,” the reaction is shown only through a physical sign, and the choices offer four close negative feelings.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Figurative or literary language major
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 1066 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 52 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
The professor’s two images are odd, and students must decode them as a comment on how the narrator reasons before they can say why he blushes. Every choice names an unpleasant feeling, so the decision rests on its cause. “You young fellows” makes sarcasm about inexperience the natural guess, but the sarcasm in this scene is the narrator’s own, and the professor smiles “wearily” and speaks in earnest. The narrator’s pointed reply shows he followed the criticism, not that it confused him.
Figurative or literary language major Understanding the question
The criticism comes in images: young men who “embark on a theory for destinations that don’t exist” and who, like swimming squirrels, “never land where you hope to,” a picture of reasoning that goes astray. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The choice about annoyance at sarcasm and the right one both name a bad reaction to the professor’s remarks; they part on the cause, sincere criticism of his logic or mockery of his youth. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The narrator never names his feeling; it shows only in “Rather red in the face” and in the defensive question that follows about whether the great auk is extinct. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Paraphrase what the professor says about “you young fellows” in paragraphs 15–17, find how the narrator reacts in paragraph 18, and choose the feeling and the cause that both fit.
Traps
- Wrong tone or attitude: Misjudges the tone, attitude or point of view, such as reading admiration as criticism, or taking a character's or subject's feelings for the author's.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Word match: Repeats striking words or phrases from the text, so it looks supported, but its meaning does not fit the question.
The wrong answers, classified
B Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Hears mockery in “Oh, you young fellows,” but the professor is sincere; the sarcasm belongs to the narrator, who “sarcastically” insists in paragraph 14 that the great auk is extinct.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Takes the blush in paragraph 18 as confusion, though the narrator answers at once with a pointed question, which shows he understood the professor’s point well enough to push back.
D Word match (Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Is drawn by “theory” in paragraph 15 and calls the professor uninterested, though he engages the narrator’s view closely enough to answer it with two vivid images.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how the professor’s words in paragraphs 15–17 make the narrator feel. Tension is a feeling of strain between characters. Each choice names a feeling and a cause. Both parts must be right.
Read what the professor says
In paragraph 15 he says, “Oh, you young fellows,” and “you embark on a theory for destinations that don’t exist.” To embark means to set out on a trip. He means young men set out with an idea toward places that are not there. Their reasoning leads them to wrong answers. In paragraph 17 he adds, “Like swimming squirrels, you navigate with the help of Heaven and a stiff breeze, but you never land where you hope to—do you?”
Understand the picture
A swimming squirrel can’t really steer. It drifts with luck and the wind. The professor is saying the narrator’s thinking drifts the same way and misses the truth. That is a criticism of his logic, or reasoning. In paragraph 18, the narrator is “Rather red in the face.” He is flustered, which means embarrassed and upset.
Check each choice
- A fits. He turns red after the professor criticizes his reasoning.
- B does not fit. Sarcasm is saying the opposite of what you mean in order to mock. The professor means what he says. The sarcastic one is the narrator, in paragraph 14.
- C does not fit. He is not confused. He fires back a sharp question right away.
- D does not fit. The professor answers the narrator’s idea closely, so he is interested in it.
Watch out: B is tempting because “you young fellows” points to the narrator’s youth. But the professor is sincere, not sarcastic.
Choose the answer
The professor says the narrator’s reasoning goes astray, and the narrator turns red. So the answer is A, “flustered by the professor’s criticism of his logic.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong choice. Both A and B say the narrator feels bad. But B blames sarcasm. Paragraph 14 says the narrator “replied, sarcastically,” so the sarcasm is his own. The professor means his words seriously. A names the real cause: criticism of the narrator’s thinking.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 18 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 19Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from In Search of the Unknown”.
Question
Which sentence from the excerpt best explains why the professor is eager to send the narrator on an expedition?
- A“I believe now that Professor Farrago perfectly interpreted my thoughts, but he betrayed neither resentment nor impatience.” (paragraph 25)
- B“Together we made out a list of articles necessary for me and itemized the expenses I might incur, and I set a date for my return, allowing no margin for a successful termination to the expedition.” (paragraph 26)
- C“ ‘What I want you to do is to get those birds here safely.’ ” (paragraph 27)
- D“ ‘I can’t get away from the idea that we are on the eve of acquiring the rarest of living creatures.’ ” (paragraph 33)
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks which sentence from the excerpt best explains why the professor is eager to send the narrator on an expedition.
A. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 25 says that the professor “perfectly interpreted” the narrator’s thoughts: in paragraph 24, the narrator suspects the professor is losing his ability to reason because his request (to secure the great auk for the society) seems impossible. The professor is excited about the discovery, but the narrator doubts whether the discovery is real. The sentence does not explain why the professor is excited, however.
B. Incorrect. Paragraph 26 shows the professor and the narrator planning the logistics of the trip, but it does not explain why the professor is eager to send the narrator on the expedition.
C. Incorrect. Although the sentence from paragraph 27 expresses the professor’s interest in having the narrator bring the birds back safely, it does not show the underlying reason why the safety of the birds is so crucial, which is that the great auk is extremely rare.
D. CORRECT. The sentence from paragraph 33 reveals the professor’s excitement to get “ ‘the rarest of living creatures,’ ” the great auk. In paragraph 14, the narrator states that “it is generally accepted . . . that the great auk has been extinct for years,” which would make a living auk incredibly rare and explains the professor’s eagerness for the narrator to go on the expedition.
Question analysis
This textual evidence question asks which sentence from In Search of the Unknown best explains why Professor Farrago is eager to send the narrator to collect a pair of great auks from a man who wrote to the zoo. Students must find the sentence that gives the professor’s reason, and the four quotations, from paragraphs 25 to 33, all concern the expedition in some way.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Choosing the sentence that best explains a character’s motive is standard grade 7 evidence work. The four quotations are short and labeled, but students must tell a reason for the professor’s eagerness apart from sentences that merely relate to the trip.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Reading between the lines minor
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 1066 words; question and choices: about grade 12, 109 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A detail in the explanation was attributed to the wrong paragraph; it was corrected.
- 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
Every quotation concerns the expedition, so the question rests on the difference between a sentence that relates to the trip and one that gives the professor’s reason for wanting it. The order to bring the birds back safely shows his eagerness plainly and draws students who stop there. Only the sentence about “the rarest of living creatures” supplies a motive, and it gains its weight from the narrator’s earlier claim that the great auk is extinct.
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The professor’s order to “get those birds here safely” and the right sentence are both his words about the birds; one says what he wants, the other why he wants it. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The right sentence never mentions the expedition, and its force depends on paragraph 14, where the narrator says the great auk “has been extinct for years.” (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
“On the eve of acquiring” is an idiom for being about to obtain, and a student who takes “eve” as evening misses that the professor feels the prize is near. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Restate the question as “Why does the professor want the narrator to go?” and ask of each quotation whether it gives a reason or only describes part of the plan.
Traps
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- Word match: Repeats striking words or phrases from the text, so it looks supported, but its meaning does not fit the question.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
The wrong answers, classified
A True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Picks the professor reading the narrator’s doubts with “neither resentment nor impatience,” a true picture of his calm that says nothing about why he wants the birds.
B Word match (Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Is drawn by “the expedition” at the end of the sentence, but the list of supplies, costs and a return date is planning, not the professor’s motive.
C Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Takes the professor’s instruction to bring the birds safely as his reason, but it states what he wants done; why the birds matter appears only in paragraph 33.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The DOE’s explanation of Option A says “In the sentence from paragraph 25, the narrator suspects the professor is losing his ability to reason.” That suspicion is in paragraph 24 (“Clearly, Professor Farrago was on the verge of dotage,” where dotage is “a loss of reasoning brought about by old age”). The sentence from paragraph 25, which is Option A, says that the professor “perfectly interpreted my thoughts” and showed “neither resentment nor impatience.” The site now says: “The sentence from paragraph 25 says that the professor ‘perfectly interpreted’ the narrator’s thoughts: in paragraph 24, the narrator suspects the professor is losing his ability to reason.” The rest of the explanation is unchanged: Option A is still wrong because the sentence does not explain why the professor is eager to send the narrator.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks for evidence: the sentence that best explains why the professor is eager to send the narrator. So look for a reason, not a plan or an order.
Recall what the narrator believes
In paragraph 14, the narrator says “that the great auk has been extinct for years.” Extinct means no longer alive anywhere on Earth. So a living great auk would be amazingly rare. The letter writer claims to have two of them.
Find the professor’s reason
In paragraph 33, the professor says, “I can’t get away from the idea that we are on the eve of acquiring the rarest of living creatures.” On the eve of means just about to. Acquiring means getting. He thinks the zoo is close to getting the rarest animal alive. That is why he is eager to send the narrator.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. It is from paragraph 25. It says the professor understood the narrator’s thoughts. Those thoughts are in paragraph 24: the professor was “on the verge of dotage,” or losing his reason in old age. A shows the professor’s calm, not his reason.
- B does not fit. It describes planning the trip, not why.
- C does not fit. It says what the professor wants done, but not why the birds matter.
- D fits. It gives his reason: a chance at the rarest of creatures.
Watch out: C is tempting because the professor is talking about the birds. But it is an order, not a reason.
Choose the answer
Only D explains what makes the trip so exciting to the professor. So the answer is D, “I can’t get away from the idea that we are on the eve of acquiring the rarest of living creatures.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong choice. In C, the professor says “What I want you to do is to get those birds here safely.” That tells what he wants. D tells why he wants it: the birds may be “the rarest of living creatures.” The question asks for the reason, so D fits better.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 19 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 20Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from In Search of the Unknown”.
Question
How does paragraph 34 help develop the plot of the excerpt?
- AIt shows that the narrator is beginning to consider the possibility of finding the great auks.
- BIt demonstrates that the narrator is struggling to understand why the professor thinks the great auks exist.
- CIt establishes that the narrator is willing to let the professor overrule him about the great auks.
- DIt emphasizes that the narrator feels a sense of urgency to complete the expedition to locate the great auks.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how paragraph 34 helps develop the plot of the excerpt.
A. CORRECT. Despite his initial disbelief, the narrator admits in paragraph 34 that he is starting to feel the “same strange hope” the professor feels, which is to find the great auks (paragraph 33).
B. Incorrect. While the narrator does make an effort in paragraphs 11–22 to understand the professor’s thinking, paragraph 34 reveals that the narrator has been affected by the professor’s “strange hope” for the auks and is beginning to share this hope “in spite of” himself.
C. Incorrect. The narrator describes a feeling of hope in paragraph 34 that would not be present if he had simply been overruled by the professor and did not share any of the professor’s belief in the possibility that the auks exist. In addition, it was established before paragraph 34 that the narrator was willing to be overruled (“I drew a chair up beside his desk—there was nothing to do but to obey, and this fool’s errand was none of my conceiving” [paragraph 25]).
D. Incorrect. The narrator does not express a sense of urgency in paragraph 34 to complete the expedition. Instead, he expresses hope that the great auks might really exist.
Question analysis
This plot question on In Search of the Unknown asks how paragraph 34, a single long sentence near the end of the excerpt, helps develop the story of the narrator’s assignment to bring back two great auks. Students must put its formal phrasing into plain words and connect it to the conversation that comes before it.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how a paragraph moves a plot forward is regular grade 7 work, and paragraph 34 is a single sentence. Its formal wording, such as “in spite of me” and “stir my pulses,” has to be put into plain words first.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Complex sentences minor
- Figurative or literary language minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 1066 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 79 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
Put into plain words, the paragraph has the narrator admitting that the professor’s hope is starting to take hold of him, which is the turn the question asks about. The losses come from reading it through earlier scenes: his obedience in paragraph 25 makes giving way to the professor look like the point, and the word “strange” makes puzzlement look likely. The paragraph records a change in what he believes, not in what he does.
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
Paragraph 34 is one 31-word sentence that turns on “on the contrary” and breaks its main clause with “in spite of me,” so its point, a hope beginning to stir, arrives late. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Figurative or literary language minor Understanding the question
“To stir my pulses” means to excite, and a student who reads it as a racing heart may take it for haste to leave rather than hope that the birds exist. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Restate paragraph 34 in plain modern words, then test each choice against what this paragraph itself says about the narrator.
Traps
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Takes “the same strange hope” as the narrator puzzling over the professor’s belief, though the sentence says that hope is now stirring in the narrator himself.
C Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Brings in paragraph 25, where the narrator draws up a chair because he must obey, but paragraph 34 shows him starting to share the hope, not yielding to an order.
D Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads stirring pulses as eagerness to finish the trip quickly, though the excitement is about the chance that the birds exist, and the paragraph says nothing of speed.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how paragraph 34 moves the story forward. Read that paragraph closely. Then decide what has changed for the narrator.
Read paragraph 34 closely
Paragraph 34 says “But I was not shocked; on the contrary, I was conscious that the same strange hope that Professor Farrago cherished was beginning, in spite of me, to stir my pulses, too.” On the contrary means the opposite is true. Cherished means held dear. To stir his pulses means to make his heart beat faster with excitement.
Put it in your own words
The professor hopes the great auks are real. Now the narrator feels that same hope starting in himself. “In spite of me” means he did not want to feel it, but he does. Before, he called the letter writer a liar or a fool. Now he is starting to think the birds might really be found.
Check each choice
- A fits. He begins to hope that the birds could be found.
- B does not fit. He is not puzzling over the professor’s belief. He is starting to share it.
- C does not fit. Giving in to the professor came earlier, in paragraph 25: “there was nothing to do but to obey.” Paragraph 34 is about hope, not obeying.
- D does not fit. Nothing in the paragraph is about hurrying.
Watch out: D is tempting because a racing pulse can sound like rushing. But the excitement is about the birds, not about speed.
Choose the answer
Paragraph 34 shows the narrator’s doubt starting to turn into hope. So the answer is A, “It shows that the narrator is beginning to consider the possibility of finding the great auks.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong choice. The narrator did agree to obey the professor. But that happened in paragraph 25, and he was not happy about it. In paragraph 34, something new happens. He feels “the same strange hope” as the professor. A names that change.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 20 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 21Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from In Search of the Unknown”.
Question
Which sentence best demonstrates the professional relationship between the narrator and the professor?
- A“He disengaged the sheet of paper and handed it to me.” (paragraph 4)
- B“Clearly, Professor Farrago was on the verge of dotage—ah, what a loss to the world!” (paragraph 24)
- C“I drew a chair up beside his desk—there was nothing to do but to obey, and this fool’s errand was none of my conceiving.” (paragraph 25)
- D“ ‘Very well,’ said Professor Farrago, good-humoredly, ‘you shall have all the assistance you may require.’ ” (paragraph 29)
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks which sentence best demonstrates the professional relationship between the narrator and the professor.
A. Incorrect. Although the professor’s handing of the paper to the narrator indicates that they are beginning to discuss the letter about the great auk, the sentence from paragraph 4 does not convey the relationship between a subordinate employee (the narrator) and a superior (the professor).
B. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 24 presents the narrator’s immediate internal reaction to the professor’s words. The sentence emphasizes that the professor’s belief in the great auk’s existence is so outrageous that the narrator initially thinks the professor is starting to lose touch with reality. This is a momentary reaction to the professor’s words, not a demonstration of the professional relationship between the two.
C. CORRECT. The sentence from paragraph 25 reveals that while the narrator disagrees with the professor (“this fool’s errand was none of my conceiving”), he obeys because he works for the professor (“there was nothing to do but to obey”).
D. Incorrect. The professor’s good-humored offer of assistance in the sentence from paragraph 29 does not best demonstrate the underlying employer-employee relationship between the professor and the narrator. The narrator has to go on the expedition because the professor, his boss, told him to.
Question analysis
This textual evidence question on In Search of the Unknown asks which sentence best demonstrates the professional relationship between the narrator, who answers letters for a zoological society, and Professor Farrago. The four quotations come from different points in their conversation about a letter. Several show the two men dealing with each other, so students must weigh which one shows the relationship most clearly.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Picking the sentence that best shows a relationship between characters is typical grade 7 evidence work. The four quotations are short and labeled, and the main step is deciding what a professional relationship would look like in this scene.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Every choice must be checked minor
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 1066 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 84 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
Several quotations show the two men interacting, and the professor’s offer of “all the assistance you may require” even shows him controlling the society’s resources. The best evidence is the sentence in which the employee’s position is plain: he disagrees, yet he must obey. Students who read “professional” loosely as anything that happens at work pick the handing over of the letter, and those who look only at the professor’s authority stop at his offer of help.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
Students must first decide what a professional relationship looks like here, a superior and an employee bound to carry out his orders, before they can see it in “nothing to do but to obey.” (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Every choice must be checked minor Choosing the answer
All four sentences show the two men dealing with each other, from handing over a letter to granting help, so each must be weighed for what it shows about rank. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
The right sentence ends “this fool’s errand was none of my conceiving,” old-fashioned wording for saying the pointless trip was not his idea, which shows the disagreement that makes his obedience telling. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Decide first what a professional relationship between these two men involves, then ask of each quotation whether it shows that relationship or only a passing moment between them.
Traps
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Treats the handing over of a letter as a boss giving an order, though the gesture only opens their discussion and shows nothing about who must answer to whom.
B True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Chooses the narrator’s private verdict that the professor is near “dotage,” an accurate view of his thoughts in paragraph 24 but a passing reaction, not a sign of their working roles.
D Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Sees the professor granting help as a superior’s power, which is partly right, but the sentence shows his good humor more than the narrator’s duty to follow orders.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks for the sentence that best shows their professional relationship. That means how they relate at work: who is the boss, and who must follow orders. Paragraph 3 calls Professor Farrago the “general superintendent of the Zoological Gardens.” He is the man in charge. The narrator sends him letters for approval.
Look for a sign of boss and worker
Paragraph 25 says “I drew a chair up beside his desk—there was nothing to do but to obey, and this fool’s errand was none of my conceiving.” To obey means to do what you are told. A fool’s errand is a pointless task. “None of my conceiving” means it was not his idea.
Put it in your own words
The narrator thinks the trip is silly. Still, he must do it, because the professor is his boss. A worker who disagrees but follows orders anyway shows a work relationship clearly. That is what this sentence does.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. Handing over a letter starts their talk. It shows nothing about who is in charge.
- B does not fit. It is the narrator’s private thought that the professor is losing his reason in old age. It is a passing reaction.
- C fits. The narrator must obey even though he disagrees.
- D does not fit. It shows the professor in a good mood. It does not show the narrator’s duty to follow orders.
Watch out: D is tempting because a boss is the one who offers help. But the sentence mostly shows his good humor.
Choose the answer
Only C shows the narrator following an order he does not agree with. So the answer is C, “I drew a chair up beside his desk—there was nothing to do but to obey, and this fool’s errand was none of my conceiving.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest wrong choice. The professor does have the power to offer “all the assistance you may require.” But that sentence mainly shows him being friendly. C shows the heart of the work relationship. The narrator thinks the job is foolish, yet he has “nothing to do but to obey.”
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 21 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 29Passage Using Fire to Keep a Prairie Healthy
Using Fire to Keep a Prairie Healthy
Inside the 40,000-acre Joseph H. Williams Tallgrass Prairie Preserve in northern Oklahoma, herds of bison roam on the scenic land that is home to hundreds of different species of plants and animals. While one of the greatest threats to the prairie is wildfire, the use of controlled fires is actually an effective way to protect this idyllic landscape.
Fires that are started by lightning or other natural circumstances are inevitable, and the results can be disastrous. However, hundreds of years ago the American Indian people who inhabited the Great Plains area between Minnesota and Texas realized that these fires could also be helpful. The bison in the area seemed to prefer grazing on tender new grass on the recently burned land rather than on grass in the unburned areas. The American Indian people began to deliberately burn areas of land for bison to graze on, which enticed the herds away from the people’s crops.
Today conservationists at the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve and farmers in the Great Plains continue to use controlled burns for land management. Intentionally burning a portion of land can dramatically improve the quality of the vegetation that regrows there. The fires burn away weedy undergrowth and help limit the overcrowding of shrubs and trees in the burn area, creating less competition for water and nutrients. Additionally, the process of burning excess plant matter adds nitrogen, an essential element for plant growth, to the soil.
One common target of controlled burns at the preserve and the surrounding area is the invasive red cedar tree. A single red cedar tree can consume up to 40 gallons of water per day, taking this vital resource away from other plant life. These tall trees also cast shade that prevents sunlight from reaching the plants beneath them. The fast-growing red cedar trees tend to crowd out prairie grasses, the primary food source for wild and domestic animals that make the prairie their home. An imbalance in one component of the prairie’s ecosystem affects the entire web of life. Controlled burns help maintain this ecosystem’s delicate balance.
Of course, these controlled fires are intended to burn only a portion of an area. A total burn, which is a risk with an uncontrolled wildfire, would destroy all wildlife as well as the crops farmers plant for income. The key to using controlled fires is knowing which areas of land to burn and when. Conservation experts at the preserve employ the “patch-burn” approach, meaning they rotate which portion of land is burned each year. They study the land to find out which areas would most benefit from being burned, and then they arrange about a dozen burns over one-third of the land. This patch burning contains the fire within a specific area and allows animals in the burn area to safely relocate. The following year, conservationists will burn a different section of the preserve, while the land burned the previous year regrows healthier than before.
Researchers have tracked and studied the variety of plant species and animals that live on the preserve, and their studies show that the patch-burn approach has restored biodiversity to the area by promoting the growth of species that were at risk of being crowded out. The patch-burn system is so successful that the conservationists at the preserve provide training to prairie farmers about conducting controlled burns on their own land. Burning land to make it healthy may seem counterintuitive, but strategic controlled fires have helped the prairie sustain life for hundreds of years and, with careful management, will continue to do so.
Question
According to the passage, how did fires started by natural causes prompt American Indians to begin practicing controlled burns?
- Aby drawing animals in to the area to feed on the new growth sprouting from the burned land
- Bby destroying tall trees and reducing the shade that had hindered the growth of planted crops
- Cby burning off excess vegetation and increasing the availability of nutrients for the remaining plants
- Dby causing changes to the bison’s migration habits as bison herds fled from the wildfires on the prairie
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how observing the effects of the fires started by natural causes prompted American Indians to begin practicing controlled burns.
A. CORRECT. In paragraph 2, the author states that American Indians observed bison “grazing on tender new grass on the recently burned land rather than on grass in the unburned areas.” These observations prompted the practice of controlled burns as a means of enticing “the herds away from the people’s crops.”
B. Incorrect. Although the author mentions in paragraph 4 that the primary targets of a controlled burn are red cedar trees and that “these tall trees also cast shade that prevents sunlight from reaching the plants beneath them,” this detail supports why conservationists use controlled burns today, not what initially prompted the use of controlled burns.
C. Incorrect. While the author states in paragraph 3 that “the process of burning excess plant matter adds nitrogen, an essential element for plant growth, to the soil” and that “intentionally burning a portion of land can dramatically improve the quality of the vegetation that regrows there,” these details do not explain the initial observations that prompted American Indians to practice controlled burning.
D. Incorrect. While paragraph 2 mentions that bison moved to a new area to graze because they preferred the “tender new grass on the recently burned land,” there is no indication in the passage that bison changed their migration habits in order to flee wildfires.
Question analysis
This key-details question about an article on controlled burns at an Oklahoma tallgrass prairie preserve asks how fires started by lightning or other natural causes led American Indians to begin burning land on purpose. Students must find the passage's account of that early practice, and since the article describes several effects of fire, each choice has to be checked against what those first observers actually saw.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Finding a stated cause in an informational text is regular grade 7 reading. The answer sits in one short paragraph, but the article describes several effects of fire, old and new, and the choices draw on them, which keeps the demand typical.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 598 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 86 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
The stem points to one short paragraph, but the article goes on to list many more benefits of fire, and two wrong choices borrow them: shade cleared from under red cedars and nutrients returned to the soil. Both are true of controlled burns today, not of what the Great Plains peoples first noticed. Students who return to paragraph 2 and restate the bison’s taste for freshly burned grass find the answer quickly.
Every choice must be checked minor Choosing the answer
Two wrong choices name real benefits of burning from later paragraphs, cedar shade removed in paragraph 4 and nutrients freed in paragraph 3, so each must be tested against what the early peoples saw. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
Paragraph 2 never says the bison’s grazing caused the practice; students connect “realized that these fires could also be helpful” to the preference for burned land and the deliberate burns that follow. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Go to the paragraph about the Great Plains peoples of hundreds of years ago, restate in your own words what they noticed after natural fires, and test each choice against that observation.
Traps
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
B Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Borrows paragraph 4’s red cedars, whose shade blocks sunlight from the plants beneath them, and adds “planted crops,” though that shade explains modern burns, not the first deliberate ones.
C True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
States paragraph 3’s real benefits, weedy undergrowth burned away and nitrogen added to the soil, but the article gives them as reasons for burning today, not as what the early peoples observed.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Remembers that bison moved onto burned land but turns their preference for “tender new grass” into herds fleeing wildfire, a change in migration the passage never describes.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This question asks about a cause. Long ago, fires started by lightning gave American Indians an idea. They began to burn land on purpose. You need to find what they saw that led them to do it. A controlled burn is a fire that people set and keep inside a planned area.
Find the right paragraph
Paragraph 2 tells this part of the story. It says the people “realized that these fires could also be helpful.” Then it says what they noticed: “The bison in the area seemed to prefer grazing on tender new grass on the recently burned land rather than on grass in the unburned areas.”
Put it in your own words
Grazing means eating grass. After a fire, soft new grass grew, and the bison liked it best. So the people began to burn land on purpose. The new grass pulled the herds to that land. That kept the bison away from the crops. The paragraph says the burning “enticed the herds away from the people’s crops.” Enticed means tempted or drew.
Check each choice
- A is right. The burned land drew animals, the bison, to eat the new grass.
- B is wrong. The shade of tall trees comes from paragraph 4. It explains why people burn red cedars today, not how burning began.
- C is wrong. Burning off weeds and adding nutrients come from paragraph 3. Nutrients are what plants need to grow. These are reasons for burning today.
- D is wrong. The bison moved toward the fresh grass. The passage never says herds fled from fires.
Watch out: C is true about controlled burns. But the question asks what first gave the people the idea. Paragraph 2 says it was the bison.
Choose the answer
The early people saw bison come to burned land to eat the new grass. So the answer is A: “by drawing animals in to the area to feed on the new growth sprouting from the burned land.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong answer, because it names real good effects of fire. But paragraph 3 gives those as reasons people burn land “today.” The question asks how burning began hundreds of years ago. Paragraph 2 says it began when people watched bison feed on burned land.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Using Fire to Keep a Prairie Healthy” as printed (page 41)
Question 22 of 92
2026 Practice Test B English, question 30Uses the passage above: “Using Fire to Keep a Prairie Healthy”.
Question
Targeting red cedar trees in controlled burns affects the animals that live on the prairie mostly by
- Aensuring that the animals’ main food source has the conditions needed for it to thrive.
- Bendangering the animals that live near the trees scheduled for removal.
- Cmaking sure that the water supply for the animals is sufficient.
- Dreducing the animals’ natural source of shade and protection from the elements.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how targeting red cedar trees in controlled burns affects the animals that live on the prairie.
A. CORRECT. According to information in paragraph 4, targeting invasive red cedar trees with controlled burns affects animals that live on the prairie by ensuring that these trees do not “crowd out prairie grasses, the primary food source for wild and domestic animals that make the prairie their home.” The paragraph also states that each red cedar tree consumes “up to 40 gallons of water per day, taking this vital resource away from other plant life.” Removing red cedars thus increases the amount of water available to the prairie grasses and helps maintain favorable conditions for the animals’ main source of food.
B. Incorrect. Although the author mentions the potential danger to wildlife from an uncontrolled burn in paragraph 5, the author emphasizes that patch burning “allows animals in the burn area to safely relocate.” Therefore, the animals that live near trees scheduled for removal are not endangered by the controlled burns.
C. Incorrect. In paragraph 4, the author states that “a single red cedar tree can consume up to 40 gallons of water per day, taking this vital resource away from other plant life.” However, the author does not suggest that reducing the number of red cedar trees through controlled burns ensures a sufficient water supply for animals that live on the prairie.
D. Incorrect. In paragraph 4, the author states that “these tall trees also cast shade that prevents sunlight from reaching the plants beneath them.” However, the author does not suggest that using controlled burns to eliminate red cedar trees reduces a natural source of shade for prairie animals. The red cedar trees are invasive; therefore, the author does not consider them a “natural” part of the prairie ecosystem.
Question analysis
This question asks how burning invasive red cedar trees on purpose mostly affects the wild and domestic animals that live on the Oklahoma prairie. Students follow a chain of cause and effect through the paragraph on red cedars, which describes the trees' heavy water use, their shade and their spread, and must pick out the effect that matters most to the animals.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Grade 7 readers routinely trace how one change leads to another in an informational text. This chain stays within one paragraph, but the paragraph names several things the cedars take from the prairie, and the stem's “mostly” asks for the main effect.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Much to keep track of minor
- The right answer is reworded minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 598 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 66 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
Paragraph 4 lists three harms the red cedar does, drinking water, casting shade and crowding out grasses, and the wrong choices hand the water and the shade straight to the animals. In the text, all three harms fall on plants, and animals feel them only through the grasses they eat. Students who ask who suffers each harm see that protecting the food supply is the main effect the stem’s “mostly” asks for.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
Paragraph 4 never names an effect on animals; students must chain the cedars crowding out “prairie grasses,” the grasses being “the primary food source,” and the burns that remove the cedars. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Much to keep track of minor Working it out
The paragraph names three harms at once, 40 gallons of water a day, shade over the plants below and crowding, and students must track which living things each harm reaches. (Sweller, 1988; Carpenter, Just & Shell, 1990)
The right answer is reworded minor Choosing the answer
The right choice speaks of “conditions needed for it to thrive” without naming grass or cedars, while the wrong ones repeat the paragraph’s vivid details of water and shade. (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Strategy: Reread the paragraph about red cedars and list each way the trees harm the prairie, then ask which of those harms reaches the animals and which would matter to them most.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
The wrong answers, classified
B Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Assumes that fire near animals must endanger them, a common belief, though paragraph 5 says patch burning “allows animals in the burn area to safely relocate.”
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Seizes on the 40 gallons a red cedar drinks each day, but the passage says that water is taken from “other plant life,” not from the animals’ supply.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Turns the cedars’ shade, which blocks sunlight from “the plants beneath them,” into shelter for animals, though the passage treats the invasive trees as a harm, never a natural refuge.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This question asks about cause and effect. People burn red cedar trees on purpose. You need to find how that mostly helps the animals. The word “mostly” means you want the biggest effect, not just any effect.
Find what the red cedars do
Paragraph 4 is about red cedars. It names three harms. First, one tree can drink “up to 40 gallons of water per day, taking this vital resource away from other plant life.” Second, the trees “cast shade that prevents sunlight from reaching the plants beneath them.” Third, they “tend to crowd out prairie grasses, the primary food source for wild and domestic animals.”
Ask who each harm hurts
Look at who loses each time. The water is taken from “other plant life.” The shade blocks light from “the plants beneath them.” The crowding pushes out prairie grasses. So every harm falls on plants. The animals feel it through the grass, because grass is their main food. Primary means main. So burning the cedars mostly helps the animals by protecting their food.
Check each choice
- A is right. The animals’ main food source is prairie grass. With the cedars gone, the grass gets water, sunlight and room to grow.
- B is wrong. Paragraph 5 says patch burning “allows animals in the burn area to safely relocate.” Relocate means move somewhere else.
- C is wrong. The cedars take water from plants. The passage never says the animals run short of water.
- D is wrong. The shade blocks light from plants. The passage never calls it shelter for animals.
Watch out: The 40 gallons of water is a striking fact, so C is tempting. But that water is taken from “other plant life.”
Choose the answer
Burning the cedars keeps the grass healthy, and the grass feeds the animals. Thrive means grow well. So the answer is A: “ensuring that the animals’ main food source has the conditions needed for it to thrive.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong answer, because paragraph 4 does talk about water. But it says the cedars take water from plants, not from animals. The grass, the animals’ main food, is what suffers from all three harms. So A fits better.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 23 of 92
2026 Practice Test C English, question 27Passage Serpent Mound
Serpent Mound
The Great Serpent Mound, located in Adams County, Ohio, is a human-made mound of earth that researchers believe was created between 300 B.C. and A.D. 1100 by an indigenous culture.
Ohio, 1846
Brush Creek stood low when the museum men came
with their measuring tapes and sketchbooks.
It was winter. Fringed with ice,
the creek doubled back on itself
as if it had forgotten something.
Pa was in Cincinnati, or else on his way home,
so Ma told me to lead the men
into the marshy low grounds. It being winter,
there was little underbrush to speak of—
in the summer there would have been
briars, poison ivy, biting flies. I listened
for the swish of a beaver’s heavy tail,
the chitter of a chickadee, or the cry of a hawk,
but the winter silence of the creek pressed
down on all of us like a weight.
The humps in the ground were all but
invisible until you were right up on them. The figure
was even less obvious: the sinuous body,
the tail coiled three times around,
and at the other end, the mouth wide open.
In the summer the creek bottom was crowded
with so much life that you could trip over
the ridges of earth before you saw
anything at all. In winter you could climb
a tree and get some idea of the whole thing:
the serpent’s body undulating, slithering
silently across the ancient
earth. At the mouth end, there was an oval mound
as if the snake were about to swallow an egg—
as snakes sometimes did in our rickety
henhouse—my Pa always said, or
as if swallowing the sun, one of the museum
men suggested, taking notes with his quill pen,
an old-style inkhorn slung at his side.
I liked that: swallowing the sun,
just the sort of thing a snake might do,
might want to do. When, later, I told my sister Ruth,
she disagreed. It is singing to the sun,
she insisted. That is why its mouth
is wide open. She said, “Sometimes I think
I hear it on summer nights. Not swallowing, singing.”
Question
Which lines reveal how the setting affects the speaker and the men from the museum?
- A“It being winter, / there was little underbrush to speak of—” (lines 8–9)
- B“but the winter silence of the creek pressed / down on all of us like a weight.” (lines 14–15)
- C“The humps in the ground were all but / invisible until you were right up on them.” (lines 16–17)
- D“In the summer the creek bottom was crowded / with so much life that you could trip” (lines 21–22)
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks which lines reveal how the setting affects the speaker and the men from the museum.
A. Incorrect. The words “being winter” (line 8) work to establish the setting, but lines 8 and 9 do not describe the effect the winter setting has on the speaker and the men.
B. CORRECT. The imagery in lines 14 and 15 describes how the winter silence makes the speaker and the men feel emotional heaviness: it “pressed / down on all of us like a weight.”
C. Incorrect. Although the words “the humps in the ground were all but / invisible” describe how the setting appears to the speaker and the men, lines 16 and 17 do not describe how the setting affects them.
D. Incorrect. Although lines 21 and 22 do describe the setting, the lines do not describe how the setting affects the speaker and the men. The lines describe the setting in the summer, which is before the men from the museum show up.
Question analysis
This evidence question on the poem “Serpent Mound” asks which lines reveal how the setting, a creek in the Ohio winter of 1846, affects the young speaker and the museum men. All four quotations come from the poem’s description of the creek and the land around the mound, in winter and in summer, so the four choices look much alike at first glance.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 A routine grade 7 evidence task: the four quotations are short, numbered and in plain modern language. What takes care is that all of them describe the setting, while the question asks about its effect on particular people.
- 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
- Every choice must be checked moderate
- Figurative or literary language minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one sentence or line
- Reading level
- Passage: 354 words (a poem; reading level not measured); question and choices: about grade 5, 77 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
Every quotation describes the setting, so a student who checks only for setting can defend almost any of them. The question turns on the people: only one quotation says what the place does to them, in the words “on all of us.” The summer lines tempt with someone tripping over the ridges, but they describe another season, not the winter day of the visit.
Every choice must be checked moderate Choosing the answer
All four quotations describe the creek and the land, so each must be asked whether it shows the place acting on the speaker and the men or only tells what the place is like. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Figurative or literary language minor Understanding the question
The answer is a simile, silence that “pressed / down on all of us like a weight,” and students must read the weight as a mood the winter quiet puts on the group. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Paraphrase each quotation, then ask whether it shows the setting acting on the speaker and the museum men or only tells what the place is like.
Traps
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
The wrong answers, classified
A Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Treats the thin winter underbrush as an effect because it would make the walk easier, but lines 8–9 only describe the ground and say nothing of how anyone feels or acts.
C Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Sees that the humps are hard to spot until “you were right up on them,” which involves a viewer, but the lines report how the land looks, not what it does to the group.
D True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Matches “you could trip” to the word “affects,” but the lines describe the creek bottom in summer, not the winter day when the speaker leads the museum men.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks for evidence about setting. Setting is where and when a story or poem takes place. Here it is a creek in Ohio, in winter. You need the lines that show how this place affects the speaker and the museum men. In other words, what does the place do to them or make them feel?
Read the lines that mention people
Lines 14–15 say “but the winter silence of the creek pressed / down on all of us like a weight.” The words “all of us” mean the speaker and the museum men together. This is a simile, a comparison using “like.” The quiet felt like something heavy pressing down on them. So the silent winter creek made the whole group feel heavy and gloomy.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. Lines 8–9 say there was little underbrush, or low bushes. That describes the ground, not how anyone felt.
- B fits. The silence “pressed / down on all of us,” so the place acts on the whole group.
- C does not fit. Lines 16–17 tell how hard the humps are to see. They describe the land, not its effect on the group.
- D does not fit. Lines 21–22 describe the creek in summer. The museum men came in winter.
Watch out: D says “you could trip,” which sounds like an effect on people. But it describes another season, not the day of the visit.
Choose the answer
Only lines 14–15 show the winter creek acting on the speaker and the men. So the answer is B, lines 14–15: “but the winter silence of the creek pressed / down on all of us like a weight.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is a close wrong choice, because it has a person in it: the humps stay hidden “until you were right up on them.” But it only reports what the land looks like. B is different. The silence “pressed / down on all of us like a weight.” Only B shows the place changing how the speaker and the men feel.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Serpent Mound” as printed (page 40)
Question 24 of 92
2026 Practice Test C English, question 28Uses the passage above: “Serpent Mound”.
Question
Lines 1–2 contribute to the development of ideas in the poem by
- Asuggesting that the men are too busy with their work to talk to the speaker.
- Bhelping establish the reason for the men’s visit and purposeful behavior.
- Chinting that the men have hidden motives for studying the mound.
- Dindicating why the speaker is fascinated by the men and wants to help them.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks how lines 1–2 contribute to the development of ideas in the poem.
A. Incorrect. The idea that the men are too busy with their work to talk to the speaker is not conveyed in the poem, and, in fact, one of the museum men discusses the oval mound with the speaker (“as if swallowing the sun, one of the museum / men suggested” [lines 32–33]).
B. CORRECT. The lines, with their mention of measuring tapes and sketchbooks, indicate that the reasons the museum men came were to measure the mound and to draw sketches of it.
C. Incorrect. There is little indication in the poem that the museum men have a hidden motive for studying the mound. Lines 1–2 present a straightforward description of the men and their equipment, which emphasizes the men’s academic interest in studying the mound.
D. Incorrect. While the speaker displays some curiosity about the work the museum men are doing (“one of the museum / men suggested, taking notes with his quill pen, / an old-style inkhorn slung at his side. / I liked that” [lines 32–35]), lines 1–2 focus on introducing the idea that the mound is a formation that is worth formal study and examination by experts.
Question analysis
This question asks how the opening lines of “Serpent Mound,” in which museum men arrive at a low winter creek with measuring tapes and sketchbooks, contribute to the development of ideas in the poem. The lines are short and plain, but the choices credit the men or the speaker with motives and feelings, and students must check each against the rest of the poem.
- Grade level
- Grade 6 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Below grade 7 Below typical grade 7 demand: the two opening lines are short and concrete, and checking the choices takes one reading of the poem, much like grade 6 questions on how a single sentence fits into a text.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what minor
- Evidence in several places minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one sentence or line
- Reading level
- Passage: 354 words (a poem; reading level not measured); question and choices: about grade 7, 62 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
The opening lines are short and concrete, and their tools, measuring tapes and sketchbooks, plainly say why the men came. The wrong choices each add something: men too busy to talk, a hidden motive, or a fascinated speaker, and the last borrows the speaker’s later delight in “swallowing the sun.” Checking each against the rest of the poem, rather than against first impressions of strangers arriving, is what the question rewards.
How, not what minor Working it out
The stem asks what lines 1–2 do in the poem, so students must see the measuring tapes and sketchbooks as setting up the visit’s purpose, not only as a description of the men. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
Ruling out two wrong choices takes later lines: a museum man offers the speaker an idea in lines 32–33, and the speaker leads the men in line 7 because Ma says to. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Say in your own words what lines 1–2 tell you about the men, then reject any choice that depends on something the poem never shows.
Traps
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Pictures men absorbed in measuring who ignore the child, though nothing says so and one of them later suggests the mound looks “as if swallowing the sun.”
C Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads a secret aim into the visit, but lines 1–2 show the men carrying measuring tools in the open, and the poem never hints at any other purpose.
D Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Jumps to line 35, where the speaker likes a museum man’s phrase; in lines 1–2 the men have only arrived, and the speaker guides them because Ma says to.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what lines 1–2 do for the poem’s ideas. They are the poem’s first lines, so they set things up. You need to decide what they tell you about the museum men, and why that matters.
Read lines 1–2
Lines 1–2 say “Brush Creek stood low when the museum men came / with their measuring tapes and sketchbooks.” A measuring tape is for measuring lengths. A sketchbook is for drawing. So the men came to measure the mound and draw it. They have a job to do. Purposeful means acting with a clear goal. Their tools show that goal from the very start.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. Nothing says the men were too busy to talk. Later, one of them shares an idea: “as if swallowing the sun.”
- B fits. The tools show why the men came and that they came to work.
- C does not fit. The men carry their tools in plain view. The poem never hints at a hidden motive, or secret reason.
- D does not fit. The speaker leads the men because “Ma told me to lead the men.” The speaker’s liking for a man’s idea comes much later, in line 35.
Watch out: D borrows a feeling from later in the poem, “I liked that.” In lines 1–2, the men have only just arrived.
Choose the answer
Lines 1–2 use the men’s tools to show why they came and what they plan to do. So the answer is B, “helping establish the reason for the men’s visit and purposeful behavior.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest wrong choice. The speaker does later like a museum man’s phrase, “swallowing the sun.” But that comes in line 35. Lines 1–2 say nothing about the speaker’s feelings. They name only the men’s tools. Tapes and sketchbooks tell you why the men came: to measure and draw the mound.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 25 of 92
2026 Practice Test C English, question 34Passage Excerpt from “Growing Peppers on the ISS Is Just the Start of Space Farming”
Excerpt from “Growing Peppers on the ISS Is Just the Start of Space Farming”
by Melanie Canales
The author, Melanie Canales, is a first-generation Peruvian American farmer and beekeeper based in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley, on lands of the indigenous Monacan and Manahoac tribes. Her work focuses on creating healthy relationships between people and their surrounding ecosystems.
Unburdened by the constraints of gravity, red and green peppers jut out at 45-degree angles inside the Advanced Plant Habitat (APH), a sort of space terrarium not much larger than a microwave. Four chile pepper plants stand effortlessly upright, despite the dozens of glossy fruits weighing them down. These plants have lived entirely in space; their leaves have never been chewed on by insects or rustled by a summer breeze, [and] their stems are unfamiliar with bending toward the sun’s arc across the sky. Scissors glint under the tank’s white and blue lights as astronaut Mark Vande Hei and his team snip the stems of those that are ready for harvest. The peppers whirl around their heads until the astronauts catch them and tape them against a board to photograph.
Back on Earth, the Plant Habitat-04 team of engineers and plant scientists are observing and conferring with the astronauts. Of the 26 peppers in this batch, only the 14 finest will stay on the International Space Station [ISS] for consumption. The rest will be wrapped in foil, sealed in a Ziploc bag, then frozen at a brisk −80 degrees, until they can come roaring back to Earth in the next cargo capsule to be studied later. Now, after a 137-day growth cycle, the astronauts remove the plants from the module and trash them. Project Plant Habitat-04 is complete. It’s taco night on the ISS.
Since 2014, NASA1 has experimented with growing lettuces, brassicas,2 and zinnias3 in space, an endeavor that relies on highly specialized technology over 50 years in the making. [Fall 2021’s] two successful pepper harvests . . . will provide data on the nutritional and psychological benefits of growing vegetables on-craft, as well as a crop’s ability to reliably produce long-term in microgravity. While controlled environmental agriculture is not new, the APH experiment represents an evolution in specialized growth habitats. It doesn’t aim to re-create Earth’s conditions, but to perfect each isolated variable of plant growth in the clinical environment of a spaceship.
“The Advanced Plant Habitat is the most complex plant growth system on orbit today,” says Lashelle Spencer, a plant scientist at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. Its more than 180 sensors control and monitor temperature, humidity, and carbon dioxide. The astronauts can adjust the color and intensity of the light, and how much moisture the plants’ roots are getting. It waters itself.
It’s the day after Thanksgiving, and Spencer has been at Kennedy since 5 a.m. to facilitate the peppers’ final harvest. As part of the project team, she played a crucial role in preparing the seeds that were sent hurtling into space in June and guiding the astronauts through maintaining the plants in orbit. . . . Though astronauts can spend upwards of 100 days in space, their on-mission meals come dehydrated and pre-packaged; their vitamins and minerals are isolated in supplements, which lose nutritional value the longer they’re stored. Spencer’s goal is to create the conditions necessary for cultivating healthy plants in space, so those plants can sustain healthy astronauts on long-term missions. Astronaut food is great, she says—“especially the shrimp cocktail. But you’re missing that crunch. You’re missing that fresh pop of flavor, the green flavor that’s not there in that packaged food.”
The sensory experience of growing productive crops can also help mitigate4 the psychological effects of long-term space travel. . . . Spencer says the team cracked open the door of the APH every day to observe their vegetable companions with all the tenderness of home gardeners. When harvest day came, they batted their bounty around the ISS, taking selfies and delighting in watching the fruits pirouetting around the spacecraft. . . .
“We were thinking no heat, so that [the peppers] wouldn’t be dangerous, but maybe the astronauts need a little spice in their life,” says Paul Bosland, who along with his colleagues at the Chile Pepper Institute genetically engineered5 the NuMex Española Improved chile pepper seeds grown in Plant Habitat-04. . . .
Working with NASA, Bosland cultivated a variety that could accommodate both the nutritional needs of astronauts as well as the logistics of growing a plant in space. . . .
. . . The experiment is helping gather the data necessary to determine the nutritional content of crops grown in space, and therefore how many people they can feed, and for how long. Though much is still unknown, Spencer is certain of one thing that future astronauts will need to do: “I think in an optimal world, a scientist like me would say that they would be growing plants from day one. From the day they left to the day they came back, they would be growing them.”
From “Growing Peppers on the ISS Is Just the Start of Space Farming” by Melanie Canales from WIRED, December 21, 2021. Copyright © 2021 Condé Nast. All rights reserved.
1NASA: National Aeronautics and Space Administration
2brassicas: a large genus of herbs, such as broccoli and cabbage
3zinnias: a genus of herbs and low shrubs that have flowers at their heads
4mitigate: to make something less severe or harmful
5genetically engineered: combined parts of DNA from different plants to produce a new plant
Question
What is the best summary of the astronauts’ process for Project Plant Habitat-04?
- AAfter a 137-day growth cycle, the astronauts harvest the peppers while being observed and advised by plant scientists. The astronauts remove the peppers from the APH and photograph them before eating the most nutritious ones.
- BThe astronauts confer with plant scientists and engineers before selecting the 14 finest peppers to keep aboard the ISS for consumption. The remaining peppers are wrapped in foil and sent back to Kennedy Space Center to be studied.
- CWith the help of plant scientists, the astronauts carefully control and monitor the growing conditions in the APH, ultimately harvesting the peppers after a 137-day growth cycle. The astronauts choose 14 of the peppers for consumption and send the rest back to be studied.
- DAstronauts use specialized tools to plant and maintain genetically modified peppers aboard the ISS. After harvesting the fruit, the astronauts tape the peppers to a board to prevent them from floating around the module.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks for the best summary of the astronauts’ process for Project Plant Habitat-04.
A. Incorrect. Although this summary mentions the pepper harvest and photographing and eating the peppers, it leaves out an important part of the process: the team’s preparation for growing the peppers and the return to Earth of some harvested peppers for study.
B. Incorrect. This summary includes the selection of some peppers for consumption and the return of some peppers for research; however, it omits important information about the previous steps required to develop the process for growing peppers.
C. CORRECT. This summary accurately and completely summarizes the astronauts’ process for Project Plant Habitat-04: collaborating with plant scientists, controlling the APH conditions, completing the 137-day growth cycle, harvesting the peppers, choosing 14 peppers to eat, and sending the remaining peppers back for study.
D. Incorrect. This summary focuses on information incidental to the process of growing peppers for Project Plant Habitat-04, mentioning the use of genetically modified peppers and the taping of harvested peppers to a board to keep them from floating, while omitting important steps such as the monitoring of growth and the selection of peppers for consumption and study.
Question analysis
This summary question asks which of four two-sentence summaries best captures the astronauts’ process for Project Plant Habitat-04, the chile pepper experiment aboard the International Space Station described in a WIRED article on space farming. Every choice repeats real details from the excerpt, so students must check each one for accuracy and for completeness instead of stopping at the first familiar fact.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Summarizing a process is regular grade 7 work. These choices are long and two-part, and the steps are spread over several paragraphs of a technical article, but the excerpt tells the process in order, so the overall demand stays typical.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- Evidence in several places moderate
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- A lot to read minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 890 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 162 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
Every summary is built from real details of the experiment, so the decision rests on completeness and accuracy rather than on recognition. Students who remember paragraph 2 best are drawn to the version that reports only the selection and the frozen peppers, while those who trust vivid details accept a meal of “the most nutritious” peppers or tape that stops them floating. The question rewards listing the stages, tending, harvesting, choosing and returning, before reading the choices.
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The process has to be pieced together out of order: the harvest opens paragraph 1, the 14 kept and the rest frozen come in paragraph 2, and the adjustable light and moisture only in paragraph 4. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The summary about the 14 finest peppers and the frozen remainder is the key’s second sentence on its own; only the key adds the controlled growing conditions and the 137-day cycle before the harvest. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
A lot to read minor Understanding the question
Each choice is two sentences of 34 to 44 words, so four summaries that mix accurate and inaccurate details must be read and compared one step at a time. (Kintsch, 1998; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Before reading the choices, list in order what happens to the pepper plants across the opening paragraphs, then test each summary for details the excerpt does not support and for stages it leaves out.
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.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Keeps the harvest, the photographs and the meal but drops the months of tending and the peppers sent back for study, and turns the “14 finest” into the most nutritious.
B Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Reports paragraph 2 faithfully, the 14 finest kept for meals and the rest frozen for study, but covers only harvest day and leaves out the 137 days of growing before it.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Strings together side details, the engineered seeds and the board, and says the peppers were taped to stop them floating, though paragraph 1 says they were taped up to be photographed.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This question asks for the best summary. A summary retells the main steps in order, in a few words. It leaves out small details. It must also be accurate, with no facts the article doesn’t give. Here you sum up what the astronauts did in Project Plant Habitat-04, from start to finish.
Find the steps in the article
The steps are spread over several paragraphs, and not in order.
- Growing: Spencer guided “the astronauts through maintaining the plants in orbit” (paragraph 5). The astronauts “can adjust the color and intensity of the light” (paragraph 4).
- Harvest: the crew snips the ripe peppers (paragraph 1) “after a 137-day growth cycle” (paragraph 2).
- Choosing: “only the 14 finest will stay” on the station “for consumption” (paragraph 2). Consumption means eating.
- Sending back: the rest are frozen and sent “back to Earth in the next cargo capsule to be studied later” (paragraph 2).
Put the process in plain words
So the whole process has four parts. First, the astronauts tend the plants for months, with help from scientists on Earth. Second, they harvest the peppers after 137 days. Third, they keep the 14 best peppers to eat. Fourth, they send the rest back to Earth to be studied. A good summary needs all four parts.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. It skips the months of growing and the peppers sent back. It also says they ate “the most nutritious ones,” but the article says “the 14 finest.”
- B is wrong. It covers only harvest day and leaves out the 137 days of growing. The article also never says the peppers go to Kennedy Space Center.
- C is right. It has all four parts: tending the plants with the scientists’ help, harvesting after 137 days, keeping 14, and sending the rest back.
- D is wrong. It strings together side details. The peppers were taped to a board “to photograph,” not to stop them floating.
Watch out: B closely repeats paragraph 2, so it feels right. But a summary of the process must include the growing, too.
Choose the answer
Only one summary covers the whole process, from tending the plants to sending peppers home. So the answer is C, “With the help of plant scientists, the astronauts carefully control and monitor the growing conditions in the APH, ultimately harvesting the peppers after a 137-day growth cycle. The astronauts choose 14 of the peppers for consumption and send the rest back to be studied.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong answer. Its facts come from paragraph 2. But it starts on harvest day, so a reader would never learn that the astronauts tended the plants for 137 days. C keeps B’s ending and adds that growing stage. That makes C complete.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “Growing Peppers on the ISS Is Just the Start of Space Farming”” as printed (pages 50–51)
Question 26 of 92
2026 Practice Test C English, question 40Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “Growing Peppers on the ISS Is Just the Start of Space Farming””.
Question
What is the relationship between the scientists and the astronauts in carrying out the plant-growing experiments?
Move the correct answer to each box.
Scientists on earth are primarily responsible for for conducting plant experiments in space, while the astronauts aboard the International Space Station are responsible for for the experiment.
On the test you drag tiles into the boxes; here, choose each box’s tile from its menu. Each tile can be used once. The DOE has not published how answers with several parts are scored; this site counts one right only when every part is right.
Show the answer
Correct answer: blank 1: developing the materials and systems; blank 2: growing the plants to harvest
The question asks for the two phrases that should be added to the sentence to explain the relationship between the scientists and the astronauts in carrying out the plant-growing experiments.
CORRECT. The phrase “growing the plants to harvest” should be added to the second box in the sentence. Paragraphs 1 and 2 of the excerpt show that astronauts aboard the ISS are responsible for tending to the plants in the system and harvesting them after the growth cycle is complete.
Incorrect. The phrase “documenting the nutritional goals” should not be added to either box in the sentence. While the excerpt does mention that the experiment is helping gather data about the nutritional value of the peppers, there is no evidence that either the scientists on Earth or the astronauts aboard the ISS are tasked with documenting specific nutritional goals.
Incorrect. The phrase “analyzing the environment” should not be added to either box in the sentence. Although the experiment requires control of environmental factors like light and moisture, the excerpt does not describe or primarily focus on describing how either the scientists on Earth or the astronauts aboard the ISS are responsible for formally analyzing the environment of the habitat as part of the experiment.
CORRECT. The phrase “developing the materials and systems” should be added to the first box in the sentence. The excerpt explains that the scientists on Earth create and prepare the systems, seeds, and equipment needed for the plant-growing experiments in space.
Incorrect. The phrase “determining the most nutritional plants” should not be added to either box in the sentence. Although growing nutritious plants is important, the excerpt does not focus on the scientists on Earth or the astronauts aboard the ISS evaluating or selecting plants based on their nutritional value.
Question analysis
This question asks students to complete a sentence describing how scientists on Earth and astronauts aboard the International Space Station divided the work of the pepper-growing experiment. On the test students drag phrase tiles into two boxes, choosing from five. Each group’s role must be pieced together from details spread across the excerpt, and each tile names a task in general words that must be matched to the text.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how the people in an informational text relate to one another is grade 7 work. Filling two boxes from five tiles with all-or-nothing credit adds some demand, but the excerpt shows the two groups doing clearly different jobs.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- The right answer is reworded moderate
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Much to keep track of minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 890 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 50 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
The astronauts’ box is the easy half, since the excerpt opens with the crew snipping and catching ripe peppers. The scientists’ box is where points are lost: the right tile is abstract, while the tempting ones name nutrition and the environment, both prominent in the article. Students who match a tile to a phrase they remember, rather than to everything the people on Earth are shown doing, fill the first box wrongly.
The right answer is reworded moderate Choosing the answer
The scientists’ tile, “developing the materials and systems,” sums up preparing seeds, engineering a variety and building the habitat in words the excerpt never uses, while the nutrition tile echoes paragraph 9. (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The scientists’ work is scattered: the habitat’s technology in paragraphs 3 and 4, Spencer preparing seeds in paragraph 5, Bosland’s engineered variety in paragraphs 7 and 8; the crew’s tending and harvest fill paragraphs 1 and 2. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Much to keep track of minor Working it out
Two boxes must both be right from five tiles that cannot be reused, so each group’s whole role must be held in mind while three plausible-sounding tiles are rejected. (Sweller, 1988; Carpenter, Just & Shell, 1990)
Strategy: List what the people on Earth did and what the crew in orbit did, then fill each box with the tile that sums up its list, not one that echoes a single word of the excerpt.
Traps
- Word match: Repeats striking words or phrases from the text, so it looks supported, but its meaning does not fit the question.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
EA Word match (Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Matches “determining the most nutritional plants” to paragraph 9’s “determine the nutritional content of crops,” though the scientists engineered one variety rather than picking the most nutritious among many.
CA Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Gives the scientists “analyzing the environment” because paragraph 2 shows them “observing and conferring,” though the excerpt shows them preparing seeds and systems while the habitat’s sensors monitor conditions.
DC Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Fills the scientists’ box correctly but gives the crew “analyzing the environment,” since they can adjust the light and moisture, though their job is tending the plants through to harvest.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
You need to finish a sentence about who did what. The first box tells what the scientists on Earth did. The second box tells what the astronauts in space did. On the test you drag a tile into each box. Here, you pick each box’s tile from a menu. Each tile can be used only once, and three tiles are left over.
List what the scientists did
- Spencer played “a crucial role in preparing the seeds that were sent hurtling into space” (paragraph 5).
- Bosland and his colleagues “genetically engineered” the pepper seeds (paragraph 7). The footnote says they “combined parts of DNA from different plants to produce a new plant.”
- Growing plants in space “relies on highly specialized technology over 50 years in the making” (paragraph 3).
So the scientists made and got ready what the experiment needed: seeds and machines.
List what the astronauts did
- They “can adjust the color and intensity of the light” for the plants (paragraph 4).
- “The team cracked open the door of the APH every day” to check on the plants (paragraph 6).
- They “snip the stems of those that are ready for harvest” (paragraph 1).
- They finish “after a 137-day growth cycle” (paragraph 2).
So the astronauts cared for the plants until the peppers were ripe, then picked them.
Match a tile to each list
The scientists’ list is about making things: seeds, a new pepper and a high-tech habitat. The tile developing the materials and systems sums that up. Materials are the things you use, like seeds. Systems are machines with many parts, like the habitat. The astronauts’ list is about care and picking. The tile growing the plants to harvest sums that up.
Rule out the other tiles
- documenting the nutritional goals: no one in the article writes down nutrition goals.
- analyzing the environment: the habitat’s sensors “control and monitor” conditions. The crew adjusts light and water, but that is caring for plants, not studying them.
- determining the most nutritional plants: paragraph 9 says the data will “determine the nutritional content of crops.” But no one picks the healthiest plants. Bosland made one special kind.
Watch out: The last tile repeats words from paragraph 9, so it is tempting for the first box. Matching a word is not the same as matching the job.
Fill in both boxes
Scientists on Earth develop the materials and systems for the experiment. Astronauts grow the plants to harvest. So the first box gets developing the materials and systems, and the second box gets growing the plants to harvest.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
The most tempting wrong tile for the first box is determining the most nutritional plants, because it echoes paragraph 9. But the scientists in the article prepared seeds, engineered a new pepper and built the habitat. That is developing materials and systems. Nobody compares plants to find the most nutritious one.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 27 of 92
2026 Practice Test C English, question 41Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “Growing Peppers on the ISS Is Just the Start of Space Farming””.
Question
How is the quotation from Lashelle Spencer at the end of paragraph 9 relevant to the discussion of the peppers referred to in paragraph 2?
- AThe quotation indicates that larger batches of peppers need to be grown during future missions and suggests a slight criticism of the astronauts discussed in paragraph 2 for not dedicating more of their time to growing peppers during their mission.
- BThe quotation explains why the 137-day growth cycle mentioned in paragraph 2 is necessary and provides a suggestion on how to grow more peppers during the same growth cycle in future missions.
- CThe quotation helps explain why some of the peppers discussed in paragraph 2 needed to be sent back to Earth and that increasing the overall number of peppers grown in space will be important in future missions.
- DThe quotation provides context for understanding why the peppers discussed in paragraph 2 must be sealed and frozen prior to their return to Earth and suggests how this method might be improved in upcoming missions.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how the quotation from Lashelle Spencer at the end of paragraph 9 is relevant to the discussion of the peppers referred to in paragraph 2.
A. Incorrect. The quotation from Spencer in paragraph 9 suggests that astronauts should spend more time on growing larger and more continuous batches of peppers during long missions, but it does not criticize astronauts for discarding plants and ending the experiment after the 137-day growth cycle.
B. Incorrect. While the quotation from Spencer in paragraph 9 stresses the value of spending more time growing plants in space, it does not provide specific details about the 137-day growth cycle or offer specific methods for producing more peppers within the same time frame.
C. CORRECT. The quotation from Spencer in paragraph 9 is relevant to the discussion of the peppers on the ISS in paragraph 2 because it emphasizes the importance of expanding plant-growing efforts on future space missions. Spencer suggests that rather than ending the experiment after the 137-day growth cycle, astronauts could continually replant and replenish their food supply from the beginning to the end of a long mission.
D. Incorrect. Although the quotation from Spencer in paragraph 9 conveys the importance of dedicating more time to growing plants in space, it does not explain why the peppers were sealed and frozen, nor does it suggest how this method for preserving them might be improved.
Question analysis
This question asks how Lashelle Spencer’s quotation at the end of the space-farming excerpt, her view of what future astronauts will need to do, relates to the account in paragraph 2 of how the pepper harvest was handled. Students must connect the article’s ending to its opening, and every choice is a long two-part statement whose halves have to be checked separately.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 readers explain how parts of a text relate, usually neighboring ones. This item links the last paragraph to the second, and its four choices run about forty words each in two parts, so it asks more than typical grade 7 work.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- A lot to read moderate
- Evidence in several places minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 890 words; question and choices: about grade 16, 163 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
Each choice has one half that sounds connected to the quotation, so students must test both halves of all four. The criticism choice is the hardest to reject, since it correctly hears a call for more growing and only then misreads Spencer’s tone. The key itself is not airtight: its first half leans on the sentence before the quotation, about gathering nutrition data, so the answer is best confirmed by ruling out the others.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
Spencer’s quotation never mentions paragraph 2; the link is that plants grown “from day one” to “the day they came back” contrast with one 137-day batch harvested and thrown away. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The criticism choice shares the key’s call for more growing on future missions and differs in its other half, a slight criticism of the crew that Spencer’s hopeful “in an optimal world” never makes. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
A lot to read moderate Understanding the question
The four choices run 32 to 40 words, and each joins two claims with “and,” so eight separate statements must be checked against the quotation and paragraph 2. (Kintsch, 1998; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
The two parts to connect are the excerpt’s second paragraph and its last sentence, with six paragraphs on the habitat, Spencer and Bosland in between. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Put Spencer’s closing quotation into your own words and recall how the pepper project ended in paragraph 2, then weigh both halves of every choice and keep the one the quotation and its paragraph best support.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Rightly hears a call for larger, continuous harvests in “from day one,” then adds a criticism of the crew, though Spencer describes an ideal and blames no one.
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Connects the quotation to the 137-day cycle because both concern time, but Spencer neither explains why the cycle lasted that long nor suggests packing more peppers into it.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Ties the quotation to the foil, sealing and freezing in paragraph 2 and to improving that method, though Spencer’s improvement is growing plants all mission long, not storing peppers.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This question links the end of the article to its beginning. Spencer speaks at the end of paragraph 9. Paragraph 2 tells what happened to the peppers. You need the choice that best explains how her words connect to those peppers. Each choice has two parts, and both must be true.
Recall the peppers in paragraph 2
Paragraph 2 says only “the 14 finest” peppers stay on the ISS to eat. The rest are frozen and sent “back to Earth in the next cargo capsule to be studied later.” Then, “after a 137-day growth cycle, the astronauts remove the plants from the module and trash them.” So the crew grew one batch, ate some, sent some home and threw the plants away.
Read the end of paragraph 9
Just before Spencer speaks, paragraph 9 says: “The experiment is helping gather the data necessary to determine the nutritional content of crops grown in space, and therefore how many people they can feed, and for how long.” Then Spencer says that in “an optimal world,” meaning the best possible world, astronauts “would be growing plants from day one.” She adds: “From the day they left to the day they came back, they would be growing them.”
Connect the two parts
The peppers sent home are studied. That gives the data paragraph 9 describes: how healthy space crops are and how many people they can feed. Spencer’s plan needs that data. You must know what a crop can feed before you plan meals for a whole trip. Her words also point to the future. Instead of one batch that ends in the trash, crews would grow plants all trip long. That means many more peppers.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. Spencer wants more growing, but she doesn’t criticize the crew. “In an optimal world” describes a hope, not a complaint.
- B is wrong. She never says why the cycle took 137 days. She doesn’t suggest squeezing more peppers into it, either.
- C is right. The returned peppers give the data, and growing “from day one” means more peppers in the future.
- D is wrong. She says nothing about freezing the peppers or a better way to store them.
Watch out: A gets the first half right. The criticism in its second half is what makes it wrong.
Choose the answer
Her words explain why some peppers went home to be studied and why more growing matters next time. So the answer is C, “The quotation helps explain why some of the peppers discussed in paragraph 2 needed to be sent back to Earth and that increasing the overall number of peppers grown in space will be important in future missions.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong answer. Like C, it hears Spencer calling for more plants on future trips. But A also says she criticizes the astronauts. She doesn’t. She calmly describes a perfect world. C keeps the right half and adds a link the paragraph supports: the peppers sent home give the data.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 28 of 92
2026 Practice Test C English, question 42Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “Growing Peppers on the ISS Is Just the Start of Space Farming””.
Question
How is the discussion of the genetic engineering of the peppers consumed on the ISS (paragraphs 7–8) important to the excerpt as a whole?
- AIt provides a detail that helps the reader identify a particular variety of pepper consumed on the ISS.
- BIt indicates that the peppers eaten on the ISS resulted from a collaboration between scientists and astronauts.
- CIt allows the reader to understand how the peppers consumed on the ISS differ from most peppers grown on Earth.
- DIt suggests that the peppers consumed on the ISS are of a type that could be grown in natural conditions.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how the discussion of the genetic engineering of the peppers consumed on the ISS (paragraphs 7–8) is important to the excerpt as a whole.
A. Incorrect. Although paragraph 7 names the NuMex Española Improved chile pepper as the variety grown on the ISS, this detail is not further developed and does not play a significant role in the overall focus of the excerpt. The passage emphasizes the process and purpose of developing the pepper rather than the pepper itself.
B. Incorrect. While paragraph 7 notes that Paul Bosland collaborated with colleagues to develop the seeds for the experiment, this fact alone is not the reason why the discussion of genetic engineering is important to the excerpt. The key point is that the pepper variety in the experiment was specifically modified to meet the needs of both astronauts and space cultivation. Who participated in the development of the peppers is secondary.
C. CORRECT. Paragraph 7 explains how specialists selected a pepper variety and genetically engineered the seeds for the experiment, while paragraph 8 adds that the variety developed also needed to provide astronauts with proper nutrition and be capable of growing in space. These details are important to the excerpt as a whole because they illustrate how the peppers grown on the ISS differ from most peppers cultivated on Earth in both purpose and design.
D. Incorrect. The details about the genetic engineering of the pepper seeds highlight that the variety was modified to suit specific space-related requirements. However, the excerpt does not discuss whether this type of pepper could be grown in natural conditions on Earth or if doing so is even a goal. Instead, these paragraphs are important because they explain how the pepper was adapted to address astronauts’ nutritional needs and the constraints of space farming.
Question analysis
Paragraphs 7–8 of the ISS pepper excerpt explain that a scientist at the Chile Pepper Institute genetically engineered the seeds grown aboard the space station. This text-structure question asks why that discussion matters to the excerpt as a whole. Students must look past what the two paragraphs say to what they add to the article’s larger account of farming in space.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how a section contributes to a whole text is standard grade 7 reading. The two paragraphs in question are short and the four choices are brief single sentences, so the demand matches ordinary grade 7 structure questions.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what moderate
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 890 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 98 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
The paragraphs are short, but the question asks what they add, not what they say, and the key states something the article leaves implicit. The trap is the collaboration choice: “Working with NASA” and Bosland’s colleagues suggest teamwork, and the excerpt as a whole does pair scientists with astronauts, but the peppers were developed on the ground. Students who instead pick the named variety have found a true detail without a purpose.
How, not what moderate Working it out
The stem asks why paragraphs 7–8 matter to the excerpt as a whole, so naming what they say, a variety bred at Bosland’s institute, is not enough; their contribution to the account must be stated. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The excerpt never says the space peppers differ from Earth peppers; that follows from a variety bred for “the nutritional needs of astronauts” and “the logistics of growing a plant in space.” (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
Paragraph 8 turns on “cultivated,” “accommodate” and “logistics,” and paragraph 7 needs its footnote for “genetically engineered,” words a reader must decode to see why the variety is special. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Restate what paragraphs 7 and 8 say about how the pepper was developed and why, then ask what that information adds to the excerpt’s account of farming in space as a whole.
Traps
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
The wrong answers, classified
A True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Notices that paragraph 7 names the NuMex Española Improved variety, a true detail, but naming it is not why the discussion of genetic engineering matters to the excerpt.
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Reads “Working with NASA” as teamwork with the crew, though Bosland worked with his Chile Pepper Institute colleagues and the space agency; the astronauts only grew what he developed.
D Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Knows that chile peppers grow in ordinary fields and assumes this one could too, though paragraphs 7–8 present a variety designed for space and say nothing about natural conditions.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This question asks why paragraphs 7 and 8 matter to the whole article. Those paragraphs tell how the peppers’ seeds were made. Don’t just repeat what they say. Ask what they add to the article’s story of farming in space.
Find what paragraphs 7 and 8 say
Paragraph 7 says Paul Bosland and his colleagues “genetically engineered the NuMex Española Improved chile pepper seeds grown in Plant Habitat-04.” The footnote explains that they “combined parts of DNA from different plants to produce a new plant.” Paragraph 8 says Bosland developed “a variety that could accommodate both the nutritional needs of astronauts as well as the logistics of growing a plant in space.”
Put it in plain words
A variety is one special kind of a plant. To accommodate means to meet the needs of. Logistics are the practical details of getting a job done. So this pepper was made for space. It had to feed astronauts well. It also had to grow in a small box in orbit. The scientists even chose how hot it would be: “maybe the astronauts need a little spice in their life.”
Check each choice
- A is wrong. The pepper’s name is a true detail. But knowing its name is not why these paragraphs matter.
- B is wrong. Bosland worked “with NASA” and his colleagues, not with the astronauts. The crew only grew the seeds he made.
- C is right. The paragraphs show that this pepper was designed for space. Most peppers on Earth were never made to meet astronauts’ needs or to grow in orbit.
- D is wrong. The paragraphs never say this pepper could grow in a normal field. They show it was made for space.
Watch out: “Working with NASA” can sound like teamwork with the crew. That is the trap in B.
Choose the answer
These paragraphs show that the space peppers were specially made, unlike ordinary peppers. So the answer is C, “It allows the reader to understand how the peppers consumed on the ISS differ from most peppers grown on Earth.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong answer, since the article does show scientists and astronauts working together. But paragraphs 7 and 8 are about seeds made on the ground by Bosland’s team. What they add is that the pepper was designed for astronauts’ needs and for space. That is how it differs from most peppers, as C says.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 29 of 92
2026 Practice Test D English, question 4Passage A Memory Revolution
A Memory Revolution
A high school senior logs on to a computer at the library to double-check the application due date listed on a college admissions website. Nearby, a librarian helps a group of biology students use a database to search for recent studies about mammals. In the past few decades, the Internet has become an integral component of daily life for many people. The seemingly limitless power of search engines made the Internet search extremely common, and today people increasingly rely on the Internet’s vast accumulation of sources to access all types of information. Scientists are beginning to examine how this reliance is modifying the strategies people use to store and prioritize information in their mind.
A Dependable and Valuable Asset
Psychologist Benjamin Storm from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and researchers Sean Stone and Aaron Benjamin devised an experiment to study students’ tendency to depend on the Internet for facts. To begin, the scientists divided sixty participants into multiple groups, including an “Internet” group and a “memory” group, and placed them in front of computers. The Internet group was required to use the search engine Google to answer eight challenging trivia questions. In contrast, participants in the memory group were permitted to use only their personal knowledge to answer the questions. In the second round, the researchers administered notably easier questions. This time, they allowed each group the option of using Google as they answered. Their results showed that 83 percent of the Internet group continued to consult Google in the second round, while only 63 percent of the memory group chose to do so.
People’s growing inclination to rely on the Internet in order to retrieve information, particularly facts and figures, is called cognitive offloading. Canadian researcher Evan F. Risko and British researcher Sam Gilbert, who have written extensively about the topic, say a similar process has been taking place for centuries. In the past, people used resources like encyclopedias to assist their memories; however, today the Internet, serving as a vast extended memory, allows people to digitally access and retrieve much larger volumes of information. Consequently, people’s minds are free for other cognitive feats, such as connecting data, learning new information, or solving problems.
Filing Information Away
The use of the Internet also appears to be modifying the strategies people use to store information in their mind. Researchers Betsy Sparrow from Columbia University, Jenny Liu from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Daniel Wegner from Harvard University conducted several studies to discover how people efficiently manage their information intake.
To begin, the researchers examined how people evaluate which information deserves their effort to remember. For this experiment, participants read forty trivia facts, such as “An ostrich’s eye is bigger than its brain,” and typed the statements into a computer file. Half the participants had been previously told the file would be saved, while half believed it would be erased. Next, the participants wrote down every fact they could recall. Those who believed the information would be erased and no longer available could recall 40 percent more facts than those who thought the information would be saved.
In another experiment, the same researchers tested the ability of study participants to remember where to access information. For this trial, participants read and typed trivia statements, which they saved in folders with generic names such as “Facts” and “Items.” After spending ten minutes writing down all the facts they could recall from memory, participants were asked which folder contained a particular fact based on a keyword. For example, “Which folder has the fact about ostriches?” Overall, participants recalled the information’s location more often than the content itself, correctly identifying 49 percent of the folders for specific facts while remembering only 23 percent of the actual trivia. The researchers concluded that our memory is adapting to the Internet age by prioritizing where to locate information even when the specific details are forgotten. According to Sparrow, the Internet has become an important form of transactive memory, an external source of the recollections and associative networks that constitute memory.
As the Internet’s resources continue to expand our “external” memory, some question whether the process may cause people to depend too heavily on technology. However, Steven Pinker, a professor of psychology at Harvard University, says, “Knowledge is increasing exponentially; human brainpower and waking hours are not. Fortunately, the Internet and information technologies are helping us manage, search and retrieve our collective intellectual output at different scales, from Twitter and previews to e-books and online encyclopedias. Far from making us stupid, these technologies are the only things that will keep us smart.”
Question
The study described in paragraph 6 influenced researchers’ ideas about memory in the digital age by
- Ahighlighting instances when organizing detailed information made it easier to remember.
- Bconfirming that keywords can be remembered more easily than large amounts of information.
- Cidentifying a shift in focus from remembering specific information to knowing where to find it.
- Demphasizing that remembering a basic idea is more important than storing detailed information.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how the study described in paragraph 6 influenced researchers’ ideas about memory in the digital age.
A. Incorrect. The study required participants to organize information into folders, but the results suggest that organizing the information did not make the information easier to remember; instead, participants remembered the folder in which to find the information but forgot the information itself.
B. Incorrect. Although the participants in the study were given a keyword, such as “ostrich,” when asked to remember “which folder contained a particular fact,” the study was significant for researchers because it demonstrated that “our memory is adapting to the Internet age by prioritizing where to locate information even when the specific details are forgotten” (paragraph 6). The study confirmed that participants were remembering where the information was stored, because they were able to provide the name of the folder where the information was stored.
C. CORRECT. The study in paragraph 6 demonstrated that participants were better able to recall where to find certain information than to recall the information itself. This influenced researchers’ ideas about memory in the digital age: “Overall, participants recalled the information’s location more often than the content itself, correctly identifying 49 percent of the folders for specific facts while remembering only 23 percent of the actual trivia” (paragraph 6).
D. Incorrect. The study did not examine the relative importance of remembering basic information or storing detailed information. It examined the effect of the Internet on the information that people remember and concluded that human memory “is adapting to the Internet age by prioritizing where to locate information” (paragraph 6).
Question analysis
This development-of-ideas question on “A Memory Revolution” asks how the folder experiment in paragraph 6, where participants saved trivia statements in folders named “Facts” and “Items” and were later quizzed, influenced researchers’ ideas about memory in the digital age. Students must understand what the experiment measured and what the researchers made of it, while the choices echo its keywords, folders and details.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how a study shaped researchers’ thinking is typical grade 7 work with informational texts. The researchers state their conclusion in paragraph 6, which shortens the search, though the paragraph’s percentages and terms such as “transactive memory” need care.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer minor
- Much to keep track of minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 14, 763 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 67 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A mislabeled term in the explanation was corrected.
- 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
The researchers state their conclusion in paragraph 6, that memory is “prioritizing where to locate information even when the specific details are forgotten,” so the question mostly rewards recognizing it in new words. The risk lies in the experiment’s moving parts: a student who mixes up the folder, the fact and the keyword can believe that filing helped recall or that keywords were the finding. The closest wrong choice keeps the downgrading of detail and swaps a basic idea in for location.
A very close wrong answer minor Choosing the answer
The choice about a basic idea mirrors the key’s first half, detailed information losing out; it differs only in what wins, a basic idea instead of knowing where the information is kept. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Much to keep track of minor Working it out
Paragraph 6 juggles three things a participant might recall, the fact, its folder and the keyword cue, plus two percentages, so students must keep straight that 49 percent is folders and 23 percent is trivia. (Sweller, 1988; Carpenter, Just & Shell, 1990)
Strategy: Locate the researchers’ own conclusion in paragraph 6, restate it in plain words, and choose the option that matches it, not one that borrows a word from the description of the experiment.
Traps
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Word match: Repeats striking words or phrases from the text, so it looks supported, but its meaning does not fit the question.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Assumes filing the facts in folders must have helped people remember them, though participants recalled only 23 percent of the trivia while naming the right folder 49 percent of the time.
B Word match (Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Seizes on “keyword” in paragraph 6, but the keyword was only the cue in the question put to participants; what they remembered best was a folder with a generic name such as “Facts.”
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Reads “prioritizing” as a ranking of what matters and turns knowing where a fact is kept into remembering a basic idea, though participants recalled locations, not the gist of the facts.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The DOE’s explanation of Option B ends by saying that participants “were able to provide the name of the folder (keyword) where the information was stored.” In paragraph 6 the keyword is the cue the participants were given (the same explanation begins “the participants in the study were given a keyword, such as ‘ostrich’”); the folders had generic names such as “Facts” and “Items.” Calling the folder name a keyword makes the sentence seem to support Option B (“keywords can be remembered more easily”), the option it is rejecting. The site drops “(keyword).”
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what the study in paragraph 6 taught the researchers about memory today. The researchers state their own conclusion in the paragraph. Find it, put it in plain words, and match it to a choice.
Follow the steps of the study
Participants typed trivia facts and saved them in folders. The folders had plain names, such as “Facts” and “Items.” Later each person got a keyword, a hint word, in a question like “Which folder has the fact about ostriches?” The result: “participants recalled the information’s location more often than the content itself, correctly identifying 49 percent of the folders for specific facts while remembering only 23 percent of the actual trivia.”
Read the researchers’ conclusion
Paragraph 6 says “our memory is adapting to the Internet age by prioritizing where to locate information even when the specific details are forgotten.” To prioritize is to put first. So people now put first knowing where a fact is kept. They may forget the fact itself. That is a shift in focus, a change in what memory pays attention to.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. Filing the facts in folders did not help people remember them. They recalled only 23 percent of the facts.
- B does not fit. The keyword, like “ostriches,” was only the hint in the question. What people remembered was the folder, such as “Facts.”
- C fits. Memory shifted from the facts themselves to where to find them.
- D does not fit. People remembered locations, not a basic idea of each fact.
Watch out: D is tempting because “prioritizing” sounds like deciding what matters most. But the study ranked nothing. It found that people recalled where facts were, not what they said.
Choose the answer
The study showed people remembering where facts were kept better than the facts. So the answer is C, “identifying a shift in focus from remembering specific information to knowing where to find it.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest wrong choice. Like C, it says detailed facts lose out. But it says a basic idea wins instead. In the study, what won was location: 49 percent of the folders against 23 percent of the facts. C names location, so C matches the researchers’ own conclusion.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “A Memory Revolution” as printed (pages 3–4)
Question 30 of 92
2026 Practice Test D English, question 7Uses the passage above: “A Memory Revolution”.
Question
The effect of the Internet on a person’s memory is illustrated in the passage through the presentation of studies that
- Aexamine how the use of search engines changes the way people evaluate and store information for future access.
- Bhighlight the difference between the capacity of the Internet and the ability of the human brain to locate information.
- Ccompare the type of information that can be obtained from the Internet with the type of information that is stored in the human brain.
- Demphasize the ease of obtaining information through search engines rather than remembering it without assistance.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how the studies presented in the passage are used to illustrate the effect of the Internet on a person’s memory.
A. CORRECT. The study described in paragraph 5 examined the effect of computer use on the way people evaluate information, specifically “which information deserves their effort to remember,” and determined that “those who believed the information would be erased and no longer available could recall 40 percent more facts than those who thought the information would be saved.” The study described in paragraph 2 established that the use of Internet search engines increases the “inclination to rely on the Internet in order to retrieve information” (paragraph 3), and the study in paragraph 6 examined how this reliance on technology affects the way people store information: “Overall, participants recalled the information’s location more often than the content itself.”
B. Incorrect. Although a difference in the ability of the human brain and the capacity of the Internet to locate information might seem evident, the studies cited in the passage did not examine the ability or the capacity of either. The studies did not measure what the human brain is capable of but rather how memory is affected by the use of the Internet.
C. Incorrect. While the studies explored the Internet’s effect on the way information is stored in human memory, the type of information was not described or compared. Instead, the studies indicated that location is the main difference between the information stored in the Internet and the information stored in human memory, noting that the Internet has become “an external source of the recollections and associative networks that constitute memory” (paragraph 6).
D. Incorrect. Although it is increasingly common to use the Internet to obtain information (paragraph 2) rather than try to memorize information (paragraph 5), the studies did not examine the difficulty or ease of obtaining/recalling information using either method.
Question analysis
This evidence question asks how the studies described in “A Memory Revolution” illustrate the Internet’s effect on a person’s memory. Students must recall three experiments, one with trivia questions and Google, one with trivia typed into a computer file, and one with named folders, and decide what they examine together. Each choice sounds like a fair claim about the Internet and the brain.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Summing up what a text’s evidence shows is everyday grade 7 work. Here the evidence is three studies spread over paragraphs 2, 5 and 6, which adds recall, but each one is described in plain terms.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Reading between the lines minor
- Every choice must be checked minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 14, 763 words; question and choices: about grade 12, 96 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
The question asks what the article’s studies show together, so a student needs a one-line summary of three experiments before reading the choices. The key is slightly loose, since only the first study uses a search engine, which can make a careful reader hesitate. The strongest pull comes from paragraph 2, where most people turned to Google even for easy questions; it sounds like proof that searching is easier, but no study weighed the effort of looking up against remembering.
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The three studies sit in paragraphs 2, 5 and 6, and the key gathers them: turning to Google even for easy questions, recalling less from a saved file, and remembering folders better than facts. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
No sentence says what the studies share; students must abstract it, that expecting later access changes what people bother to store, from experiments built on Google, a computer file and named folders. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Every choice must be checked minor Choosing the answer
Each wrong choice names something the studies might plausibly have measured, the Internet’s capacity, kinds of information or ease of searching, and only a check of the three experiments shows that none did. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Strategy: Sum up in a phrase what the studies in paragraphs 2, 5 and 6 each tested, then pick the option that describes what they examined rather than a point made elsewhere in the article.
Traps
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
B Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Borrows paragraph 3’s “much larger volumes of information” and Pinker’s remark about “human brainpower,” points made outside the studies, which never measured what the Internet or the brain can hold.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Turns paragraph 6’s gap between recalling where a fact was kept and recalling the fact itself into a comparison of kinds of information, though no study sorted facts by type.
D Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads paragraph 2’s finding that 83 percent of the Internet group kept using Google as proof that searching is easier, though no study compared the effort of searching with remembering.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what the studies in the article have in common. How do they show the Internet’s effect on memory? There are three studies, in paragraphs 2, 5 and 6. Sum up each one in a few words. Then find the choice that fits all three.
Sum up the three studies
- Paragraph 2: People who had used Google kept using it, even for easy questions. In fact, “83 percent of the Internet group continued to consult Google in the second round.”
- Paragraph 5: People who thought a file of facts would be erased remembered more. They decided which facts deserved “their effort to remember.”
- Paragraph 6: People remembered where facts were kept better than the facts themselves.
Find what the studies share
Each study looks at how people treat information when a computer or search engine can hold it for them. People decide what is worth the effort to remember. Judging the value of something like this is called evaluating. People also change what they store in their minds, such as where a fact is instead of the fact. That is the effect on memory.
Check each choice
- A fits. The studies show people judging what to remember and storing where to find it.
- B does not fit. No study measured how much the Internet can hold or what the brain can do.
- C does not fit. No study sorted information into types.
- D does not fit. No study compared how easy it is to search and to remember.
Watch out: D is tempting because most people in paragraph 2 kept using Google. That might seem to show searching is easier. But the study never measured ease. It only counted who used Google.
Choose the answer
Only one choice describes what the studies actually tested. So the answer is A, “examine how the use of search engines changes the way people evaluate and store information for future access.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest wrong choice. It sounds like a fair reason people use Google. But none of the studies timed or rated the effort of searching or remembering. They tested what people chose to remember and what they stored. A describes that. Only the first study used a search engine, but the other two show the same pattern with a computer file and folders.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 31 of 92
2026 Practice Test D English, question 8Passage Excerpt from “How We Made the First Flight”
Excerpt from “How We Made the First Flight”
by Orville Wright
In 1903 brothers Wilbur and Orville Wright conducted experiments related to flying machines. These experiments would eventually lead to air travel becoming a reliable form of transportation.
During the night of December 16, 1903, a strong cold wind blew from the north. When we arose on the morning of the 17th, the puddles of water, which had been standing about camp since the recent rains, were covered with ice. The wind had a velocity of 10 to 12 meters per second (22 to 27 miles an hour). We thought it would die down before long, and so remained indoors the early part of the morning. But when ten o’clock arrived, and the wind was as brisk as ever, we decided that we had better get the machine out and attempt a flight. We hung out the signal for the men of the Life Saving Station.1 We thought that by facing the flyer into a strong wind, there ought to be no trouble in launching it from the level ground about camp. We realized the difficulties of flying in so high a wind, but estimated that the added dangers in flight would be partly compensated for by the slower speed in landing.
Final Preparations
We laid the track on a smooth stretch of ground about one hundred feet north of the new building. The biting cold wind made work difficult, and we had to warm up frequently in our living room, where we had a good fire in an improvised stove made of a large carbide2 can. By the time all was ready, J. T. Daniels, W. S. Dough and A. D. Etheridge, members of the Kill Devil3 Life Saving Station; W. C. Brinkley of Manteo, and Johnny Moore, a boy from Nags Head,4 had arrived.
We had a “Richard” hand anemometer with which we measured the velocity of the wind. Measurements made just before starting the first flight showed velocities of 11 to 12 meters per second, or 24 to 27 miles per hour. . . .
Audacity—and Calculation
Wilbur having used his turn in the unsuccessful attempt on the 14th, the right to the first trial now belonged to me. After running the motor a few minutes to heat it up, I released the wire that held the machine to the track, and the machine started forward in the wind. Wilbur ran at the side of the machine, holding the wing to balance it on the track. Unlike the start on the 14th, made in a calm, the machine, facing a 27-mile wind, started very slowly. Wilbur was able to stay with it till it lifted from the track after a forty-foot run. One of the Life Saving men snapped the camera for us, taking a picture just as the machine had reached the end of the track and had risen to a height of about two feet. The slow forward speed of the machine over the ground is clearly shown in the picture by Wilbur’s attitude. He stayed along beside the machine without any effort.
Flight
The course of the flight up and down was exceedingly erratic, partly due to the irregularity of the air, and partly to lack of experience in handling this machine. The control of the front rudder was difficult on account of its being balanced too near the center. This gave it a tendency to turn itself when started; so that it turned too far on one side and then too far on the other. As a result the machine would rise suddenly to about ten feet, and then as suddenly dart for the ground. A sudden dart when a little over a hundred feet from the end of the track, or a little over 120 feet from the point at which it rose into the air, ended the flight. As the velocity of the wind was over 35 feet per second and the speed of the machine over the ground against this wind ten feet per second, the speed of the machine relative to the air was over 45 feet per second, and the length of the flight was equivalent to a flight of 540 feet made in calm air. This flight lasted only 12 seconds, but it was nevertheless the first in the history of the world in which a machine carrying a man had raised itself by its own power into the air in full flight, had sailed forward without reduction of speed and had finally landed at a point as high as that from which it started.
From “How We Made the First Flight” by Orville Wright—Public Domain/Federal Aviation Administration
1Life Saving Station: one of the rescue stations along the Atlantic coastline that provided assistance to mariners in distress
2carbide: a very hard material composed of carbon and other heavy metals
3Kill Devil: the town of Kill Devil Hills in eastern North Carolina
4Nags Head: a town in eastern North Carolina
Question
How does paragraph 1 introduce the idea that the Wright brothers knew that their flight attempt was risky?
- Athrough the mention of a signal to notify lifesaving experts that the flight attempt was about to begin
- Bby providing specific details about the speed of the wind and the Wright brothers’ response to the windy conditions
- Cby suggesting that a slower landing would be necessary at the end of the flight in order to maintain safety
- Dthrough the indication that the Wright brothers waited indoors for most of the morning because of the poor weather
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how paragraph 1 introduces the idea that the Wright brothers knew that their flight attempt was risky.
A. CORRECT. Paragraph 1 describes the Wright brothers hanging out “the signal” to notify the lifesaving crew to stand by as they attempted flight; the need for lifesaving experts to be available in case of an accident introduces the idea that the attempted flight might crash.
B. Incorrect. The specifics on the speed of the wind by themselves do not emphasize the danger of the flight. While the brothers admitted that the strong wind posed certain risks, they also noted that the windy conditions might make landing safer (“estimated that the added dangers in flight would be partly compensated for by the slower speed in landing” [paragraph 1]).
C. Incorrect. A slower landing was expected as a result of the windy conditions, but it was not part of a plan to increase the safety of the flight.
D. Incorrect. While the Wright brothers’ initial decision to wait to see whether the wind would die down does suggest they were concerned about the safety of the flight, the explanation of their decision to proceed with the flight shows that they expected one benefit from the poor weather: “the slower speed in landing” (paragraph 1).
Question analysis
This question on Orville Wright’s account “How We Made the First Flight” asks how the opening paragraph, which describes a cold, windy December morning at the brothers’ camp, introduces the idea that the Wright brothers knew their flight attempt was risky. Students must judge which of four details from the paragraph does that work, and the paragraph mentions both dangers and reasons for confidence.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Finding how a paragraph introduces an idea is grade 7 work, but this paragraph is long and old-fashioned, every choice points to something it mentions, and students must decide which detail most clearly signals that the brothers saw a risk.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Every choice must be checked moderate
- Complex sentences minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 7, 816 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 93 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
Paragraph 1 states the danger outright only in its last sentence, and that sentence then weighs it against a gentler landing, so the choice built on the brothers’ response to the wind is the strongest pull. The key rests on a quieter detail whose meaning comes from a footnote: men from a rescue station were signaled before the attempt. Students must decide which detail shows the brothers preparing for trouble, not just noticing the weather, and that test is narrower than most expect.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The key never says danger: students must connect “the signal for the men of the Life Saving Station” to footnote 1, rescue stations for “mariners in distress,” and see that summoning rescuers means expecting trouble. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Every choice must be checked moderate Choosing the answer
All four details come from paragraph 1, and its plainest admission of danger, “We realized the difficulties of flying in so high a wind,” sits inside a wrong choice, so each detail must be weighed for what it shows. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
The paragraph’s last sentence sets danger against benefit, “the added dangers in flight would be partly compensated for by the slower speed in landing,” and students must untangle it to see the brothers playing the risk down. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Strategy: Locate each of the four details in paragraph 1, reread the sentence it sits in, and ask what that detail on its own reveals about what the brothers feared could go wrong.
Traps
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
B Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Seizes on the wind speeds and “We realized the difficulties of flying in so high a wind,” but the response the paragraph describes is a calculation that a slower landing would offset the danger.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Turns the slower landing, a side effect of facing a strong wind, into a safety step the brothers needed, when the paragraph counts it as a partial offset to the added danger.
D Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads the wait for calmer air as fear and stretches “the early part of the morning” into most of it, though at ten o’clock they decided to fly in the same brisk wind.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how paragraph 1 first shows that the Wright brothers knew their flight was risky. Risky means it could end badly. All four choices name details from paragraph 1. Your job is to find the detail that shows them getting ready for trouble.
Find the signal in paragraph 1
Paragraph 1 says “We hung out the signal for the men of the Life Saving Station.” The small number 1 after “Station” points to footnote 1 at the end of the excerpt. Read it. A Life Saving Station was “one of the rescue stations along the Atlantic coastline that provided assistance to mariners in distress.” Mariners are sailors. Distress means danger or trouble.
Work out what the signal means
The brothers called rescue workers before they tried to fly. People call rescuers only when someone might get hurt. So the signal shows the brothers knew the flight could go wrong. They wanted help close by in case of a crash.
Check each choice
- A fits. Signaling rescuers shows the brothers planned for trouble.
- B does not fit. The wind speeds are only numbers. The brothers’ response was to fly anyway, thinking “there ought to be no trouble in launching.”
- C does not fit. The slower landing was a side effect of the wind. They counted it as a plus, not as a safety step they needed.
- D does not fit. They stayed inside only “the early part of the morning,” hoping the wind would die down. Then they went out in the same wind.
Watch out: B is tempting because the paragraph says “We realized the difficulties of flying in so high a wind.” But that same sentence weighs those dangers against a slower landing. It plays the risk down.
Choose the answer
The call to the rescue station is the detail that shows the brothers preparing for danger. So the answer is A, “through the mention of a signal to notify lifesaving experts that the flight attempt was about to begin.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong choice. The paragraph does admit the wind made flying harder. But the brothers then argue the danger down: a slower landing would partly make up for it. A shows them acting on the risk. They called in rescuers before they flew. You only do that if you think something could go wrong.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “How We Made the First Flight”” as printed (pages 13–14)
Question 32 of 92
2026 Practice Test D English, question 9Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “How We Made the First Flight””.
Question
Read this sentence from paragraph 4.
Wilbur having used his turn in the unsuccessful attempt on the 14th, the right to the first trial now belonged to me.
The sentence contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt by
- Ademonstrating the challenge of the extreme winter conditions during the flight.
- Brevealing how many tries it took for Wilbur Wright to finally get the machine to take flight.
- Cdemonstrating that both Orville and Wilbur Wright were eager to pilot what could potentially be the first flight.
- Dsuggesting a sense that both brothers felt confident they would soon succeed in completing the first flight.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how the sentence from paragraph 4 contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 4 does not refer to the challenge of the winter conditions during the flight attempt.
B. Incorrect. While the sentence from paragraph 4 specifically references a previous flight several days earlier, it does not state how many attempts came before Wilbur’s attempt on December 14.
C. CORRECT. The sentence from paragraph 4 indicates that the Wright brothers had agreed to take turns attempting to achieve the first flight, which suggests their eagerness to each be the first to successfully fly the machine.
D. Incorrect. Orville’s trial came about simply because the brothers took turns, which would suggest that there was no greater likelihood of success or reason to be more confident at that moment than there had been for previous attempts.
Question analysis
This question quotes the sentence that opens the “Audacity—and Calculation” section of Orville Wright’s account, in which he explains that the first trial on December 17 was his because Wilbur had used his turn on the 14th. Students decide how the sentence contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt. Several choices bring in other parts of the story, so students must stay with what this one sentence shows.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining what one quoted sentence adds is routine grade 7 work. This sentence is short but opens with an old-fashioned “Wilbur having used his turn” construction, and its point about the brothers is implied rather than stated.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Complex sentences minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one sentence or line
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 7, 816 words; question and choices: about grade 8, 102 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
The sentence is about whose turn it is, and the question asks what that arrangement says about the brothers. A quick reader may lose the subject in the opening phrase and think Wilbur is still trying, or may carry the cold of earlier paragraphs into a sentence that never mentions it. The harder call is between eagerness and confidence: the heading “Audacity—and Calculation” makes confidence sound right, but a failed attempt three days earlier gives no reason for it.
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The choice about confidence matches the key’s frame, both brothers feeling something about the first flight; it differs in one word, confident instead of eager, and only eagerness follows from taking turns. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The sentence names no feeling; eagerness has to be read from the turn-taking itself, the brothers alternating for “the right to the first trial,” a chance each wanted to be his. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
The sentence opens with an absolute phrase, “Wilbur having used his turn in the unsuccessful attempt on the 14th,” whose subject is not the subject of the main clause, so a reader can lose track of who flies. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Strategy: Untangle the sentence first: say who used a turn, when, and who goes next. Then ask what the arrangement it describes suggests about the two brothers, and test each choice against that.
Traps
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Carries the frozen puddles and “biting cold wind” of paragraphs 1 and 2 into this sentence, which says nothing about the weather and is only about whose turn it was.
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Loses the subject of the opening phrase and has Wilbur keep trying until he flies, though the sentence mentions one failed attempt and gives this trial to Orville.
D Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads “the right to the first trial” and the heading “Audacity—and Calculation” as confidence, but taking turns says nothing about their odds, and the attempt on the 14th had failed.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what one sentence adds to the excerpt. The sentence is short, but it starts in an old-fashioned way. First untangle who did what. Then ask what the sentence tells you about the two brothers.
Untangle the sentence
The sentence is “Wilbur having used his turn in the unsuccessful attempt on the 14th, the right to the first trial now belonged to me.” The first part gives a reason. In plain words: Wilbur already had his turn on the 14th. Unsuccessful means it failed. The second part says: so now it is my turn. The “me” is Orville, who wrote the excerpt. A trial here is a try.
Ask what taking turns shows
The brothers took turns trying to fly. Each one had a “right” to a turn. You take turns when both people want the same chance. Each brother wanted to be the pilot. This could be the first flight in history, so both were eager. Eager means they really wanted it.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. The sentence says nothing about the cold or the wind.
- B does not fit. It mentions only one failed try by Wilbur. And this trial was Orville’s, not Wilbur’s.
- C fits. Taking turns shows that each brother wanted to fly the machine.
- D does not fit. Nothing in the sentence shows confidence. The last try had failed, and it was simply Orville’s turn.
Watch out: D is tempting because the section heading is “Audacity—and Calculation.” Audacity means boldness. But taking turns shows eagerness, not a belief that they would succeed.
Choose the answer
The turn-taking shows that both brothers wanted to fly. So the answer is C, “demonstrating that both Orville and Wilbur Wright were eager to pilot what could potentially be the first flight.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest wrong choice. Both C and D describe how the brothers felt about the first flight. But the sentence gives no reason to feel sure of success. It even mentions “the unsuccessful attempt on the 14th.” What it does show is that each brother wanted his own turn. That is eagerness, so C fits better.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 33 of 92
2026 Practice Test D English, question 10Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “How We Made the First Flight””.
Question
The photograph mentioned in paragraph 4 is significant because it
- Adocuments that the machine rose into the air as soon as the tethering wire was released.
- Bprovides proof of the critical moment the machine took flight.
- Cdocuments that the wind reduced the speed of the plane at the start of the flight.
- Dprovides proof that the pilot had to gradually increase the height of the plane in the air.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks why the photograph mentioned in paragraph 4 is significant.
A. Incorrect. According to paragraph 4, the photograph was not taken immediately after the tethering wire was released but rather after an intervening period during which “Wilbur ran at the side of the machine, holding the wing to balance it on the track.” The picture was not taken until “the machine had reached the end of the track,” which occurred after a “forty-foot run” (paragraph 4).
B. CORRECT. The photograph mentioned in paragraph 4 is significant because it provides proof that the machine did, in fact, take flight: “One of the Life Saving men snapped the camera for us, taking a picture just as the machine had reached the end of the track and had risen to a height of about two feet. The slow forward speed of the machine over the ground is clearly shown in the picture by Wilbur’s attitude. He stayed along beside the machine without any effort.”
C. Incorrect. The photograph mentioned in paragraph 4 is described as showing the plane moving forward through the air at a height of two feet, but while the effect of the wind may be visible, it is not why the photo is significant. Instead, the photograph provides proof that the plane is, in fact, moving through the air (“One of the Life Saving men snapped the camera for us, taking a picture just as the machine had reached the end of the track and had risen to a height of about two feet. The slow forward speed of the machine over the ground is clearly shown in the picture by Wilbur’s attitude”).
D. Incorrect. Although the plane is shown at a height of two feet in the photograph mentioned in paragraph 4, the picture documents only one moment of the plane’s flight and does not provide proof that the pilot had to gradually increase the height of the plane in the air.
Question analysis
This question on Orville Wright’s account of the first airplane flight asks why the photograph mentioned in paragraph 4, taken by one of the Life Saving men, is significant. The photograph itself is not printed with the excerpt, so students must work from Orville’s description of the moment it was taken. Several choices describe the machine’s movement, so each must be checked against that description.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 readers often explain why a detail matters. This photograph is not printed, so students must picture it from Orville’s description, which uses “attitude” in an old sense meaning posture, and then judge why the picture mattered.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- The right answer is reworded moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 7, 816 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 68 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
The photograph is not printed, so students work from three sentences of description, and the last two tell what Orville thinks the picture shows: the machine’s slow speed, visible in Wilbur’s easy pace. That stated detail is the strongest lure. The question asks for significance instead, which the excerpt leaves unstated; students must link the moment captured, the machine just off the track at the end of its run, to paragraph 5’s closing claim that this was the first such flight in history.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
Orville never says why the picture matters; students must notice it was taken “just as the machine had reached the end of the track and had risen to a height of about two feet,” the instant of lift-off. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
The right answer is reworded moderate Choosing the answer
The key’s “critical moment the machine took flight” appears nowhere, while the wrong choices echo the paragraph’s released wire, the slow speed Orville says the picture shows, and the “height of about two feet.” (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
Orville says the slow speed shows “by Wilbur’s attitude,” using attitude in an old sense, Wilbur’s posture as he keeps pace, which students must decode to follow the description of the picture. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Reread the three sentences about the picture in paragraph 4, note when it was taken and what Orville says it shows, then weigh which choice explains why such a picture would matter.
Traps
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
A Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Collapses the release of the wire and the lift-off into one moment, skipping Wilbur’s run beside the machine; it rose only after a forty-foot run, when the picture was taken.
C True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Takes Orville’s own remark that the picture shows “the slow forward speed of the machine” as its significance, but that is a detail in the picture, not why a picture of this moment matters.
D Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Treats the two-foot height as one step in a steady climb, though a single picture catches one instant and paragraph 5 describes sudden rises to ten feet and darts toward the ground.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks why the photograph in paragraph 4 matters. The photograph is not printed with the excerpt. You have to picture it from Orville’s words. Find when it was taken. Then ask why a picture of that moment would be important.
Read the description of the photograph
Paragraph 4 says “One of the Life Saving men snapped the camera for us, taking a picture just as the machine had reached the end of the track and had risen to a height of about two feet.” The next sentences say “The slow forward speed of the machine over the ground is clearly shown in the picture by Wilbur’s attitude. He stayed along beside the machine without any effort.”
Work out what the picture shows
The machine had just left the track and was two feet in the air. So the picture caught the moment it lifted off. Here “attitude” means the way Wilbur held his body. He kept up with the machine easily, so it was moving slowly. Paragraph 5 says this flight was “the first in the history of the world” of its kind. A photo of that lift-off is proof that it really happened.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. The machine did not rise at once. It lifted “after a forty-foot run.”
- B fits. The picture caught the moment the machine first took flight.
- C does not fit. The picture does show the slow speed. But that is a detail in the photo, not why the photo matters.
- D does not fit. One picture shows one moment. It cannot show a steady climb. In fact, paragraph 5 says the machine rose and dropped suddenly.
Watch out: C is tempting because Orville himself says the slow speed is “clearly shown in the picture.” But the question asks why the picture is significant, which means important.
Choose the answer
The photo captured the very moment the first flight began. So the answer is B, “provides proof of the critical moment the machine took flight.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong choice. Orville does say the picture shows the machine’s slow speed. But slow speed is not what makes this photo special. It was taken just as the machine “had risen to a height of about two feet” at the end of the track. That is proof of the first moment of flight, as B says.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 34 of 92
2026 Practice Test D English, question 14Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “How We Made the First Flight””.
Question
The use of chronological structure contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt by
- Aoutlining the actions that the Wright brothers took to prepare for and successfully complete the first flight.
- Bidentifying the primary factors that allowed the Wright brothers to overcome obstacles and achieve the first flight.
- Cshowing how the Wright brothers applied lessons learned from their previous flight attempts to accomplish the first flight.
- Ddemonstrating how the Wright brothers analyzed the impact of wind velocity to identify the ideal conditions for the first flight.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how the use of chronological structure contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt.
A. CORRECT. Through the chronological structure, Orville addresses all stages of the flight in a way that builds from flight concerns and preparations for takeoff to his experiences during the flight and his successful landing.
B. Incorrect. While obstacles are presented within the excerpt, the chronological structure emphasizes the events that ended in the successful achievement of flight on that day rather than how the Wright brothers overcame obstacles.
C. Incorrect. The chronological structure of the excerpt does not show that the Wright brothers applied lessons learned from their previous attempts at flight; instead, the structure describes Orville’s December 17 attempt.
D. Incorrect. While Orville’s narrative certainly shows a strong need to analyze wind speed, this idea is not conveyed through the chronological structure of the excerpt. Additionally, the description of the first flight on December 17 indicates that it did not take place in ideal conditions (“We realized the difficulties of flying in so high a wind” [paragraph 1] and “The course of the flight up and down was exceedingly erratic, partly due to the irregularity of the air” [paragraph 5]).
Question analysis
This text-structure question asks how the chronological structure of Orville Wright’s “How We Made the First Flight,” an account that begins on the night of December 16, 1903, contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt. Students must see what telling events in time order does for the account. Each choice names a purpose that could suit a story of the first airplane flight.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Below grade 7 Grade 7 structure questions often ask how a less obvious pattern, such as problem and solution, shapes ideas. This excerpt is plainly told in time order, with dates and section headings, so recognizing what that order does is a lighter task.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what minor
- A very close wrong answer minor
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 7, 816 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 87 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
The excerpt is plainly chronological, with a date in its first sentence and headings that move from “Final Preparations” to “Flight,” so the structure is easy to recognize. The difficulty is in saying what that order does. The strongest pull sounds like the excerpt’s central idea, success over obstacles, but ranking the causes of success is analysis, not sequence, and the other choices invent lessons from the failed attempt on the 14th or a search for ideal winds.
How, not what minor Working it out
The question asks what telling events in time order does, and the excerpt moves from the night of December 16 through laying the track and the launch to the flight, so the structure’s job is to trace those steps. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
A very close wrong answer minor Choosing the answer
The choice about the primary factors shares the key’s ending, achieving the first flight; it differs in its first half, an analysis of what made success possible, which a time order does not set out. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Strategy: Skim the section headings and the first sentence of each paragraph to see how the excerpt moves through time, then test each choice against what a time order can do.
Traps
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
B Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Expects the structure to explain why the flight succeeded, a fair summary of the excerpt’s message, but time order tells events as they happened and never ranks which factors mattered most.
C Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Builds on the failed attempt of the 14th and assumes the brothers learned from it, though the excerpt only contrasts that calm start with this windy one.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Recalls the anemometer readings and the risk estimate and turns them into a search for ideal conditions, though the brothers flew in a wind whose difficulties and added dangers they admitted.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This is a structure question. Chronological structure means telling events in time order, from first to last. The question asks what that order does for the excerpt. So first check how the excerpt moves through time.
Trace the order of events
Look at the section headings and the start of each paragraph.
- Paragraph 1 starts “During the night of December 16, 1903.” The brothers decide to fly.
- Under “Final Preparations,” they lay the track and measure the wind.
- Under “Audacity—and Calculation,” Orville takes off.
- Under “Flight,” the machine flies and lands.
Say what the time order does
The story moves step by step. It goes from getting ready, to taking off, to flying, to landing. Each step leads to the next. By the end, you have followed everything the brothers did to make the first flight happen. The last sentence says the machine “had finally landed at a point as high as that from which it started.”
Check each choice
- A fits. Time order lays out what the brothers did to prepare and then to fly.
- B does not fit. Primary factors are the main causes. Time order tells events as they happen. It does not rank which causes mattered most.
- C does not fit. The excerpt mentions the failed try on the 14th. But it never says what they learned from it.
- D does not fit. They did not wait for ideal, or perfect, conditions. They flew in a strong wind and knew its dangers.
Watch out: B is tempting because the excerpt does show success over problems. But naming the main causes of success is a different job from telling events in order.
Choose the answer
The time order walks you through the preparations, the takeoff and the flight. So the answer is A, “outlining the actions that the Wright brothers took to prepare for and successfully complete the first flight.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong choice. The excerpt does show the brothers succeeding despite problems. But time order cannot explain which factors mattered most. It just tells events in the order they happened. That is what A says: the time order outlines the actions, from getting ready to completing the flight.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 35 of 92
2026 Practice Test D English, question 16Passage Wolves of the Sea
Wolves of the Sea
The cool and misty landscape of the Great Bear Rainforest can be found along the coast of British Columbia, Canada, and its nearby islands, from Vancouver Island to the Alaskan border. Within this protected area, wolves roam the forests, islands, and beaches. When biologist Chris Darimont began to study these wolves, he wanted to confer with local First Nations groups, as aboriginal Canadians are known, in order to learn what they knew about these wolves. He spoke with Chester Starr, an elder of the Heiltsuk Nation that has occupied the Great Bear Rainforest for thousands of years. What Starr had to say about the wolves changed Darimont’s perception of the animals.
Starr asked Darimont which wolves he and his team were going to study—the timber wolves (mainland wolves) or the coastal wolves on the islands. The question took Darimont by surprise. Biologists had always believed that the wolves that are sometimes spotted swimming between islands and eating salmon are the same wolves that live on the mainland. Darimont was intrigued by Starr’s classification of the wolves as two different groups. At first, he was hesitant to accept the idea. The distances between the mainland and the islands are small, less than a mile. Why would the wolves on the islands be any different from the wolves on the mainland? To find out, Darimont and his research team studied the wolves on the islands and in the densely forested territory of the Great Bear Rainforest for ten years.
Throughout the study, Darimont recorded several significant, observable differences between the “sea wolves,” as they are nicknamed, and the mainland wolves. Compared with the mainland wolves, the sea wolves are smaller in size and are strong swimmers. In 1996 sea wolves were spotted on an island nearly eight miles from any other land formation. While mainland wolves almost exclusively eat meat, such as deer and elk, and teach their young to hunt for land animals, sea wolves get as much as 90 percent of their nutrition from the sea and teach their young to dig for clams and to catch fish. Sea wolves regularly swim between islands and have been known to sneak up on a seal sunning itself on a rock and make a leaping attack from the water. Some salmon-eating mainland wolves come and go from the islands with the fish-spawning season, but the sea wolves are full-time island residents. Darimont suspects that some sea wolves live their entire life on the islands.
The sea wolves displayed not only physical and behavioral differences but also genetic variations from the mainland wolves. After collecting and analyzing the DNA in 800 samples of gray fur and wolf waste, researchers could produce hard biological evidence that sea wolves had genetic markers that made them distinct from the mainland wolves. A genetic marker is a variation in a DNA sequence that can be used to identify individuals or a species because it is passed down to offspring. Darimont hypothesizes that a change in habitat led to the eventual genetic differences between sea wolves and mainland wolves. Many years ago, loss of habitat and food sources forced some mainland wolves out to the islands. They learned to eat everything from kelp and fish eggs to the remains of sea creatures that washed up on the beach. Wolves living on the islands and mainland wolves became more isolated and rarely mated with each other. Over time the two types of wolves became more distinct.
It turned out that Chester Starr was right all along. “It sounded totally bizarre at first,” admits Darimont, “that there could be two versions of the species.” But he now realizes that this skepticism “definitely reflected my ignorance of indigenous knowledge at the time.” Learning to trust the wisdom of the Heiltsuk people opened Darimont up to knowledge accumulated over millennia and positioned him so that he could gather new scientific evidence about one of British Columbia’s most elusive species, the sea wolf.
Question
Why does the author include details about the conversation between Starr and Darimont in paragraph 2?
- Ato explain why Starr had closely observed the relationship between the two groups of wolves Darimont wanted to study
- Bto show that Darimont was hoping to work with Starr and to study both groups of wolves in the area
- Cto highlight that Darimont was unfamiliar with the area and expected Starr to help him find wolves to study
- Dto emphasize that the question asked by Starr caused Darimont to review his initial assumption about the wolves
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks why the author includes details about the conversation between Starr and Darimont in paragraph 2.
A. Incorrect. The details in paragraph 2 do not explain why Starr had closely observed the two groups of wolves. Instead, they convey that Starr believed the wolves to be separate groups (“Starr asked Darimont which wolves he and his team were going to study—the timber wolves (mainland wolves) or the coastal wolves on the islands”), a supposition that intrigued Darimont and ultimately changed the course of his research study.
B. Incorrect. Although paragraph 1 indicates that Darimont did hope to work with Starr (“he wanted to confer with local First Nations groups, as aboriginal Canadians are known, in order to learn what they knew about these wolves”), Darimont did not initially plan to study both groups of wolves in the area because, as the conversation in paragraph 2 indicates, he did not initially know they were two distinct groups of wolves.
C. Incorrect. The details about the conversation in paragraph 2 highlight that Darimont was eager to learn from Starr’s knowledge of the wolves (“Darimont was intrigued by Starr’s classification of the wolves as two different groups”), but they do not indicate that Darimont expected Starr’s help to find the wolves.
D. CORRECT. According to paragraph 2, Starr wanted to know which group of wolves Darimont planned to study—“the timber wolves (mainland wolves) or the coastal wolves on the islands.” The author states that the question “took Darimont by surprise,” adding that “Darimont was intrigued by Starr’s classification of the wolves as two different groups.” The author adds that Darimont was initially “hesitant to accept the idea” that the wolves were separate groups but ultimately spent years studying the two groups of wolves. These details indicate that the question Starr posed to Darimont forced Darimont to reevaluate his initial assumption “that the wolves that are sometimes spotted swimming between islands and eating salmon are the same wolves that live on the mainland” and investigate Starr’s observation that the wolves had separated into two distinct groups.
Question analysis
In paragraph 2 of “Wolves of the Sea,” the Heiltsuk elder Chester Starr asks Darimont whether his team will study the timber wolves or the coastal wolves on the islands. This question asks why the author includes the details of that conversation, so students must explain what a short exchange does for the passage, not just what was said.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining why an author includes a detail is everyday grade 7 structure work. The paragraph in question is short and plainly written, and each choice can be checked against it directly, so the demand is typical of grade 7.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what moderate
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 662 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 91 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
The paragraph is short and the turn in it is clear: a question surprises Darimont, he doubts it, and he sets out to test it. The main risk is the choice that mixes a true fact from paragraph 1, that Darimont wanted to learn from Starr, with a plan to study two groups he did not yet know existed. Students who keep the order of events straight, what Darimont believed before and after Starr spoke, rule it out.
How, not what moderate Working it out
The stem asks why the conversation is there, so students must say what Starr’s question about “the timber wolves … or the coastal wolves” does to Darimont’s research, not just repeat it. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
Paragraph 2 never says Darimont rethought anything; the review of his assumption is pieced together from “took Darimont by surprise,” “hesitant to accept” and the ten-year study that followed. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Read all of paragraph 2, not just Starr’s question, and say in your own words why the conversation matters to the research; then reject choices that add facts the paragraph never gives.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
The wrong answers, classified
A Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Assumes the conversation is there to show how Starr came to know the two groups, but paragraph 2 reports only his question, never how or why he watched the wolves.
B Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Rightly recalls that Darimont hoped to learn from Starr, but he could not have planned to study “both groups” before Starr’s question told him there were two.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Turns Darimont’s wish to learn what the Heiltsuk knew into a newcomer asking a local guide to find wolves for him, a reason the passage never gives.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks about the author’s purpose. Why did the author put the talk between Starr and Darimont into paragraph 2? Don’t just retell the talk. Ask what it does to Darimont and his research.
Find the conversation
Paragraph 2 opens with Starr’s question. He asked which wolves the team would study, “the timber wolves (mainland wolves) or the coastal wolves on the islands.” Next, “The question took Darimont by surprise.” Why? “Biologists had always believed” that the island wolves were “the same wolves that live on the mainland.”
Follow what happens next
Darimont “was intrigued,” which means curious. Still, “At first, he was hesitant to accept the idea.” Hesitant means unsure and slow to agree. Then, “To find out,” his team studied the wolves for ten years. So Starr’s question made Darimont rethink his first belief. He had assumed, or believed without checking, that all the wolves were one group.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. The paragraph gives Starr’s question. It never says how or why Starr watched the wolves.
- B is wrong. Darimont did hope to learn from Starr. But he could not plan to study both groups before he knew there were two.
- C is wrong. Nothing says Darimont needed Starr to help him find wolves.
- D is right. The question surprised Darimont and sent him to test his first idea. His initial assumption means that first idea.
Watch out: B mixes a true fact from paragraph 1 with a plan Darimont did not have yet. Keep the order of events straight.
Choose the answer
The talk shows Starr’s question changing how Darimont thought about the wolves. So the answer is D, “to emphasize that the question asked by Starr caused Darimont to review his initial assumption about the wolves.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong answer. It is true that Darimont wanted to work with Starr. But before Starr spoke, Darimont thought all the wolves were one group. So he had no plan to study two groups. D fits the order of events: Starr asks, Darimont is surprised, and then he tests his old idea.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Wolves of the Sea” as printed (pages 23–24)
Question 36 of 92
2026 Practice Test D English, question 20Uses the passage above: “Wolves of the Sea”.
Question
How did a change in habitat most affect the wolf population of the Great Bear Rainforest over time?
- AIt caused some of the wolves to learn new hunting techniques in order to catch increasingly scarce prey.
- BIt caused the wolves to form smaller packs and eventually separate, establishing distinct territories.
- CIt caused some of the wolves to gradually become a new, genetically distinct species as they adapted behaviorally.
- DIt caused the wolves to adapt their diet as different food sources became available in the area.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how a change in habitat most affected the wolf population of the Great Bear Rainforest over time.
A. Incorrect. Although the island wolves learned new hunting techniques (“dig for clams and to catch fish,” “sneak up on a seal sunning itself on a rock and make a leaping attack from the water” [paragraph 3]), there is no evidence in the passage that these hunting techniques were developed in response to scarcity of prey. The most significant effect of the change in habitat was not an influence on hunting techniques but the behavior differences that evolved because of the isolation of the groups of wolves from each other.
B. Incorrect. The change in habitat did not cause the wolves to form smaller packs but rather served to create distinctive behaviors because of the isolation of one pack from another, eventually causing the groups of wolves to become distinct species.
C. CORRECT. The change in habitat caused the wolves to gradually become two distinct species. Though the “sea wolves regularly swim between islands” and “some salmon-eating mainland wolves come and go from the islands,” the “sea wolves are full-time island residents” (paragraph 3). This behavioral adaptation to their environment caused the sea wolves to become “more isolated” from the mainland wolves; as a result, the two groups “rarely mated with each other,” and “over time the two types of wolves became more distinct” (paragraph 4).
D. Incorrect. Only the sea wolves adapted their diet. They did this not because different food sources became available in the area but because they were in an entirely different area from the mainland wolves.
Question analysis
This cause-and-effect question asks how a change in habitat most affected the wolf population of the Great Bear Rainforest over time, in the article “Wolves of the Sea.” Students must follow the account in paragraphs 3 and 4 of how some wolves came to live on the islands and pick the result the passage treats as the main one, among several that sound possible.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Tracing how one event leads to another is core grade 7 informational reading. The effects here are spread over two paragraphs of science writing, and several choices mix real details with causes the passage never gives, which keeps the demand typical.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 662 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 85 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- Two grammar slips in the explanation were corrected.
- 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
Several effects of the move are real, and the strongest wrong answer names one of them, a change of diet, but gives it the wrong cause by having food appear nearby instead of wolves being forced out to the islands. Students who stop at the first effect they recognize miss that the question asks what happened over time. The key’s “new, genetically distinct species” overstates the passage, which calls the wolves “two versions of the species,” though it is still the only choice that follows the chain to its end.
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The chain of effects runs across two paragraphs: the island habits of paragraph 3, then paragraph 4’s loss of habitat, isolation, rare mating and the two types becoming “more distinct” over time. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The word “most” and the phrase “over time” point past the first changes, a new diet and new skills, to the end of the chain, genetic difference, which students must rank as the main effect. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Trace the chain of events in paragraphs 3 and 4 from the wolves’ move to the islands onward, then test each choice for who changed, why, and with what result.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
The wrong answers, classified
A Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Joins paragraph 4’s lost food sources to paragraph 3’s new skills, but the scarcity drove wolves to the islands and a new diet, not to new ways of catching scarce prey.
B Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Supplies familiar facts about wolf packs and territories that the passage never mentions; the groups grew apart because island wolves stayed put and rarely mated with mainland wolves.
D Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Rightly sees that diet changed, but only the island wolves changed it, after lost food forced them out, not because new food appeared in the area.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The DOE’s explanation of Option B says “eventually causing the groups of wolves to became distinct species”; the site says “to become.” Its explanation of Option C says the change “caused the sea wolves to ‘became more isolated’ from the mainland wolves,” putting paragraph 4’s past-tense “became” after “to”; the site now reads “caused the sea wolves to become ‘more isolated’ from the mainland wolves.”
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This is a cause-and-effect question. The cause is a change in habitat. A habitat is the place where an animal lives and finds food. You need the biggest effect it had “over time.” So follow the whole chain of events to its end.
Find the cause in paragraph 4
Paragraph 4 says, “Many years ago, loss of habitat and food sources forced some mainland wolves out to the islands.” There, “They learned to eat everything from kelp and fish eggs to the remains of sea creatures that washed up on the beach.” Kelp is a kind of seaweed.
Follow the chain to its end
Next, the two groups “became more isolated and rarely mated with each other.” Isolated means cut off. Then, “Over time the two types of wolves became more distinct.” Distinct means clearly different. Darimont thinks the change in habitat “led to the eventual genetic differences.” Genetic means in the DNA, passed from parents to young. So the chain ends with the two groups becoming different in their DNA.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. Lost food sent wolves to the islands. The passage never says they learned tricks to catch scarce, or hard-to-find, prey.
- B is wrong. The passage never mentions packs or territories.
- C is right. Some wolves changed how they live, then grew apart in their DNA. One caution: C says “species.” The passage is more careful. It speaks of “two versions of the species.”
- D is wrong. Only the island wolves changed their diet. They did not find new food nearby. Lost food forced them to move.
Watch out: D names a real effect, a new diet. But that is only an early step, and D gives the wrong reason for it.
Choose the answer
The biggest effect over time was that the island wolves grew different in their DNA from the mainland wolves. So the answer is C, “It caused some of the wolves to gradually become a new, genetically distinct species as they adapted behaviorally.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest wrong answer, because the diet really did change. But D says new food “became available in the area.” The passage says the opposite: lost food forced some wolves out to the islands. A new diet is also only an early step. C follows the chain all the way to the change in their DNA.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 37 of 92
2026 Practice Test D English, question 25Passage Ode to Fireworks
Ode to Fireworks
In autumn my mother drove us to the edge of the field
where the fair was set up year after year:
the carousel, the bumper cars, the long, low sheds
filled with prizewinning animals.
We—my sister, my cousin, and I—were ready for bed,
already in our pajamas. This was a treat we waited
all year for. We waited in the darkness
for the first low, dull thwumps, like someone
beating an old, filthy rug hung on a wash line.
Then we counted the seconds between the lightning
and thunder, as we also used to do, until the sky
lit up: red, blue, green, gold. In my mind’s eye
I can still see the straggly, ancient oak whose branches
reached up past the exhibition halls, silhouetted
against the spectrum of stars that cascaded behind it.
It was one thing to look up into the sky
and imagine yourself in it or to make out pictures
among the clouds, which my sister liked to do.
No, I would tell her, that cloud
does not look like an elephant, a hat, an umbrella.
But it was another thing to see
the sky at night written upon
with those jewels. (We lived in the country:
night was night.) All around us, crickets
stridulated in the stubble of what had been
somebody’s cornfield, their song rising and falling.
You could smell winter on the air’s edge.
Now, in the city, when the sky dips into shadow
at New Year’s or on the Fourth of July, I find myself
craning my neck upward at odd moments.
The city sky is always lit up. This is where we live now,
and it is how we live now, awash in light
of every hue. Everything is a constant celebration:
picking up washing at the cleaner’s or stopping by
the corner market for a loaf of heavy bread.
And the music around me is the music of people,
their voices rising and falling in a hundred languages.
But beneath the yellowish glow deep in the sky
of all our city lights pelting out into the universe,
I remember the feel of the pickup truck bumping
across the ridged field, as I kept waiting for those
childhood bursts, watching as they escorted us home.
Question
Read lines 41–42 from the poem.
I kept waiting for those
childhood bursts, watching as they escorted us home.
How does this memory affect the speaker?
- AThe speaker believes it is impossible to ever return to a place in the past.
- BThe speaker is still amused by the impatience felt during fireworks displays.
- CThe speaker now regrets abandoning the rural way of life.
- DThe speaker feels a sense of comfort when reflecting on the past.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks how the memory in lines 41–42 affects the speaker.
A. Incorrect. The speaker does not express concern in these lines about the impossibility of returning to childhood or the past. For the speaker, the past and the memories associated with it are a source of comfort and a way to remember simpler times (“I remember the feel of the pickup truck bumping / across the ridged field” [lines 40–41]).
B. Incorrect. While the speaker recalls anticipation before the start of a fireworks display, there is no hint that the speaker is impatient. Particularly in lines 41–42, the speaker is reminded of the expectation of hearing and seeing fireworks and the sense of simple contentment felt in the experience (“I find myself / craning my neck upward at odd moments” [lines 29–30]).
C. Incorrect. The speaker is reflecting on past experiences and pointing out the elements of the city that remind the speaker of these past experiences. The speaker acknowledges the differences between the country and city settings but does not convey regret for leaving the rural area (“This is where we live now, / and it is how we live now, awash in light / of every hue” [lines 31–33]).
D. CORRECT. The memory of watching the fireworks on the way home creates a sense of comfort that stays with the speaker (“escorted us home”). The speaker looks forward to moments when the youthful experience (“childhood bursts”) of being excited by something like a fireworks display can be a source of happiness.
Question analysis
This question quotes the last lines of “Ode to Fireworks,” where the adult speaker, now living in the city, recalls waiting for the “childhood bursts” that “escorted us home,” and asks how this memory affects the speaker. Students must read the feeling in a brief closing image and check each choice against the whole final stanza about city life.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Inferring how an experience affects a speaker is regular grade 7 work. The two quoted lines are plain, but the feeling behind them is implied rather than named, and the choices offer four believable reactions to a memory.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Evidence in several places minor
- Figurative or literary language minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: 379 words (a poem; reading level not measured); question and choices: about grade 6, 74 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- The DOE printed this question’s explanation after a different question; the site matches the question with its own explanation.
- 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
The memory is warm, but warm memories of a lost place are easy to read as sadness, and the choice about regretting the move to the city draws students who hear nostalgia as complaint. The other wrong choices turn the anticipation of “kept waiting” into impatience or make the past impossible to reach, both stronger than anything the lines say. Students who read the whole sentence from “But beneath the yellowish glow” see a speaker carried home by the memory, not mourning it.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
Lines 41–42 name no feeling, so the comfort must be read from fireworks that “escorted us home” and from the grown speaker still waiting for “those / childhood bursts” in the city. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
Ruling out regret takes the rest of the third stanza, where city life is “a constant celebration” and “This is where we live now” is said without complaint. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Figurative or literary language minor Understanding the question
“Escorted us home” makes the fireworks companions guarding the family’s drive across the field, a personification that carries the sense of safety the question asks about. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Read lines 38–42 as one sentence, starting from “But beneath the yellowish glow,” and ask how the speaker feels about the city and about the memory, using the whole third stanza, before choosing.
Traps
- Wrong tone or attitude: Misjudges the tone, attitude or point of view, such as reading admiration as criticism, or taking a character's or subject's feelings for the author's.
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Turns a speaker who looks back into one mourning a place for good, with the absolute “impossible to ever return,” though the poem never says so and keeps the memory alive.
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Turns the eager waiting of “kept waiting for those / childhood bursts” into impatience and adds amusement, though nothing in the lines is treated as funny.
C Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads the speaker’s longing for the country as regret for leaving it, though the third stanza calls city life “a constant celebration” and never wishes the move undone.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: In the DOE’s explanations appendix, the explanation printed after this question belongs to question 24 (“what the purpose is of the repeated words ‘rising and falling’ in lines 26 and 37”) and marks B correct, and this question’s explanation (“how the memory in lines 41–42 affects the speaker”) is printed after question 24, marking D correct. Read page by page, the appendix gives this question the answer B. The site gives the question the explanation that restates it, and the answer follows that explanation: D, because the memory of the fireworks that “escorted us home” is a source of comfort to the speaker.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how a memory makes the speaker feel. The lines don’t name a feeling. So you have to infer it, which means figure it out from clues.
Read the whole sentence
The sentence starts in line 38: “But beneath the yellowish glow deep in the sky / of all our city lights pelting out into the universe, / I remember the feel of the pickup truck bumping / across the ridged field, as I kept waiting for those / childhood bursts, watching as they escorted us home.” The bursts are the fireworks.
Work out the feeling
To escort is to go along with someone to guide or protect them. So the speaker pictures the fireworks keeping the family company on the way home. That is a safe, warm picture. The memory comes back even under the bright city sky. It works like a favorite old song that still makes you feel good.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. The speaker never says it is “impossible to ever return.” The memory is still alive.
- B is wrong. The waiting was eager, not impatient. Nothing is treated as funny.
- C is wrong. Regret means wishing you had done something else. The speaker never wishes the move undone. The city is “a constant celebration.”
- D is right. The fireworks that “escorted us home” give the speaker a sense of comfort.
Watch out: Missing the past is not the same as regret. C reads a complaint into the poem that is not there.
Choose the answer
The memory of the fireworks bringing the family home warms the speaker. So the answer is D, “The speaker feels a sense of comfort when reflecting on the past.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong answer, because the speaker clearly misses the country. But stanza 3 says “This is where we live now” with no complaint. It even calls city life “a constant celebration.” The memory warms the speaker. It does not make the speaker wish to undo the move. That is comfort, choice D.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Ode to Fireworks” as printed (page 32)
Question 38 of 92
2025 Practice Test A English, question 9Passage Excerpt from “Scribe Like an Egyptian”
Excerpt from “Scribe Like an Egyptian”
by Hilary Wilson
In ancient Egypt, literacy was the key to success. However, contrary to popular belief, not all Egyptian scribes understood hieroglyphs. Many relied instead on the simpler hieratic script for the multitude of everyday documents generated by the Egyptian bureaucracy.
Hieroglyphs—“the Words of God”—compose a writing system with more than 1,000 distinct characters, the meanings of which were lost for 1,500 years before they were deciphered by Jean-François Champollion in 1822. Including both ideograms (which convey a whole word or idea, either concrete or abstract, in a single sign) and phonograms (representing either an alphabetic sound or a group of consonants), [the writing system] was used in formal inscriptions on tomb and temple walls as well as on elaborate funerary papyri. For everyday purposes, however, scribes used a shorthand version of the hieroglyphic script known as hieratic, which was quicker to write and more economical of space. The two writings existed side by side for at least 2,500 years.
Scraps of ancient hieratic writing, mostly penned by student scribes on limestone flakes called ostraca, suggest that no matter how humble his origins, an educated Egyptian could achieve almost anything. Horemheb (d.1292 B.C.) is a good example. Born of middle-ranking parents, his scribal training led to an army career. From Scribe of Recruits, during the reign of Akhenaten (1353–1336 B.C.), Horemheb rose through the military ranks and, by the rule of Tutankhamun (1332–1323 B.C.), he was commander in chief of the Egyptian forces. As a close adviser of the young Pharaoh, Horemheb was appointed “Deputy of the King throughout the Two Lands,” and might have expected to succeed to the throne should the king die childless. He had to wait a few years, but eventually Horemheb achieved the pinnacle of his career by becoming the last king of the 18th Dynasty, making his mark by instituting dramatic reforms to the organisation of the army, the judiciary and administration in general. The lasting success of these changes owed much to his scribal background. . . .
But education was not available to all. Government departments and major temples supported schools, where boys commenced their training at six or seven, sometimes earlier. To these boarding establishments . . . family or household servants delivered the students’ food and drink rations daily for several years, during which time the student was not contributing to the family’s income. Boys from poorer families could only hope to be educated with support from a wealthier relative or patron, or through apprenticeship to an older scribe, perhaps the local clerk or land agent, who would teach them the basics of the scribe’s craft. This limited the scope for employment but such “on the job” training allowed apprentices to help out at home while learning. . . .
Scribal education began with the elementary principles of the hieratic script. The lowliest scribes, who trained for just five or six years, probably learned only the rudiments of the hieroglyphic script. Students were set exemplar documents and extracts from popular texts to copy, to practice their hieratic handwriting on basic-format letters, reports and contracts, while absorbing the good advice contained in the texts. Surviving examples of copy-work sometimes include tutors’ corrections added in red. Some significant Egyptian literary works survive almost exclusively from student copies.
A schoolboy “dictionary” of hieroglyphs with their hieratic equivalents shows that a knowledge of more than 450 signs was required for everyday writing purposes. Lessons in record-keeping and filing and labelling enabled any half-competent scribe to perform that most essential of all scribal functions: the making and updating of lists. For professions such as those of government official, priest or lawyer, a scribe would train for several more years, increasing his vocabulary to perhaps a thousand or more signs. Those with the best handwriting or drawing skills might follow the craft of creating beautifully illustrated copies of funerary texts, commonly called Books of the Dead. Others could become draughtsmen, artists or architects. Doctors compiled their own collections of medication recipes, treatments and associated incantations, many copied from texts found in the House of Life, the temple library. Lawyers had to be familiar with the corpus of civil and religious laws and precedents found in the official records, which were administered by archivists. Egypt’s bureaucratic society depended on the skills of an army of scribes of all ranks from filing clerk to tax assessor. For young Egyptians, “be a scribe” was the best of career advice.
From “Scribe Like an Egyptian” by Hilary Wilson from HISTORY TODAY, August 8, 2019. Copyright © 2019 by History Today Ltd. Company.
bureaucracy: an administrative staff of government officials
funerary papyri: a sheet or scroll of papyrus containing religious images and hieroglyphs meant to help the deceased be reborn in the afterlife
rudiments: basics
schoolboy: slang that refers to materials used during the course of receiving an education
draughtsmen: people who draw plans of machinery or structures
corpus: a collection of writings
Question
Which sentence from the excerpt best supports the idea that there were different levels of education for a scribe?
- A“However, contrary to popular belief, not all Egyptian scribes understood hieroglyphs.” (paragraph 1)
- B“For everyday purposes, however, scribes used a shorthand version of the hieroglyphic script known as hieratic, which was quicker to write and more economical of space.” (paragraph 2)
- C“This limited the scope for employment but such ‘on the job’ training allowed apprentices to help out at home while learning.” (paragraph 4)
- D“For professions such as those of government official, priest or lawyer, a scribe would train for several more years, increasing his vocabulary to perhaps a thousand or more signs.” (paragraph 6)
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks for a sentence from the excerpt that best supports the idea that different levels of education were available to scribes.
A. Incorrect. The sentence from paragraph 1 provides evidence that Egyptian scribes used two different forms of writing, but it does not address the topic of education or the different levels of education that were available to scribes.
B. Incorrect. The advantages and purposes of hieratic script are described in this sentence from paragraph 2, but this explanation of the advantages and purposes does not suggest that there were different levels of education for scribes.
C. Incorrect. The fact that scribes could learn their trade through apprenticeships as discussed in this sentence from paragraph 4 does provide evidence that another method of learning to be a scribe was possible, but this process was for a limited entry into becoming a scribe, not the continued education scribes would need in order to work in specific areas.
D. CORRECT. By explaining that certain professions required additional years of training, this sentence from paragraph 6 supports the idea that different levels of education existed for scribes.
Question analysis
This evidence question on Hilary Wilson’s “Scribe Like an Egyptian,” a magazine article about how ancient Egyptian scribes learned their trade, asks which quoted sentence best supports the idea that scribes received different levels of education. The four sentences come from paragraphs 1, 2, 4 and 6, and more than one seems to touch on the idea, so close reading of each decides it.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Choosing the sentence that best supports an idea is routine grade 7 evidence work. Here several quotations touch on ways scribes differed, and the article’s dense, technical wording makes those differences harder to sort than usual.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Every choice must be checked moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 12, 810 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 110 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
Two of the wrong sentences are not off topic: one says not all scribes understood hieroglyphs, the other that apprenticeship narrowed a scribe’s job prospects, and both imply that scribes differed. The question rewards asking what the idea actually claims, that schooling itself came in stages, and only the sentence about professions that required more years of training says so outright. Students who stop at the first sentence suggesting a difference lose the point.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The right sentence never says “levels”; students must see that training “for several more years” for official, priest or lawyer posts means a higher tier of schooling than the basic course. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Every choice must be checked moderate Choosing the answer
Two other quotations also hint at differences among scribes, paragraph 1’s “not all Egyptian scribes understood hieroglyphs” and paragraph 4’s “limited the scope for employment,” so each must be weighed, not just scanned. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
Terms such as “hieratic,” “economical of space” and “scope for employment” slow the reading of the quotations, and the shorthand sentence is hard to dismiss until hieratic is understood as a script. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Ask what a sentence would have to say to prove that scribal education came in levels, then test each quotation against that and prefer a direct statement over a hint.
Traps
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
The wrong answers, classified
A Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Reads “not all Egyptian scribes understood hieroglyphs” as proof of different levels of schooling, but it reports a difference in knowledge without saying anything about how scribes were taught.
B True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Picks the sentence on hieratic as a faster everyday shorthand, which describes how scribes wrote, not how long or how far any of them studied.
C Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Sees that on-the-job training “limited the scope for employment” and takes it for a lower level of education, though the sentence contrasts two routes into the trade, not stages of study.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks for the sentence that best supports one idea: scribes could get “different levels of education.” A level is a stage. Some scribes studied for a short time, and others went on to study more. You need a sentence that shows a difference in schooling, not just any difference between scribes.
Find what each level looked like
Paragraphs 5 and 6 describe the training. Paragraph 5 says the lowest scribes studied for only five or six years. They learned just the basics of hieroglyphs. Paragraph 6 says that more than 450 signs were needed for everyday writing. Then choice D adds a higher level: “For professions such as those of government official, priest or lawyer, a scribe would train for several more years, increasing his vocabulary to perhaps a thousand or more signs.”
Work out what choice D means
A profession is a job that needs special training. Choice D says some jobs needed more years of study and more signs, perhaps over a thousand. A basic scribe stopped sooner and knew fewer signs. So schooling came in stages: a basic course, and then more years for the top jobs. That is what the question means by levels of education.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. It says not all scribes understood hieroglyphs. That is a difference in what scribes knew. It says nothing about how they were taught.
- B does not fit. It explains hieratic, a faster shorthand way of writing. That is about writing, not schooling.
- C does not fit. It is about apprentices, who learned on the job from an older scribe. That is a different way into the work, not a higher or lower stage of study.
- D fits. Some jobs needed several more years of training.
Watch out: A is tempting because it shows that scribes were not all alike. But it never mentions school.
Choose the answer
Only one sentence shows some scribes studying for years after the basic course. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong choice. It shows that some scribes knew hieroglyphs and others did not. But it doesn’t say why, or how long anyone studied. D says plainly that some jobs needed several more years of training. That is a level of education above the basic one.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “Scribe Like an Egyptian”” as shown on the test
Question 39 of 92
2025 Practice Test A English, question 10Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “Scribe Like an Egyptian””.
Question
Read this sentence from paragraph 2.
Including both ideograms (which convey a whole word or idea, either concrete or abstract, in a single sign) and phonograms (representing either an alphabetic sound or a group of consonants), [the writing system] was used in formal inscriptions on tomb and temple walls as well as on elaborate funerary papyri.
The author’s purpose for including the sentence is to
- Aexplain that hieroglyphs were reserved for royal and religious purposes.
- Bdemonstrate the methods experts use to interpret hieroglyphs.
- Cclarify the significance of hieroglyphs in language and literature.
- Ddescribe the basic features of hieroglyphs and how they were typically used.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks for an explanation of the author’s purpose for including a sentence in paragraph 2 that describes the two types of hieroglyphs and the main uses of this particular writing system.
A. Incorrect. The sentence explains that hieroglyphs were used for formal inscriptions, but it does not suggest that these inscriptions were limited to royal and religious contexts.
B. Incorrect. The sentence describes the two basic types of hieroglyphs, ideograms and phonograms, but it does not address how experts interpret the ancient writing system. A sentence earlier in the paragraph explains that the hieroglyphs were deciphered by Champollion, but it does not explain how he deciphered them.
C. Incorrect. Although the sentence explains that the hieroglyphs were typically used for formal inscriptions, it does not provide an explanation of the significance or importance of hieroglyphs in the Egyptian language.
D. CORRECT. The sentence explains that hieroglyphs included both phonograms and ideograms that were used in formal inscriptions and funeral papyri; therefore, this sentence achieves the purpose of describing the basic features of hieroglyphs as conveying either words and ideas or sounds, in addition to explaining the common uses for the writing system.
Question analysis
This author’s-purpose question quotes a long, technical sentence from paragraph 2 of “Scribe Like an Egyptian” about the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic writing system, and asks why the author includes it. Students must make sense of its specialist vocabulary before they can say what the sentence contributes to the paragraph and to the article.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining why an author includes a sentence is regular grade 7 work. This one is long, with definitions in parentheses and a bracketed insert, but it is quoted in full, so the task stays within one sentence.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Complex sentences moderate
- Hard words minor
- How, not what minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one sentence or line
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 12, 810 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 103 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
Once the parentheses are set aside, the sentence says two simple things: what kinds of signs hieroglyphs were, and where they appeared. The wrong purposes each go one step beyond that, turning tombs and temples into an exclusive royal and religious use, borrowing Champollion’s deciphering from the sentence before, or claiming a significance the sentence never weighs. Students who untangle the syntax first find the matching purpose quickly.
Complex sentences moderate Understanding the question
The quoted sentence runs fifty words, two parenthetical definitions come before the verb, and its subject, the bracketed “[the writing system],” appears only after thirty words of description. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
“Ideograms,” “phonograms” and “funerary papyri” are specialist terms; the parentheses define the first two, but students who stall on them may not reach the sentence’s plain point about where the signs were used. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
How, not what minor Working it out
The stem asks why the author includes the sentence, so students must match the job it does in paragraph 2 to a purpose, and only one purpose stays within what the sentence actually covers. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Strategy: Restate the quoted sentence in plain words, setting the parentheses aside at first, then choose the purpose that fits everything the sentence says and nothing more.
Traps
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads “formal inscriptions on tomb and temple walls” and “funerary papyri” as royal and religious only, though the sentence names where hieroglyphs usually appeared, not a rule reserving them.
B Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Remembers that Champollion deciphered the signs, which the sentence before reports, and takes this sentence for an account of how experts read them, though it never mentions interpreting.
C Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Chooses an important-sounding purpose, the significance of hieroglyphs in language and literature, though the sentence never says why the script mattered or mentions any literature.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks why the author put this sentence in paragraph 2. In other words, what job does the sentence do? First work out what the sentence says. Then pick the purpose that matches all of it and adds nothing extra.
Untangle the long sentence
The sentence is long, so set the parentheses aside at first. The main part says the writing system “was used in formal inscriptions on tomb and temple walls as well as on elaborate funerary papyri.” An inscription is writing carved or painted on something. Funerary means having to do with burials. Papyri are scrolls made from papyrus, a kind of early paper.
Read the parentheses
Now add back the two kinds of signs. Ideograms “convey a whole word or idea” in one sign. Phonograms stand for “either an alphabetic sound or a group of consonants.” Consonants are letter sounds like b, t and m. So one kind of hieroglyph shows a meaning, and the other shows a sound.
Sum up the sentence’s job
Put the two parts together. The sentence tells what hieroglyphs were made of: signs for ideas and signs for sounds. It also tells where people usually used them: on tombs, temples and burial scrolls. So its job is to describe what hieroglyphs were like and how they were used.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. The sentence says where hieroglyphs usually appeared. It never says they were reserved, or kept only, for kings and religion.
- B does not fit. The sentence before it says Champollion figured out the signs. This sentence never says how experts read them.
- C does not fit. The sentence never says why hieroglyphs mattered, and it never mentions literature.
- D fits. It names both parts: the basic features and the usual uses.
Watch out: Tombs and temples sound royal and religious, so A tempts. But “used in” is not the same as “reserved for.”
Choose the answer
The sentence describes the two kinds of signs and where they were usually used. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong choice. Tombs and temples do suggest kings and religion. But the sentence only lists where hieroglyphs were used. It never says they were kept for those uses alone. D matches everything the sentence says and adds nothing it doesn’t.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 40 of 92
2025 Practice Test A English, question 11Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “Scribe Like an Egyptian””.
Question
Which statement summarizes the process that schools used to train scribes?
- ABoys had to memorize around 450 hieratic signs. Once they had learned these, they were expected to copy literary texts that contained valuable lessons.
- BBoys spent at least five years learning hieratic signs, which they practiced by copying texts. During this period, they were also introduced to basic hieroglyphs.
- CBoys spent five or six years learning the basics of hieratic script. After this period, they could become apprentices and begin learning hieroglyphics.
- DBoys were taught two different scripts. They practiced both types by copying lists and eventually progressed to writing letters, reports, and contracts.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks for the best summary of the process that schools used to train scribes.
A. Incorrect. This summary incorrectly explains that scribes were expected to learn 450 hieratic signs instead of 450 hieroglyphs along with their hieratic versions as explained in paragraph 6. In paragraph 5, the author explains that scribes copied texts as part of the process of learning the scripts rather than as practice after the signs had already been memorized.
B. CORRECT. Paragraph 5 explains that students began by learning hieratic script and studied for about five or six years by using “exemplar documents and extracts from popular texts to copy, to practice their hieratic handwriting.” The paragraph also explains that during this time, they learned only the basics of hieroglyphic script.
C. Incorrect. Although paragraph 5 does explain that the scribes spent five or six years learning hieratic script, it does not suggest that hieroglyphs were learned only during apprenticeships.
D. Incorrect. This summary correctly explains that scribes learned two types of scripts, but the second sentence of the summary is incorrect. In paragraph 5, the author explains that the students copied from exemplar texts, but the author clearly states that the purpose of this copy work was “to practice their hieratic handwriting” and does not suggest that the copy work was used to practice hieroglyphs. Paragraph 6 explains that scribes could make lists as part of their professional skills but does not suggest that copy work was used to help them learn this task. Paragraph 5 mentions letters, reports, and contracts as the formats students practiced on while copying, not as a later stage of their training.
Question analysis
This summary question on “Scribe Like an Egyptian” asks which statement sums up how ancient Egyptian schools trained young scribes. Each choice is a two-sentence summary that combines years of study, kinds of script and copying practice, so students must check every detail against what the article says about scribal education.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Summarizing a process is a grade 7 standard, but these four summaries are long, two-part and mostly accurate, and the details they mix up come from three different paragraphs, so judging them asks more than typical grade 7 work.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Evidence in several places moderate
- The right answer is reworded minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 12, 810 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 104 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A detail in the explanation that misdescribes the excerpt was corrected.
- 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
Every wrong summary opens with something true or nearly true, so a quick reading of first sentences cannot separate them. Most of the errors concern order: one makes copying follow memorizing, one turns apprenticeship into a later stage where hieroglyphs begin, and one makes the copied letters, reports and contracts a later step. Students who check the order of training against paragraph 5, not just the facts, find the only summary with nothing out of place.
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The apprenticeship summary repeats the right one’s opening, years of hieratic study, and parts from it on one phrase: hieroglyphs come “After this period” instead of “During this period.” (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The details sit in three paragraphs: the five or six years, the copying and the hieroglyph basics in paragraph 5, apprenticeship in paragraph 4, and the 450-sign dictionary and list-making in paragraph 6. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
The right answer is reworded minor Choosing the answer
The right summary puts the text in new words, “at least five years” and “basic hieroglyphs,” while wrong ones repeat its own details: “five or six years,” the “450” signs, “letters, reports, and contracts.” (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Strategy: Note what the article says students learned, for how long and by what method, then check both sentences of each summary against those notes; one wrong detail rules a summary out.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Takes paragraph 6’s 450 signs, hieroglyphs listed with their hieratic forms, as hieratic signs to memorize first, and makes copying come afterward, though copying was how students learned.
C Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Gets the five or six years of hieratic right, then makes apprenticeship, the other route paragraph 4 offers poorer boys, a later stage where hieroglyphs are first taught.
D Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Rightly says two scripts were taught, then claims students copied lists for both and only later wrote letters, reports and contracts, though paragraph 5 ties copying to hieratic and to those very formats.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The DOE’s explanation of Option D ends: “Paragraph 6 explains that scribes could make lists and write letters as part of their professional skills but does not suggest that copy work was used to help them learn these tasks.” Paragraph 6 mentions the making and updating of lists, but not letters. Letters come up in paragraph 5, where students copy texts “to practice their hieratic handwriting” on basic-format letters, reports and contracts, so the excerpt does tie the copy work to letters. The site now says that paragraph 6 explains that scribes could make lists as part of their professional skills but does not suggest that copy work was used to help them learn this task, and that paragraph 5 mentions letters, reports, and contracts as the formats students practiced on while copying, not as a later stage of their training. Option D is still wrong, and the answer, B, is unchanged.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks for the best summary of how schools trained scribes. A summary retells the main steps in a few words. Each choice has two sentences. Both must match the article, including the order of the steps. One wrong detail rules a choice out.
Find the training in paragraph 5
Paragraph 5 says training began with the basics of hieratic script. The lowest scribes studied for five or six years, and others studied longer. In that time they learned only the basics of hieroglyphs. Students were given “exemplar documents and extracts from popular texts to copy, to practice their hieratic handwriting.” Exemplar means model. Extracts are short pieces. So they learned by copying good examples.
Sort out paragraphs 4 and 6
Two other paragraphs hold details that look alike. Paragraph 4 describes apprenticeship. An apprentice learns on the job from a skilled worker. It was another way in for boys from poorer families, not a step after school. Paragraph 6 mentions a list of hieroglyphs with their hieratic forms. It says more than 450 signs were needed for everyday writing. It never says students memorized them before copying.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. The 450 signs were hieroglyphs paired with their hieratic forms. And copying was how students learned, not a step after memorizing.
- B fits. Students spent at least five years on hieratic, practiced by copying, and learned basic hieroglyphs along the way.
- C does not fit. Apprenticeship was a different route, not a later stage. Hieroglyphs were not saved for apprentices.
- D does not fit. The copying was to practice hieratic. Lists come up in paragraph 6 as a job skill, not as practice. Letters, reports and contracts were what students copied, not a later stage.
Choose the answer
Watch out: C starts out right, with five or six years of hieratic. Then it says hieroglyphs came “After this period” instead of during it. That one change makes it wrong.
Only B gets every detail and the order right. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong choice. It gets the five or six years of hieratic right. But it says hieroglyphs came afterward, through apprenticeship. Paragraph 5 says students learned the basics of hieroglyphs during their schooling. Apprenticeship was a separate path for poorer boys. B says “During this period,” which matches.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 41 of 92
2025 Practice Test A English, question 13Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “Scribe Like an Egyptian””.
Question
Hieratic script was particularly valuable in a bureaucratic government because
- Ausing hieratic script was an efficient way for scribes to produce large amounts of documentation.
- Bmany members of the general public could comprehend information that was written in hieratic script.
- Cknowledge of hieratic script prepared scribes to serve their society in increasingly challenging roles.
- Dpeople from different professional backgrounds could easily communicate with one another in hieratic script.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks why hieratic script was especially valuable in a bureaucratic government.
A. CORRECT. Hieratic script is described in paragraph 1 as being simpler for the “multitude of everyday documents” generated by the government and as “quicker to write and more economical of space” in paragraph 2. The logical conclusion based on these details is that hieratic script was more efficient for the large amounts of documentation produced by the government.
B. Incorrect. In paragraph 4, the author explains that “education was not available to all,” suggesting that only people who were educated could read and write. The excerpt as a whole does not provide sufficient information to indicate what portion of the general public would be able to comprehend material written in hieratic script.
C. Incorrect. The idea that becoming a scribe could lead to taking different positions in society is addressed in paragraphs 3, 4, and 6. However, the use of hieratic script in the fields of medicine, law, or religion does not necessarily explain the value of the script for the bureaucratic government referenced in the question.
D. Incorrect. Although different professions such as doctors and lawyers used hieratic script, the author uses these professions as examples of different job opportunities for scribes in paragraph 6. There is no discussion in the excerpt about different professions communicating with each other, and these professions were not necessarily part of the bureaucratic government.
Question analysis
This inference question on “Scribe Like an Egyptian” asks why hieratic, one of the two scripts of ancient Egypt, was especially valuable to a bureaucratic government. The article never gives the reason in a single sentence, so students must connect what it says about Egypt’s bureaucracy with what it says about the script itself. Each choice offers a reasonable-sounding benefit.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Drawing a conclusion from two neighboring paragraphs is typical grade 7 inference work. The word “bureaucratic” and the article’s formal style add some load, but the details needed are close together and plainly stated.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- Evidence in several places minor
- Hard words minor
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 12, 810 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 68 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
The two facts that answer the question sit a few lines apart in the first two paragraphs, so the work is mostly connecting them. The wrong reasons all sound like advantages a simpler script might bring, public readability, career preparation, communication across professions, and each rests on a guess or on the excerpt’s talk of scribal careers rather than on what it says hieratic was used for. Students who return to the description of hieratic itself avoid them.
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
The reason is split between paragraph 1, where hieratic serves the “multitude of everyday documents,” and paragraph 2, where it is “quicker to write and more economical of space.” (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
The stem turns on “bureaucratic,” a word students must connect to a government that runs on paperwork; without it, the link to large amounts of documentation is hard to see. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
No sentence says why hieratic helped the government; students must combine speed and compactness with the sheer volume of records to reach efficiency. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Find the sentences that describe hieratic script and what it was used for, then pick the choice those sentences support rather than one that only sounds like an advantage.
Traps
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
The wrong answers, classified
B Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reasons that a simpler script must have been readable by ordinary people, though paragraph 4 says “education was not available to all” and the excerpt never says the public read hieratic.
C True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Recalls the careers in paragraphs 3 and 6 that schooling opened to scribes, which is true of the excerpt but explains a scribe’s prospects, not why the government valued hieratic.
D Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Imagines hieratic as a shared language linking doctors, lawyers and officials, a sensible-sounding benefit the excerpt never raises; paragraph 6 names those professions only as careers for scribes.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks why hieratic script was so useful to a bureaucratic government. A bureaucracy is a government run by many officials, with lots of paperwork. Hieratic is the quick, simple form of Egyptian writing. Look for what the article says about hieratic and what it was used for.
Find the evidence in paragraphs 1 and 2
Paragraph 1 says many scribes used hieratic for the “multitude of everyday documents” that the government produced. Multitude means a huge number. Paragraph 2 says hieratic was “quicker to write and more economical of space.” Economical of space means it took up less room on the page.
Connect the two facts
Put the facts together. The government made a huge number of papers. Hieratic was fast to write and used less space. So scribes could turn out lots of papers quickly. Getting a lot done with little time and effort is called being efficient.
Check each choice
- A fits. Hieratic let scribes make large amounts of paperwork quickly.
- B does not fit. Paragraph 4 says “education was not available to all.” The article never says ordinary people could read hieratic.
- C does not fit. Training did lead to careers, but that explains a scribe’s chances, not why the government valued the script.
- D does not fit. Paragraph 6 lists jobs like doctor and lawyer as careers for scribes. It never says those workers wrote to each other in hieratic.
Watch out: B sounds sensible, since a simpler script seems easier for anyone to read. But that is a guess, not something the article says.
Choose the answer
Hieratic was fast and compact, and the government needed a huge number of documents. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong choice, because a simpler script does sound easier to read. But the article says only some Egyptians got an education. It never says the public could read hieratic. A rests on two facts the article states: the government made a “multitude of everyday documents,” and hieratic was quicker to write.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 42 of 92
2025 Practice Test A English, question 16Passage Excerpt from Winter Wheat
Excerpt from Winter Wheat
by Mildred Walker
Ellen, the narrator, is preparing to leave her parents and the family farm for college the next day.
I love Dad’s way of talking that makes him seem different from other ranchers. He’s lived here twenty-three years, but he still says “back East where I come from.” He’s the one who gets excited when I do about spring coming or a serial running in the magazine we’re both reading, but it’s what Mom says that I depend on. When Mom used to say “Don’t worry” about my pet chicken or dog or new calf, it always got well. Dad is always talking of going some place, not now, but next year, maybe. Mom seems to think of nothing farther away than today or perhaps yesterday or tomorrow morning.
Mom folded the ironing board and put it inside their bedroom that was just off the kitchen. She carried in the freshly ironed clothes. Dad went back to his paper. When Mom came back she took beans from the cupboard to soak for tomorrow. Dad always said Mom could make all the dishes he’d had back in Vermont as well as though she were a New Englander herself, instead of a Russian. All of a sudden, I realized that tomorrow when those beans would be ready to eat I’d be going away. It gave me a funny feeling.
“I’ll be taking the train tomorrow night,” I said aloud, more to hear it myself.
“We can drive you into town in the afternoon,” Dad said, dropping his paper on the floor.
“There’s no need to go to town; she can catch the train at Gotham just as well. We haven’t nothing to take us into town for,” Mom said.
“Well, we don’t have to decide tonight,” Dad said, but I knew he wanted to go into Clark City. It wouldn’t be so flat as just seeing me go off on the train from Gotham. My going away was hard on both of them; they were so different—and I was part of them both. It made me uncomfortable to think of leaving them.
While I was getting ready for bed in my room that’s off the front room, I saw how it would be if I left from town. We’d go in right after dinner and go around to the stores, Dad going one way and Mom and I another. Dad would probably have his hair cut at the barbershop and stop in the bank and meet someone he knew to talk to. Then we’d meet at the big store on the corner and go to the cafeteria for supper. The train stops ten minutes or so at the station in town and there are other people and excitement and you have time to wave from the platform and then again from your window by your seat. We went to the station in Clark City to see the Goodals off when they went back to Iowa.
If I left from Gotham, we’d just drive down in the truck and wait till the train came. It only stops long enough for you to get on and you hardly have time to taste the flavor of going away.
I sat on the bed in my pyjamas with my arms around my knees. I couldn’t keep from thinking of that time Dad went back East. I tried to, and then I just sat still and looked straight at it. Sometimes that’s better than working so hard to keep from looking at what’s in your mind.
Dad went all the way back to Vermont. . . . It was in November and it was already dark when the train came through Gotham. Even now, I could feel how cold and dark it was. I held Mom’s hand. Dad was so dressed-up he seemed strange. . . . We stood there without saying anything until Dad told Mom to remember to call Mr. Bardich, our neighbor, if the cow didn’t calve tomorrow.
“I’ll manage,” Mom snapped back.
“I wish you could go, Anna,” Dad said to Mom, “and we could take Ellen.” . . .
“Good-by, Anna Petrovna,” he said, looking at Mom. I had never heard him call her by two names before.
“Good-by,” Mom said, standing still, without smiling.
Then he was gone and the crossroads were darker than ever. The train light shone on the high window in the top of the grain elevator for a moment and then that too was dark. We got into our old Ford and Mom drove back to the house. My throat ached all the way. The name Dad had called Mom kept saying itself in my ears: “Anna Petrovna, Anna Petrovna.” . . .
Our house seemed lonely when we came back to it. It seemed to be hiding under the coulee. I went with Mom to put the truck in the barn that was bigger than the house. I think Mom was prouder of our barn than the house, anyway. We walked back to look at the cow that was going to calve. She was just a big light blob in the dark, waiting. I had thought she was exciting this morning, but now she seemed sad, too.
The wind blew when we walked across the open space to the house and I couldn’t help shivering with the cold. Inside the house it was warm, but empty.
“Bring your nightgown in here and I heat you some milk,” Mom said.
I drank the milk sitting on a stool in front of the stove. It tasted good, but the lonely ache in my throat was still there. I picked up my clothes and hung them neatly behind the stove and put my cup on the sink board. Mom was fixing oatmeal for tomorrow morning.
“Good night, Mom,” I said almost timidly, standing beside her. She seemed wrapped around in a kind of strangeness. Then she turned around and drew me to her. The front of her dress was warm from the stove. I felt the comfortable heat through my gown. She laid her hand against my face and it felt rough and hard but firm. I dared ask her something I wanted to know.
“Mom, was that really your name—what Dad called you?”
Her voice sounded surprised. “Why, Yeléna, you know that; Anna Petrovna. You know I am born in Russia, in Seletskoe.”
“Yes, but I didn’t know your other name,” I said.
“Anna Petrovna Webb.” She pronounced it slowly. “Once I think what a funny name Ben Webb is!” She laughed. Her laugh was warm and low like our kitchen, and comfortable. The house seemed natural and right again. . . .
But now that I am grown, I feel the wall of strangeness between them, more than when I was a child. I wondered how they would get along without me.
From WINTER WHEAT by Mildred Walker, published by University of Nebraska Press. Copyright © 1944 by Harcourt, Brace and Company, Inc. Copyright renewed 1971 by Mildred Walker. All rights reserved.
serial: story published in short segments at regular intervals
coulee: small gulch or ravine
Question
Which sentence from the excerpt supports the idea that Ellen understands what her father is really thinking, and which sentence supports the idea that Ellen and her father share similar interests?
Move the correct answer to each box.
Supports the idea that Ellen understands what her father is really thinking
Supports the idea that Ellen and her father share similar interests
On the test you drag tiles into the boxes; here, choose each box’s tile from its menu. Each tile can be used once. The DOE has not published how answers with several parts are scored; this site counts one right only when every part is right.
Show the answer
Correct answer: blank 1: “Well, we don’t have to decide tonight,” Dad said, but I knew he wanted to go into Clark City.” (paragraph 6); blank 2: “He’s the one who gets excited when I do about spring coming or a serial running in the magazine we’re both reading” (paragraph 1)
The question asks for the identification of one sentence that supports the idea that Ellen understands what her father is really thinking, and one sentence that supports the idea that Ellen and her father share similar interests.
A. Incorrect. (“I love Dad’s way of talking that makes him seem different from other ranchers.” [paragraph 1]) This sentence from paragraph 1 presents a unique quality that Ellen loves about her father, but it does not provide evidence for the idea that Ellen and her father share similar interests or that Ellen understands what her father is really thinking.
B. CORRECT. (“He’s the one who gets excited when I do about spring coming or a serial running in the magazine we’re both reading” [paragraph 1]) This sentence from paragraph 1 shows that Ellen and her father both get excited about the coming of spring and share an enthusiasm for reading magazine serials (stories published in serial installments). Thus, it provides clear evidence for the idea that Ellen and her father share similar interests.
C. CORRECT. (“ ‘Well, we don’t have to decide tonight,’ Dad said, but I knew he wanted to go into Clark City.” [paragraph 6]) This sentence from paragraph 6 provides evidence that Ellen and her father share the same unspoken wish to go to Clark City rather than for Ellen to catch the train at Gotham, as suggested in paragraph 5 by Ellen’s mother. This quotation reveals that Ellen understands the true preference that her father is not expressing aloud, thereby providing evidence for the idea that Ellen understands what her father is really thinking.
D. Incorrect. (“We’d go in right after dinner and go around to the stores, Dad going one way and Mom and I another.” [paragraph 7]) Although this sentence from paragraph 7 indicates that Ellen can predict how her father would behave in a particular scenario, it does not show that Ellen understands what her father is really thinking, nor does it provide evidence for the idea that Ellen and her father share similar interests.
Question analysis
This evidence question on an excerpt from Mildred Walker’s 1944 novel Winter Wheat asks for one quotation showing that Ellen understands what her father is really thinking and another showing that the two share interests. On the test students drag two of four sentence tiles into labeled boxes, so each quotation’s exact wording decides where it belongs, if anywhere.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Matching quotations to ideas about a character is grade 7 evidence work, and the novel’s language is plain. Placing two of four tiles, with credit only when both are right, adds a step, and every tile mentions Ellen’s father.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- Much to keep track of moderate
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 4, 1179 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 61 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A repeated word in the explanation was corrected.
- 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
Each box has a tile that matches it closely, so the question is less about finding evidence than about not being drawn by the near misses. Ellen’s detailed picture of the town trip in paragraph 7 shows she knows her father’s habits, which can pass for knowing his mind, and the tiles about shared excitement and a shared wish can each seem to fit the other box. Because credit needs both placements, one doubtful tile costs the whole question.
Much to keep track of moderate Working it out
Two boxes must both be right, and all four tiles mention Dad, so each tile has to be held against two different ideas before the two that fit neither can be set aside. (Sweller, 1988; Carpenter, Just & Shell, 1990)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The first box turns on the gap between what Dad says and what Ellen knows: “Dad said, but I knew he wanted” marks a wish he does not speak aloud. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Treat the boxes as two separate evidence questions: restate each idea in your own words, then test all four tiles against it before placing one, since two tiles fit neither box.
Traps
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
DB Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Puts the town-trip tile in the first box because Ellen can foresee how Dad will spend the afternoon in town, though foreseeing his errands is not knowing an unspoken wish.
BC Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Swaps the right tiles, reading Dad’s excitement, which he shows openly, as a hidden thought Ellen grasps, and their one shared wish for Clark City as a shared interest.
CA True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Fills the first box correctly but puts Ellen’s love of Dad’s way of talking in the second, though admiring how he speaks is her feeling, not an interest they share.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The DOE’s explanation of Option D says the sentence does not “provide evidence for the idea that that Ellen and her father share similar interests,” with “that” printed twice. The site prints it once.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This question has two boxes, and each needs a different idea. Box 1: Ellen knows what Dad is really thinking, even when he doesn’t say it. Box 2: Ellen and Dad like the same things. On the test you drag a tile into each box. On this site you pick each box’s tile from a menu. Two tiles are left over.
Find a hidden thought for box 1
In paragraph 5, Mom says Ellen can catch the train at Gotham, the nearby stop. Then paragraph 6 says “ ‘Well, we don’t have to decide tonight,’ Dad said, but I knew he wanted to go into Clark City.” Dad’s words put off the choice. But Ellen knows his real wish, the trip into town. The word “but” marks the gap between what he says and what she knows.
Find a shared interest for box 2
Paragraph 1 says Dad is “the one who gets excited when I do about spring coming or a serial running in the magazine we’re both reading.” A serial is a story printed in parts, one part in each issue of a magazine. Ellen and Dad look forward to spring together, and they read the same story. Those are shared interests.
Rule out the other two tiles
- “I love Dad’s way of talking that makes him seem different from other ranchers.” (paragraph 1) This is Ellen’s feeling about how Dad talks. It is not a hidden thought, and it is not an interest they share.
- “We’d go in right after dinner and go around to the stores, Dad going one way and Mom and I another.” (paragraph 7) Ellen pictures how a trip to town would go. Knowing Dad’s habits is not knowing his unspoken wish. And here they split up.
Watch out: Don’t swap the two right tiles. Dad shows his excitement openly, so it is not a hidden thought.
Fill in both boxes
- Box 1, Ellen understands what her father is really thinking: “Well, we don’t have to decide tonight,” Dad said, but I knew he wanted to go into Clark City.” (paragraph 6)
- Box 2, Ellen and her father share similar interests: “He’s the one who gets excited when I do about spring coming or a serial running in the magazine we’re both reading” (paragraph 1)
Both boxes must be right to get the point.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
The town-trip tile is the closest wrong choice for box 1. In paragraph 7, Ellen can picture just what Dad would do in town. But that shows she knows his habits. In paragraph 6, Dad says one thing, and Ellen knows he wants another. That is knowing what he is really thinking.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from Winter Wheat” as shown on the test
Question 43 of 92
2025 Practice Test A English, question 18Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from Winter Wheat”.
Question
Read this sentence from paragraph 3.
“I’ll be taking the train tomorrow night,” I said aloud, more to hear it myself.
This remark contributes to the conflict in the excerpt by
- Arevealing Dad’s reasons for wanting to drive to the city.
- Bcausing tension between Mom and Dad.
- Cleading Ellen to distance herself from both Mom and Dad.
- Dshowing Mom’s reluctance to plan that far in advance.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks how the sentence from paragraph 3 contributes to the conflict in the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. Although Ellen’s father does want to drive to the city, this sentence does not reveal his reasons for wanting to do so. Ellen’s father’s wish to drive to the city is important to the conflict of the excerpt not because of his underlying reasons but because his wish differs from Ellen’s mother’s wish to take Ellen to the train at Gotham—a difference of opinion that introduces tension between the parents.
B. CORRECT. The sentence causes Ellen’s parents to propose competing options for taking her to the train, and the resulting conversation recalls fraught memories of an earlier leave-taking in the family. The disagreement between Ellen’s mother and father over where to take Ellen to catch the train heightens the tension between them. Because the primary conflict of the excerpt is Ellen’s anxiety about the effect her leaving will have on the relationship between her parents, this remark contributes to the conflict by bringing her parents’ disagreement into view.
C. Incorrect. Although Ellen will put physical distance between herself and her parents on the following day, the remark she makes does not lead her to emotionally distance herself from her parents. Moreover, the emotional distance between Ellen and her parents is not the primary source of conflict in the excerpt.
D. Incorrect. While paragraph 1 states that Ellen’s mother “seems to think of nothing farther away than today or perhaps yesterday or tomorrow morning,” the sentence in paragraph 3 does not show any reluctance to plan far in advance. Moreover, planning for the future is not a source of conflict in the excerpt.
Question analysis
This plot question quotes Ellen’s remark in paragraph 3 of the Winter Wheat excerpt, said aloud mostly so she can hear it herself, and asks how it contributes to the excerpt’s conflict. Students must first work out what the conflict is, since the story has no fight or villain, and then follow what the remark leads to.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Analyzing how a line of dialogue drives a plot matches the grade 8 wording of the standard. The remark is short and plain, though, and what it sets off plays out in the next few paragraphs, which keeps the demand typical.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Evidence in several places moderate
- How, not what minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 4, 1179 words; question and choices: about grade 5, 65 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
The remark itself is plain, and neither parent raises a voice in reply, so the tension it causes is easy to miss. Students who do not see that the excerpt’s real problem is Ellen’s worry about her parents look for a more visible effect, such as Dad’s wish to drive her or Mom’s habit of thinking no farther than tomorrow. The question rewards reading the remark together with the quiet exchange it starts in paragraphs 4 to 6.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The excerpt never names its conflict; students must infer from paragraph 6 and the closing paragraph that Ellen worries about her very different parents getting along once she leaves. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The remark’s effect unfolds over the next three paragraphs: Dad offers to drive into town, Mom says the Gotham train will do, and Dad puts off the decision. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
How, not what minor Working it out
The question asks what the remark does for the plot, not what it says; a plain statement of travel plans matters only for the disagreement it sets off. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Strategy: Name the excerpt’s central problem in your own words first, then reread the remark with the paragraphs right after it and pick the choice that shows how the remark feeds that problem.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
A Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Sees that the remark prompts Dad’s offer to drive Ellen into town but credits it with revealing his reasons, which neither the remark nor his offer gives; Ellen guesses one later.
C Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Turns Ellen’s coming departure into an emotional withdrawal, though after speaking she grows no more distant; she worries about her parents and, in the flashback, clings to Mom.
D Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Recalls paragraph 1’s comment that Mom thinks no farther ahead than tomorrow morning, but the remark shows nothing of the kind: Mom answers it at once with a plan of her own.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how Ellen’s remark adds to the conflict, the main problem in the story. The remark itself is plain. It just says when she will leave. So look at what happens right after she says it.
Name the story’s conflict
In paragraph 6, Ellen says her going away was hard on both parents. They were very different, and she was part of them both. In paragraph 25, she says she feels a distance between them. She wonders how they will get along without her. So the conflict is Ellen’s worry about her two very different parents once she is gone.
See what the remark sets off
Right after Ellen speaks, her parents disagree. In paragraph 4, Dad offers to drive her into town. In paragraph 5, Mom says there is no need, because Ellen can catch the train at Gotham. In paragraph 6, Dad puts off the choice, though Ellen knows he wants to go to town. Neither parent shouts, but they want different things.
Connect the remark to the conflict
Ellen’s simple remark brings her parents’ differences into the open. Their quiet disagreement shows the tension between them. Tension is a tight, uneasy feeling between people. That tension is just what worries Ellen about leaving. So the remark feeds the conflict by causing tension between Mom and Dad.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. Dad offers to drive, but no one explains why he wants to.
- B fits. The remark leads straight to the parents’ disagreement.
- C does not fit. Ellen doesn’t pull away from her parents. She worries about them.
- D does not fit. Paragraph 1 says Mom doesn’t think far ahead. But here Mom answers at once with a plan of her own.
Watch out: D borrows a detail from paragraph 1. The remark itself shows nothing of the kind.
Choose the answer
The remark starts a quiet disagreement about how Ellen will leave. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong choice, because the remark does lead to Dad’s offer to drive. But Dad never gives his reasons. What matters is that Mom wants something else. Their different wishes show the tension between them, and that tension is what Ellen worries about. That is B.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 44 of 92
2025 Practice Test A English, question 21Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from Winter Wheat”.
Question
Read these sentences from the excerpt.
Mom seems to think of nothing farther away than today or perhaps yesterday or tomorrow morning. (paragraph 1)
Mom was fixing oatmeal for tomorrow morning. (paragraph 19)
The sentences help develop a central idea of the excerpt by
- Asuggesting that practical people focus on current needs rather than worrying about the future.
- Bshowing that parents tend to consider the needs of their children before thinking of themselves.
- Crevealing that it is sometimes important to plan ahead.
- Dillustrating that dreaming about the future is a waste of time.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how the sentences from paragraph 1 and paragraph 19 help develop a central idea of the excerpt.
A. CORRECT. The sentences illustrate a practical aspect of Ellen’s mother’s personality and show that she is concerned with an immediate task that needs to be completed. The details in these sentences help develop the central idea that practical people focus on current needs—such as preparing food for the following day—rather than worrying about the future.
B. Incorrect. These sentences do not show Ellen’s mother focusing on her daughter’s needs before her own, and the idea that parents consider their own needs only after considering those of their children is not a central idea of the excerpt.
C. Incorrect. Although the sentence from paragraph 19 shows Ellen’s mother planning a few hours ahead by preparing the next morning’s breakfast, the idea that it is sometimes important to plan ahead is not a central idea of the excerpt, nor is it supported by the sentence from paragraph 1.
D. Incorrect. The details in the sentences do not show that it is a waste of time to dream about the future. The sentences highlight the tendency of Ellen’s mother to focus her attention on the practical necessities of the moment, but the idea that dreaming about the future is a waste of time is not a central idea of the excerpt.
Question analysis
This central-idea question quotes two sentences about Ellen’s mother from paragraphs 1 and 19 of the Winter Wheat excerpt, far apart in the story, and asks how they help develop a central idea. Students must see what the two sentences have in common and decide which general statement about people they actually support.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Connecting repeated details about a character to a central idea is typical grade 7 work. Both sentences are short and plain, but they sit eighteen paragraphs apart, and the choices are broad statements that must be checked for overreach.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Evidence in several places minor
- Every choice must be checked minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 4, 1179 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 91 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
Read alone, the oatmeal sentence looks like a lesson in getting ready for tomorrow, which is why the planning choice tempts. Paired with paragraph 1’s description of Mom, though, it shows a mind fixed on the next practical task, the opposite of thinking far ahead. The other wrong choices go past the sentences, into parents’ sacrifices or a verdict on daydreaming, and students who keep both sentences in view can set them aside.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
Neither sentence states an idea; students must see what they share, Mom’s attention stopping at today and tomorrow morning, and then decide what general statement that habit supports. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
The sentences come from paragraphs 1 and 19, and paragraph 1 sets Mom’s present-minded talk against Dad’s plans for next year, a contrast that frames the idea. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Every choice must be checked minor Choosing the answer
Three choices speak of the future, planning or dreaming, so each must be tested against both sentences, not just the oatmeal for tomorrow morning. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Strategy: Say in your own words what both sentences show about how Mom thinks and acts, then choose the statement that follows from that without going further than the sentences do.
Traps
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- 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.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
The wrong answers, classified
B Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Brings in the common belief that parents put children first, treating breakfast-making as self-sacrifice, though neither sentence sets Mom’s needs against Ellen’s or says whom the oatmeal is for.
C Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Builds a lesson about planning on the oatmeal prepared for the next morning alone, a single detail that paragraph 1’s picture of Mom’s short horizon works against.
D Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Hardens Mom’s focus on the present into a verdict that dreaming is “a waste of time,” a judgment the excerpt never passes on Dad’s talk of travel or anyone’s.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how two sentences about Mom help build a central idea, a main idea the story develops. Find what the two sentences have in common. Then pick the idea that follows from both, without going further.
Read the first sentence
Paragraph 1 says “Mom seems to think of nothing farther away than today or perhaps yesterday or tomorrow morning.” Just before this, Ellen says Dad is always talking about going places next year. So Mom is different. Her mind stays on the here and now.
Read the second sentence
Paragraph 19 says “Mom was fixing oatmeal for tomorrow morning.” This is the night Dad left on his trip, and Ellen is sad. But Mom does the next useful job, making breakfast. Again her mind goes no farther than tomorrow morning.
Find the shared idea
Both sentences show Mom as practical. Practical means focused on real, useful tasks. She deals with what needs doing now and next, not with far-off plans or dreams. So the sentences develop the idea that practical people focus on current needs instead of worrying about the future.
Check each choice
- A fits. Both sentences show Mom focused on today’s needs.
- B does not fit. Neither sentence weighs Mom’s needs against Ellen’s.
- C does not fit. Oatmeal for the next morning is a small step, not planning ahead. Paragraph 1 says Mom doesn’t think far ahead at all.
- D does not fit. The story never says dreaming is a waste of time. It doesn’t judge Dad’s talk of travel.
Watch out: Read alone, the oatmeal sentence looks like planning ahead. Read it together with paragraph 1.
Choose the answer
Both sentences show Mom paying attention to what is needed now, not to the far future. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong choice, because making oatmeal for tomorrow does look like planning. But paragraph 1 says Mom thinks no farther ahead than tomorrow morning. The oatmeal is just the next job, not a long-range plan. Together the sentences show a practical mind fixed on present needs, which is A.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 45 of 92
2025 Practice Test A English, question 22Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from Winter Wheat”.
Question
The flashback in paragraphs 10–24 affects the plot by
- Ashowing that the departure of one member of the family makes extra work for those left on the farm.
- Bshowing that the bond within the family persists even when its members are apart.
- Cexplaining why Ellen fears that leaving her parents will be too difficult.
- Dillustrating the close connection Ellen has with both of her parents.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks how the flashback in paragraphs 10–24 affects the plot of the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. The flashback does not show that Ellen and her mother faced extra work as a result of the father’s trip to Vermont. Although paragraph 19 describes Ellen’s mother making oatmeal for the next day’s breakfast, this task was not extra work.
B. Incorrect. Although the flashback highlights Ellen’s fondness for each of her parents, it describes her father’s initial departure only and does not show what happened to the familial bond while he is away.
C. Incorrect. Although Ellen describes the memory of her father’s departure as something she wanted to avoid thinking about, she does not fear that it will be too difficult to leave her parents. Instead, she is concerned about what will happen to her parents’ relationship when she is no longer there.
D. CORRECT. The flashback illustrates the close connection that Ellen has with her parents by describing her sadness over the departure of her father (“My throat ached all the way” [paragraph 15]) and presenting a moment of comfort and reassurance between Ellen and her mother (“She laid her hand against my face and it felt rough and hard but firm” [paragraph 20]).
Question analysis
This text-structure question asks how the long flashback in paragraphs 10–24 of the Winter Wheat excerpt, Ellen’s memory of the night her father left by train for Vermont, affects the plot. Students must hold fifteen paragraphs in mind, see why the narrator recalls that night just before her own departure, and choose among several believable effects.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 students study how a flashback shapes a story. This one runs through most of the excerpt, so students must sum up a long stretch of narrative and then tell apart choices that are close in meaning, more than typical grade 7 work.
- Estimated difficulty
- Among the hardest on the SHSAT: a non-obvious approach, heavy reading, or a well-hidden trap.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Evidence in several places major
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- How, not what moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 4, 1179 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 64 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
The flashback is most of the excerpt, and it carries several things at once: grief at Dad’s leaving, the parents’ stiffness with each other, Mom’s comfort, the mystery of her Russian name. The two strongest wrong choices sound like plot effects, a bond lasting through absence or a fear of leaving, while the key describes a relationship, so students looking for an event to point to may pass it by. Students must sum up the whole memory and test each choice against what it actually shows.
Evidence in several places major Working it out
The support for “both of her parents” lies in two separate stretches of a fifteen-paragraph flashback: Ellen’s aching throat after Dad’s train leaves in paragraph 15, and Mom’s hand on her face in paragraph 20. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The choice about the family bond persisting while members are apart shares the right one’s subject, family closeness, and differs in one claim, that the bond lasts through a separation the flashback never follows. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
How, not what moderate Working it out
The stem asks how the flashback affects the plot, yet the keyed effect is about character, so students must accept that the memory works by showing Ellen’s ties to each parent before she leaves. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Strategy: Summarize what happens in the flashback and how Ellen feels at each stage, then compare it with the present-day scenes before and after it and decide what the memory adds.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
The wrong answers, classified
A Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Assumes a farmer’s absence must mean more chores, perhaps from Dad’s reminder about the cow and Mom’s “I’ll manage,” though the flashback never shows Ellen and Mom burdened with extra work.
B Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Sees the warmth between Ellen and her parents and stretches it into a bond that lasts through a long separation, though the memory ends the night Dad leaves.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Ties the flashback to Ellen’s unease about leaving but misplaces the worry: what troubles her is how her parents will manage without her, not whether leaving will be too hard.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how the flashback in paragraphs 10–24 affects the story. A flashback is a scene from the past that interrupts the present. Here Ellen, about to leave for college, remembers the night Dad left for Vermont years ago. Sum up what the memory shows, then test each choice.
Sum up the flashback
Ellen and Mom see Dad off at the train in the cold dark. On the drive home, Ellen says “My throat ached all the way.” At home, Mom comforts her: “She laid her hand against my face and it felt rough and hard but firm.” Later, Mom laughs warmly about her name, and the house feels right again.
See what the memory shows
An aching throat is the tight, sore feeling you get when you hold back tears. That shows how much Ellen loves her father. Mom’s firm hand and warm laugh show how close Ellen is to her mother. So the flashback shows Ellen’s strong tie to both parents.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. The flashback never shows Ellen and Mom with extra farm work.
- B does not fit. The memory ends the night Dad leaves. It never shows the family while he is away.
- C does not fit. Ellen’s worry is about how her parents will get along without her, not about whether leaving will be too hard.
- D fits. It shows Ellen’s love for Dad and her closeness to Mom.
Watch out: B also talks about family closeness. But it says the bond lasts through time apart, which the flashback never shows.
Choose the answer
The flashback shows how close Ellen is to her father and to her mother. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong choice, because it also describes a strong family bond. But B says the bond lasts while family members are apart. The flashback stops on the night Dad leaves, so it never shows that. It does show Ellen grieving for Dad and comforted by Mom. That is D.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 46 of 92
2025 Practice Test A English, question 23Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from Winter Wheat”.
Question
Which sentence from the excerpt provides evidence that Mom wants Ellen to understand the family’s heritage?
- A“Mom folded the ironing board and put it inside their bedroom that was just off the kitchen.” (paragraph 2)
- B“ ‘There’s no need to go to town; she can catch the train at Gotham just as well.’ ” (paragraph 5)
- C“We’d go in right after dinner and go around to the stores, Dad going one way and Mom and I another.” (paragraph 7)
- D“ ‘Why, Yeléna, you know that; Anna Petrovna.’ ” (paragraph 22)
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks which sentence from the excerpt provides evidence that Mom wants Ellen to understand the family’s heritage.
A. Incorrect. Although this sentence from paragraph 2 describes a domestic moment that takes place within the family home, it does not relate to the heritage of either parent and therefore does not provide evidence that her mother wants Ellen to understand the family’s heritage.
B. Incorrect. Although this sentence from paragraph 5 provides the name of the train station closest to Ellen’s family’s farm, the train stop at Gotham is not related to the family’s heritage. Therefore, this sentence does not provide clear evidence that her mother wants Ellen to understand the family’s heritage.
C. Incorrect. Although this sentence from paragraph 7 describes an aspect of the family dynamic (Ellen predicts that while browsing in stores in town, “Dad [would go] one way and Mom and I another”), their shopping habits do not provide clear evidence that her mother wants Ellen to understand the family’s heritage.
D. CORRECT. In this sentence from paragraph 22, Ellen’s mother addresses her by the Russian version of her name (Yeléna) and repeats her own Russian name (Anna Petrovna). The choice to call her daughter Yeléna instead of Ellen follows immediately after Ellen asks, “Mom, was that really your name—what Dad called you?” (paragraph 21), and the mother’s surprised response provides evidence that she both wants and expects Ellen to understand the family’s Russian heritage.
Question analysis
This evidence question asks which quoted sentence from the Winter Wheat excerpt shows that Mom wants Ellen to understand the family’s heritage. The four sentences, from paragraphs 2, 5, 7 and 22, all involve Mom, so students must reread each one in its paragraph to see what it really shows about her.
- Grade level
- Grade 6 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Below grade 7 Finding the sentence that supports a stated idea is everyday grade 7 work. The quotations are short and plainly worded and the idea is concrete, so one careful rereading of each in context is enough, a lighter task than usual.
- Estimated difficulty
- Routine: one familiar step, little to misread.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 4, 1179 words; question and choices: about grade 8, 83 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
Only one of the four sentences touches the family’s origins at all, so a student who knows what heritage means can rule out the others at a glance. The small risk lies with students who match “Mom wants” to any line where Mom states a preference, or who do not recognize the Russian names, since the quotation stops before Mom mentions Russia.
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The quoted line never mentions heritage; students must see that Mom calling Ellen “Yeléna” and repeating “Anna Petrovna,” as things Ellen should already know, shows her wish to pass on their Russian roots. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
The names’ Russian origin is clearest outside the quotation, in the rest of paragraph 22, where Mom names her birthplace, and in paragraph 2’s “instead of a Russian.” (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Define heritage in your own words, then reread each quoted sentence in its paragraph and ask whether it shows Mom handing something about the family on to Ellen.
Traps
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
The wrong answers, classified
A True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Picks an everyday moment of Mom putting away the ironing board, perhaps remembering that paragraph 2 also mentions her Russian roots, though this sentence shows only housework.
B Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Matches “Mom wants” to Mom’s spoken preference that Ellen catch the train at Gotham, which backs half the idea, a wish of Mom’s, but concerns travel, not heritage.
C True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Notices Mom and Ellen shopping together in Ellen’s imagined trip to town, a sign of closeness, but going around the stores says nothing about where the family comes from.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks which sentence shows that Mom wants Ellen to understand the family’s heritage. Heritage is the history and traditions a family passes down, such as where it came from. Look for a sentence where Mom shares something about the family’s roots.
Look at the conversation
At the train, Dad called Mom Anna Petrovna, a name Ellen had never heard him use. In paragraph 21, Ellen asks, “Mom, was that really your name—what Dad called you?” In paragraph 22, Mom answers, “Why, Yeléna, you know that; Anna Petrovna.” Then she reminds Ellen that she was born in Russia.
Work out what Mom’s answer shows
Mom calls her daughter Yeléna, the Russian form of Ellen. She repeats her own Russian name. She also says “you know that,” as if Ellen should already know. Mom is surprised that Ellen doesn’t. That shows Mom wants and expects Ellen to know where the family comes from.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. Folding the ironing board is housework. It says nothing about the family’s past.
- B does not fit. Mom does want something here, the train at Gotham. But that is about travel, not heritage.
- C does not fit. Shopping in town shows family habits, not family roots.
- D fits. Mom uses Russian names and expects Ellen to know them.
Watch out: B tempts because it shows what Mom wants. But the question asks what she wants Ellen to understand about the family.
Choose the answer
Only one sentence has Mom passing on the family’s Russian roots. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong choice, because Mom states a wish in it: Ellen can catch the train at Gotham. But that wish is about the trip, not the family’s past. In D, Mom uses the Russian names Yeléna and Anna Petrovna. She is surprised that Ellen doesn’t know them. That shows she wants Ellen to understand her heritage.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 47 of 92
2025 Practice Test A English, question 24Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from Winter Wheat”.
Question
What is Ellen’s primary mood at key points in the excerpt?
Move the correct answer to each box in the table.
| Paragraphs | Ellen’s Primary Mood |
|---|---|
| 1–2 | |
| 7–8 | |
| 9–10 |
On the test you drag tiles into the boxes; here, choose each box’s tile from its menu. Each tile can be used once. The DOE has not published how answers with several parts are scored; this site counts one right only when every part is right.
Show the answer
Correct answer: blank 1: Affectionate; blank 2: Wishful; blank 3: Worried
The question asks for identification of Ellen’s primary mood in key points in the excerpt—paragraphs 1–2, paragraphs 7–8, and paragraphs 9–10.
B. Affectionate: CORRECT. Ellen’s primary mood in paragraphs 1–2 is affectionate. She states in the first sentence of paragraph 1 that she loves her father’s way of talking and then describes with affection her mother’s reassuring certainty and her father’s appreciation of her mother’s cooking.
E. Wishful: CORRECT. Ellen’s primary mood in paragraphs 7–8 is wishful as she pictures the two departure scenarios available to her. She expresses in detail her longing for the “other people and excitement” at the train station in town, along with her wish to have plenty of “time to wave from the platform and then again from your window by your seat,” and her dislike of the idea of leaving from Gotham, where the train “only stops long enough for you to get on and you hardly have time to taste the flavor of going away.”
C. Worried: CORRECT. Ellen’s primary mood in paragraphs 9–10 is worried. Her worry is suggested by the description of her posture in the first sentence of paragraph 9 (“I sat . . . with my arms around my knees”). In the next sentence, she reveals that she “couldn’t keep from thinking,” or worrying, about her concern that her departure will be as tense as the time her father left for a trip to Vermont.
A. Calm: Incorrect. Ellen’s mood is not primarily calm in any of the paragraphs in the table. In paragraphs 1–2, her reflections might seem to focus on calm times, but any mood of calm is shattered by her sudden realization that she’d “be going away” the next day. Similarly, although paragraph 7 describes what might be a calm or routine day of shopping in town, she is imagining the scene in great detail as a way of making a difficult decision about where she would prefer to catch the train. Finally, in paragraphs 9–10, Ellen is far from calm as she forces herself to look “straight at” an upsetting childhood memory of seeing her father off on a long train trip.
D. Jealous: Incorrect. Ellen’s mood is not primarily jealous in any of the paragraphs in the table. In paragraphs 1–2, she admires and enjoys the positive atmosphere created by her father’s praise of her mother, rather than expressing jealousy. The contrast in paragraphs 7–8 between her narration of the two possible departure plans might seem to suggest that Ellen is jealous of the family whom she and her parents once watched depart from the town, but instead, her narration reflects Ellen’s wishful desire to recreate that pleasurable town visit as part of her own departure. In paragraphs 9–10, her flashback memory is focused on the stiffness of her parents’ behavior and includes no indications that she feels jealousy of either parent.
Question analysis
This question on the Winter Wheat excerpt asks students to identify Ellen’s primary mood at three points in the story: paragraphs 1–2, 7–8 and 9–10. On the test students drag mood words from five tiles into a table, and each stretch of the story mixes more than one feeling, so they must judge which feeling dominates each one.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Tracking how a narrator’s feelings change across a story is grade 7 work, and the writing is plain. Placing three tiles with all-or-nothing credit, where each stretch holds mixed feelings, raises the demand only somewhat.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Much to keep track of moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 4, 1179 words; question and choices: about grade 6, 24 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- The punctuation of an ellipsis in a quotation was corrected.
- 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
Each stretch of the story holds more than one feeling, so the word “primary” does the work. The quiet evening of paragraphs 1–2 and Ellen sitting still in paragraph 9 both invite Calm, though the first is full of her fondness for her parents and the second shows her forcing herself to face a painful memory. With three placements that must all be right, a student who settles for the setting’s mood in either row loses the question.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
No mood is named: affection must be read from “I love Dad’s way of talking,” wishfulness from Ellen picturing waving from the platform, and worry from her arms around her knees. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Much to keep track of moderate Working it out
Three rows, five tiles that cannot be reused, and credit only when all three are right: each stretch must be judged on its own while the two leftover moods are kept out. (Sweller, 1988; Carpenter, Just & Shell, 1990)
Strategy: Reread each stretch of paragraphs by itself and name Ellen’s main feeling in your own words before looking at the tiles, then place the closest tile; two tiles will be left over.
Traps
- Wrong tone or attitude: Misjudges the tone, attitude or point of view, such as reading admiration as criticism, or taking a character's or subject's feelings for the author's.
The wrong answers, classified
BEA Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads Ellen sitting still and looking “straight at” the memory in paragraph 9 as calm, though she has just failed to stop thinking of Dad’s leaving and is bracing to face it.
AEC Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Puts Calm in the first row because paragraphs 1–2 show a quiet evening of ironing and reading, taking the scene’s mood for Ellen’s, which is warm affection for both parents.
BDC Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Puts Jealous in the middle row, reading envy into Ellen’s memory of seeing another family off from the town station, when she is only wishing for a send-off like theirs.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The DOE’s explanation of “Worried” quotes the first sentence of paragraph 9 as “I sat. . . with my arms around my knees,” with the first dot set against “sat,” as if a sentence ended there. The words are left out from the middle of the sentence, so the site spaces the ellipsis as the DOE’s explanations do elsewhere: “I sat . . . with my arms around my knees.”
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This table asks for Ellen’s primary mood, her main feeling, in three parts of the story. Each part may hold more than one feeling, so pick the strongest. On the test you drag a tile into each box. On this site you pick from a menu in each row. Each tile is used once, so two are left over.
Read paragraphs 1–2
Ellen begins by saying she loves the way Dad talks. She likes that he gets excited about the same things she does. She admires how sure Mom is that things will turn out well. She tells how Dad praises Mom’s cooking. These details are warm and loving. Affectionate means showing love and fondness. So the mood is Affectionate.
Read paragraphs 7–8
Ellen pictures leaving from Clark City. The family would shop and eat supper in town. At the station there would be “other people and excitement.” She would have “time to wave from the platform and then again from your window by your seat.” At Gotham, the train “only stops long enough for you to get on.” She longs for the big send-off. So the mood is Wishful.
Read paragraphs 9–10
Paragraph 9 begins “I sat . . . with my arms around my knees.” People often curl up like that when they feel uneasy. Ellen “couldn’t keep from thinking” of the night Dad left on a trip. That parting was sad and tense. She fears her own leaving may be like it. So the mood is Worried.
Rule out the two extra tiles
- Calm does not fit any row. In paragraph 9, Ellen sits still. But she is bracing herself to face a painful memory, not resting. And the quiet evening of paragraphs 1–2 is full of warm feeling for her parents.
- Jealous does not fit any row. Ellen remembers seeing another family off at the town station. She wants a send-off like theirs, but she doesn’t resent them.
Watch out: Sitting still is not the same as feeling calm.
Fill in the table
- Paragraphs 1–2: Affectionate
- Paragraphs 7–8: Wishful
- Paragraphs 9–10: Worried
All three rows must be right to get the point.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
Calm is the closest wrong tile, for paragraphs 9–10. Ellen sits still, and that can look calm. But she has just tried and failed to stop thinking about Dad’s leaving. Her arms are wrapped around her knees. She is facing a memory that upsets her, so Worried fits better.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 48 of 92
2025 Practice Test A English, question 37Passage Excerpt from “The Spirit of the Herd”
Excerpt from “The Spirit of the Herd”
by Dallas Lore Sharp
In this excerpt, published in 1914, author and professor Dallas Lore Sharp describes a summer cattle roundup in Oregon. The heat and dust had been relentless for three days. The cowboys were exhausted, and the cattle were restless. The ranch boss, Wade, had led the drive to a watering place, only to find it empty.
Along with the wagon had come the fresh horses—one of them being Peroxide Jim, a supple, powerful, clean-limbed buckskin, a horse, I think, that had as fine and intelligent an animal-face as any creature I ever saw. Wade had been saving this horse for emergency work. And why should he not have been saved fresh for just such a need as this? Are there not superior horses as well as superior men—a Peroxide Jim to complement a Wade?
The horse knew the cattle business and knew his rider perfectly; and though there was nothing like sentiment about the boss of the P Ranch riders, his faith in Peroxide Jim was complete. . . .
The desert, where the herd was camped, was one of the highest of a series of tablelands, or benches; it lay as level as a floor, rimmed by sheer rock, from which there was a drop to the bench of sage below. The herd when overtaken by the dusk had been headed for a pass descending to the next lower bench, but was now halted within a mile of the rim rock on the east, where there was a perpendicular fall of about three hundred feet. . . .
In the taut silence of the stirless desert night, with the tension of the herd at the snapping-point, any quick, unwonted sight or sound would stampede them. The sneezing of a horse, the flare of a match, would be enough to send the whole four thousand headlong—blind, frenzied, trampling—till spent and scattered over the plain.
And so, as he rode, Wade began to sing. The rider ahead of him took up the air and passed it on until, above the stepping stir of the hoofs rose the faint voices of the men, and all the herd was bound about by the slow plaintive measures of some old song. It was not to soothe their savage breasts that the riders sang to the cattle, but rather to preempt the dreaded silence, to relieve the tension, and so to prevent the shock of any sudden startling noise.
So they sang and rode and the night wore on to one o’clock, when Wade, coming up on the rim-rock side, felt a cool breeze fan his face, and caught a breath of fresh, moist wind with the taste of water in it.
He checked his horse instantly, listening as the wind swept past him over the cattle. But they must already have smelled it, for they had ceased their milling, the whole herd standing motionless, the indistinct forms close to him in the dark showing their bald faces lifted to drink the sweet wet breath that came over the rim. Then they started on again, but faster, and with a rumbling now from their hoarse throats that tightened Wade’s grip on the reins.
The sound seemed to come out of the earth, a low, rumbling mumble, as dark as the night and as wide as the plain, a thick, inarticulate bellow that stood every rider stiff in his stirrups. . . .
Then the breeze caught the dust and carried it back from the gray-coated, ghostly shapes, and Wade saw that the animals were still moving in a circle. He must keep them going. He touched his horse to ride on with them, when across the black sky flashed a vivid streak of lightning.
There was a snort from the steers, a quick clap of horns and hoofs from far within the herd, a tremor of the plain, a roar, a surging mass—and Wade was riding the flank of a wild stampede. Before him, behind him, beside him, pressing hard upon his horse, galloped the frenzied steers, and beyond them a multitude borne on, and bearing him on, by the heave of the galloping herd.
Wade was riding for his life. He knew it. His horse knew it. He was riding to turn the herd, too, back from the rim, as the horse also knew. The cattle were after water—water-mad—ready to go over the precipice to get it, carrying horse and rider with them. Wade was the only rider between the herd and the rim. It was black as death. He could see nothing in the sage, could scarcely discern the pounding, panting shadows at his side. He knew that he was being borne toward the rim, how fast he could not tell, but he knew by the swish of the brush against his tapaderos and the plunging of the horse that the ground was growing stonier, that they were nearing the rocks.
To outrun the herd was his only chance for life. If he could come up with the leaders he might not only escape, but even stand a chance of heading them off upon the plain and saving the herd. There were cattle still ahead of him; how many, what part of them all, he could not make out in the dark. But the horse knew. The reins hung on his straight neck, where his rider had dropped them, as, yelling and firing over the wild herd, he had given this horse the race to win, to lose.
They were riding the rim. Close on their left bore down the flank of the herd, and on their right, under their very feet, was a precipice, so close that they felt its blackness—its three hundred feet of fall! . . .
. . . Then Wade found himself racing neck and neck with a big white steer, which the horse, with marvelous instinct, seemed to pick out from a bunch, and to cling to, forcing him gradually ahead, till, cutting him free from the bunch entirely, he bore him off into the swishing sage.
The steers coming on close behind followed their leader, and in, after them, swung others. The tide was turning from the rim. More and more were veering, and within a short time the whole herd, bearing off from the cliffs, was pounding over the open plains.
Whose race was it? It was Peroxide Jim’s, according to Wade, for not by word or by touch of hand or knee had the horse been directed in the run. From the flash of the lightning the horse had taken the bit, had covered an indescribably perilous path at top speed, had outrun the herd and turned it from the edge of the rim rock, without a false step or a tremor of fear.
From “The Spirit of the Herd” by Dallas Lore Sharp—Public Domain
tablelands: plateaus, flat areas of land sharply elevated from the surrounding area
tapaderos: leather covers for stirrups
Question
How does paragraph 9 fit into the overall structure of the excerpt?
- AIt hints at the change in the setting that caused Wade to suddenly become alert.
- BIt creates a false sense of calm that shows how unprepared the men were for what was about to happen.
- CIt introduces the idea that Wade was a skillful leader in unpredictable circumstances.
- DIt presents the incident that caused the main conflict Wade and Peroxide Jim addressed.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks how paragraph 9 fits into the overall structure of the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. Wade was alert long before the events of paragraph 9. In paragraph 5, he began singing to the cattle because he knew that they were on the verge of stampeding. He was even more alert when he “caught a breath of fresh, moist wind with the taste of water in it” (paragraph 6) and heard the low rumbling of the herd in paragraph 8: “The sound seemed to come out of the earth, a low, rumbling mumble.”
B. Incorrect. Wade and the other riders were not calm; rather, they were alert and attempting to keep the cattle calm by singing to them. They were as prepared as they could be for what was about to happen, as shown in paragraph 1, through the selection of fresh horses and, specifically, Wade’s choice to ride Peroxide Jim in the face of possible danger: “Wade had been saving this horse for emergency work.”
C. Incorrect. Although Wade’s leadership is implied in paragraph 9 (“He must keep them going. He touched his horse to ride on with them”), his leadership is revealed in earlier portions of the excerpt as well (“Wade had been saving this horse” [paragraph 1]; “Wade began to sing” [paragraph 5]), so this is not new information being introduced in paragraph 9 of the excerpt.
D. CORRECT. Paragraph 9 describes the lightning strike that made the cattle panic and stampede. The stampede is the main conflict Wade and Peroxide Jim addressed in the excerpt; and therefore, paragraph 9 fits into the overall structure of the excerpt by presenting the incident that caused the main conflict.
Question analysis
This text-structure question asks how paragraph 9 of “The Spirit of the Herd,” Dallas Lore Sharp’s account of a cattle drive through the Oregon desert at night, fits into the overall structure of the excerpt. Students must judge what the paragraph does at that moment in the story, and several choices describe something real in the scene around it.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how a paragraph fits a story’s structure is typical grade 7 work. The 1914 prose is dense, but this paragraph is short and its role is clear once the paragraphs around it are read.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what moderate
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Complex sentences minor
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 1160 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 73 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A paragraph number and a detail that is not in the excerpt were corrected in the explanation.
- 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
Paragraph 9 is short and its turning point comes in its final words, so a student who reads it as a pause in the night’s tension, or as a portrait of Wade, can miss that it sets off everything after it. The wrong choices each describe something that happens around this point in the story, which is why checking what came earlier matters: Wade was already alert and already leading. Seeing the paragraph as the hinge between suspense and stampede settles it.
How, not what moderate Working it out
The question asks what paragraph 9 does in the sequence of events, and its job is carried by its last clause, the lightning that the next paragraph turns into a stampede. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
Ruling out the choices about alertness and leadership means looking back: Wade starts the singing in paragraph 5, reins in his horse at the moist wind in paragraph 7, and had saved Peroxide Jim in paragraph 1. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
The paragraph’s key event arrives at the end of a long sentence in inverted order, “across the black sky flashed a vivid streak of lightning,” after Wade’s plan to keep riding. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Strategy: Sum up what happens before, during and after paragraph 9 in a few words each, then pick the choice that describes the paragraph’s role in that sequence.
Traps
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
- Wrong tone or attitude: Misjudges the tone, attitude or point of view, such as reading admiration as criticism, or taking a character's or subject's feelings for the author's.
The wrong answers, classified
A Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Connects the breeze that clears the dust in paragraph 9 to Wade’s alertness, but the change that alerted him was the moist wind of paragraph 6, and he was watchful even earlier.
B Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Takes the clearing dust and the herd’s steady circling as a lull, then calls the riders unprepared, though they were tense and ready, singing to the herd on fresh horses.
C Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Sees leadership in Wade’s resolve that “He must keep them going,” which is there, but paragraph 9 does not introduce it: he had saved his best horse and started the singing earlier.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The DOE’s explanation of Option A says “In paragraph 4, he began singing to the cattle.” Wade begins to sing in paragraph 5 (“And so, as he rode, Wade began to sing”), as the explanation of Option C itself says; paragraph 4 describes the tension that makes the singing necessary. The same explanation says Wade “heard thunder in paragraph 8,” but the excerpt has no thunder: the sound in paragraph 8 is the herd’s “thick, inarticulate bellow,” the rumbling that comes “from their hoarse throats” in paragraph 7. The site now says “In paragraph 5, he began singing” and “heard the low rumbling of the herd in paragraph 8.” Option A is still wrong, and the answer, D, is unchanged.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how paragraph 9 fits into the structure of the excerpt. Structure is the order of events and how the parts connect. Ask what happens before paragraph 9, in it, and right after it.
Sum up what comes before
Before paragraph 9, the night is tense. In paragraph 1, Wade had been saving Peroxide Jim, his best horse, for an emergency. In paragraph 5, “Wade began to sing” to keep the herd from being startled. In paragraph 6, he caught a moist wind. In paragraph 8, the herd’s low rumbling “stood every rider stiff in his stirrups.” Everyone is alert.
Read paragraph 9
Paragraph 9 says the breeze cleared the dust, and Wade saw that the animals “were still moving in a circle.” He decided “He must keep them going.” Then the paragraph ends with the key event: “across the black sky flashed a vivid streak of lightning.” Vivid means very bright.
See what comes right after
Paragraph 10 begins with a snort from the steers and a roar. Then “Wade was riding the flank of a wild stampede.” A stampede is a sudden wild run by a frightened herd. The rest of the excerpt is Wade and Peroxide Jim racing to turn the herd from the cliff. So the lightning in paragraph 9 sets off the main conflict.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. Wade was alert long before. He began singing in paragraph 5, caught the moist wind in paragraph 6 and heard the herd rumbling in paragraph 8.
- B does not fit. The riders were not calm or unprepared. They were singing to the herd, and Wade had a fresh horse ready.
- C does not fit. Wade’s leadership shows earlier, when he saved his best horse and started the singing.
- D fits. The lightning causes the stampede that Wade and Peroxide Jim must stop.
Choose the answer
Paragraph 9 ends with the lightning that starts the stampede, the problem the rest of the excerpt is about. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong choice, because Wade does lead in paragraph 9 when he decides “He must keep them going.” But C says the paragraph introduces his leadership. We already saw it in paragraph 1, when he saved his best horse, and in paragraph 5, when he started the singing. What is new in paragraph 9 is the lightning.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “The Spirit of the Herd”” as printed (page 41)
Question 49 of 92
2025 Practice Test B English, question 15Passage A Miracle Mile
A Miracle Mile
In the 1950s people compared running one mile in four minutes to scaling Mount Everest and nicknamed the feat a “dream mile.” Although such an accomplishment was considered humanly impossible, several elite runners aimed to break that supposedly impenetrable barrier. One of them was a twenty-five-year-old medical student named Roger Bannister.
Roger Bannister had tasted failure during the 1952 Olympics. There, he was favored to win the 1,500-meter competition, a distance slightly shorter than a mile, but he finished in a dismal fourth place instead. Bannister’s performance was a disappointment for him and his country, Great Britain. Determined to redeem himself, Bannister postponed his plans to retire from racing and focused on the ultimate prize—breaking the four-minute-mile barrier.
Bannister attacked the elusive milestone with a positive attitude and logical planning. The amateur athlete decided to use intensive interval training to develop endurance and speed. For these workouts, Bannister ran an interval of ten consecutive laps on a quarter-mile track, aiming for sixty seconds each lap. In between intervals, he let his body recover for two minutes.
By early 1954, Bannister had succeeded in lowering his quarter-mile pace to sixty-one seconds, but he had to shave off at least one more second in order to reach his target. Frustrated by the plateau he had reached, Bannister took a break from training and went mountain climbing for three days. The rest from running permitted his muscles to recuperate and left him feeling refreshed. When Bannister returned to the track, he completed ten quarter-mile-long intervals at fifty-nine seconds each. He finally felt prepared to attempt to break the world record.
As a member of the Amateur Athletic Association (AAA), Bannister joined the AAA team for a track meet against Oxford University. The event took place on a cinder track in Oxford on May 6, 1954. Bannister and his two AAA teammates, Chris Chataway and Chris Brasher, were close friends and frequent running partners. Chataway and Brasher agreed to help Bannister accomplish his goal by being his “rabbits.”
In track and field, rabbits are runners who enter the race solely to pace a teammate for a segment of the course. Typically, a runner settles in behind the rabbit and allows the rabbit to set an appropriate tempo. Additionally, by running behind the rabbit, the runner conserves about 15 percent of his or her effort. When the starting pistol fired, Brasher pounced into the lead, and Bannister followed behind his first rabbit.
Propelled by the excitement, Bannister lost his instinctive feel for his pace and shouted “Faster!” at Brasher. Brasher, however, remained composed and maintained his current steady but grueling pace, completing the first two laps in a desirable one minute and fifty-eight seconds. Then Chataway surged forward, leading Bannister at this same punishing rate for another lap and a half. At the beginning of the back straightaway of the track, Bannister bolted past Chataway. Bannister said, “I felt that the moment of a lifetime had come. There was no pain, only a great unity of movement and aim.” Bannister crossed the finish line in 3 minutes 59.4 seconds. The ecstatic crowd erupted the moment the timekeeper announced the word “three.”
Soon after Bannister’s achievement, four other athletes matched his performance. A new mindset had taken root among runners. Over the years, the record continued to fall. However, the current record, 3 minutes 43.13 seconds, has stood unbroken since 1999. Some question whether this record represents the limits of human ability. But perhaps there is another Bannister, an athlete who, with willpower and dedication, will accomplish the miraculous.
Question
How does the author’s use of chronological structure contribute to the development of ideas in the passage?
- AIt presents the increasing physical effects of Bannister’s training methods as he prepared to break the four-minute-mile barrier.
- BIt shows the increase in Bannister’s confidence in his ability to break the four-minute-mile barrier.
- CIt emphasizes the key events in Bannister’s life that inspired him to break the four-minute-mile barrier.
- DIt highlights the progression of Bannister’s training and details about his successful attempt to break the four-minute-mile barrier.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks how the author’s use of chronological structure contributes to the development of ideas in the passage.
A. Incorrect. While paragraph 4 mentions the “plateau” Bannister dealt with and the break that “permitted his muscles to recuperate,” the chronological structure of the passage focuses mainly on the progression of Bannister’s process over time.
B. Incorrect. Even though the passage suggests that Bannister’s ability to break the four-minute-mile barrier improved and that he felt “prepared to attempt to break the world record” (paragraph 4), the chronological structure of the passage primarily serves to show how Bannister’s progress over time led to his success.
C. Incorrect. The chronological structure of the passage begins with an acknowledgment that Bannister was inspired to break the four-minute-mile barrier by his loss at the 1952 Olympics (paragraph 2); however, the overall organization of the passage highlights his dedicated efforts over time to break the four-minute-mile barrier.
D. CORRECT. The chronological structure of the passage follows the progression of Bannister’s training from his loss at the 1952 Olympics to the race where he ran the first sub-four-minute mile on May 6, 1954 (paragraph 5).
Question analysis
This text-structure question asks how the chronological structure of “A Miracle Mile,” an article about Roger Bannister’s attempt to run a mile in under four minutes, contributes to the development of its ideas. The article moves from the 1950s to the present day, and each choice names a thread a reader might trace through it, so students must decide which one the time order really follows.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Below grade 7 Grade 7 students analyze how an author organizes a text. Here the stem names the structure, and the article moves through dated events in plain prose, so seeing what the order brings out is lighter than most grade 7 structure questions.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what minor
- Every choice must be checked minor
- Evidence in several places minor
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 587 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 84 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
The article tells Bannister’s story in order, and the right choice simply names what that order follows: training that improves, then the race itself. Each wrong choice picks a thread the text touches without tracing, a confidence present from the start, a physical toll mentioned once, an inspiration that comes only from 1952. Students who sum up each paragraph in a few words see that only the training and the race run all the way through.
How, not what minor Working it out
The stem names the structure and asks what it does, so students must say which thread the time order follows from the 1952 Olympics to May 6, 1954, not retell the events. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Every choice must be checked minor Choosing the answer
Each wrong thread has a foothold: “a positive attitude” and “finally felt prepared” for confidence, muscles that needed to “recuperate” for physical effects, and the 1952 loss for inspiration. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
A thread counts only if it runs from paragraph 2 to paragraph 7, so it must cover both the training of paragraphs 3 and 4 and the race told in paragraphs 5 to 7. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Note in a few words what each paragraph covers, in order, then choose the description that matches what the whole sequence follows rather than one detail along the way.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- 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.
The wrong answers, classified
A Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Recalls the plateau and the muscles that needed to “recuperate” in paragraph 4, but the article tracks lap times falling from sixty-one to fifty-nine seconds, not a physical toll that grows.
B Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Follows Bannister from “Frustrated by the plateau” to “finally felt prepared” and “the moment of a lifetime,” but he began with “a positive attitude,” and the order traces training, not confidence.
C Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Starts from the 1952 Olympic loss that left him “Determined to redeem himself,” but that single event belongs to paragraph 2, and the later paragraphs follow training and a race, not further inspirations.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This is a structure question. Chronological structure means telling events in time order, from first to last. The question asks what that order helps the passage show. So sum up each paragraph in a few words. Then see which thread runs through all of them.
Sum up each paragraph in order
- Paragraph 1: In the 1950s, a four-minute mile seemed impossible.
- Paragraph 2: Bannister loses at the 1952 Olympics and sets his goal.
- Paragraph 3: He makes a training plan.
- Paragraph 4: By early 1954, his laps get faster.
- Paragraph 5: A race is set for May 6, 1954. Two teammates will set his pace.
- Paragraphs 6–7: The race is run. He finishes in 3 minutes 59.4 seconds.
- Paragraph 8: Other runners match him, and over the years the record is lowered.
See what the order follows
Most of the passage follows two things. First, his training improves step by step. The track is a quarter mile, so four laps make a mile. Sixty seconds a lap would be exactly four minutes. He goes from sixty-one seconds a lap to fifty-nine, so the goal comes within reach. Second, the passage gives details of the race. It is set up in paragraph 5 and run in paragraphs 6 and 7. Progression means step-by-step progress.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. His body comes up only now and then, as when a rest “permitted his muscles to recuperate” in paragraph 4. Recuperate means recover. The passage never tracks effects that grow, and A leaves out the race.
- B does not fit. He had “a positive attitude” from the start, in paragraph 3. The order follows what he did, not how sure he felt.
- C does not fit. Only one event inspired him, the 1952 loss in paragraph 2. After that come training and the race.
- D fits. The order traces his training and then the record-breaking race.
Watch out: B is tempting because he “finally felt prepared” in paragraph 4. But that is one moment, not the thread of the whole passage.
Choose the answer
The time order follows Bannister’s training as it improves, then the race where he broke the barrier. So the answer is D, “It highlights the progression of Bannister’s training and details about his successful attempt to break the four-minute-mile barrier.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong choice. Bannister does end up ready, and he “finally felt prepared” in paragraph 4. But he began with “a positive attitude,” so his confidence does not build from low to high. The paragraphs follow his training and then the race itself. Only D names both.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “A Miracle Mile” as printed (page 13)
Question 50 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 11Passage Excerpt from “Impressions of an Indian Childhood”
Excerpt from “Impressions of an Indian Childhood”
by Zitkala-Sa
Zitkala-Sa (Gertrude Simmons Bonnin) was a Native American writer, musician, teacher, and political activist who was raised on the Yankton Sioux Reservation in South Dakota. In 1900 she published “Impressions of an Indian Childhood” (the term Indian was commonly used at the time to refer to Native American people) to expose readers to what life is like on a reservation.
Soon after breakfast Mother sometimes began her beadwork. On a bright, clear day, she pulled out the wooden pegs that pinned the skirt of our wigwam1 to the ground, and rolled the canvas part way up on its frame of slender poles. Then the cool morning breezes swept freely through our dwelling, now and then wafting the perfume of sweet grasses from newly burnt prairie.
Untying the long tasseled strings that bound a small brown buckskin2 bag, my mother spread upon a mat beside her bunches of colored beads, just as an artist arranges the paints upon his palette. On a lapboard she smoothed out a double sheet of soft white buckskin; and drawing from a beaded case that hung on the left of her wide belt a long, narrow blade, she trimmed the buckskin into shape. Often she worked upon small moccasins for her small daughter. Then I became intensely interested in her designing. With a proud, beaming face, I watched her work. In [my] imagination, I saw myself walking in a new pair of snugly fitting moccasins. I felt the envious eyes of my playmates upon the pretty red beads decorating my feet.
Close beside my mother I sat on a rug, with a scrap of buckskin in one hand and an awl in the other. This was the beginning of my practical observation lessons in the art of beadwork. From a skein3 of finely twisted threads of silvery sinews my mother pulled out a single one. With an awl she pierced the buckskin, and skillfully threaded it with the white sinew. Picking up the tiny beads one by one, she strung them with the point of her thread, always twisting it carefully after every stitch.
It took many trials before I learned how to knot my sinew thread on the point of my finger, as I saw her do. Then the next difficulty was in keeping my thread stiffly twisted, so that I could easily string my beads upon it. My mother required of me original designs for my lessons in beading. At first I frequently ensnared many a sunny hour into working a long design. Soon I learned from self-inflicted punishment to refrain from drawing complex patterns, for I had to finish whatever I began.
After some experience I usually drew easy and simple crosses and squares. These were some of the set forms. My original designs were not always symmetrical nor sufficiently characteristic, two faults with which my mother had little patience. The quietness of her oversight made me feel strongly responsible and dependent upon my own judgment. She treated me as a dignified little individual as long as I was on my good behavior; and how humiliated I was when some boldness of mine drew forth a rebuke from her!
In the choice of colors she left me to my own taste. I was pleased with an outline of yellow upon a background of dark blue, or a combination of red and myrtle-green. There was another of red with a bluish-gray that was more conventionally used. When I became a little familiar with designing and the various pleasing combinations of color, a harder lesson was given me. It was the sewing on, instead of beads, some tinted porcupine quills, moistened and flattened between the nails of the thumb and forefinger. My mother cut off the prickly ends and burned them at once in the centre fire. These sharp points were poisonous, and worked into the flesh wherever they lodged. For this reason, my mother said, I should not do much alone in quills until I was as tall as my cousin Warca-Ziwin.
Always after these confining lessons I was wild with surplus spirits, and found joyous relief in running loose in the open again. Many a summer afternoon a party of four or five of my playmates roamed over the hills with me. We each carried a light sharpened rod about four feet long, with which we pried up certain sweet roots. When we had eaten all the choice roots we chanced upon, we shouldered our rods and strayed off into patches of a stalky plant under whose yellow blossoms we found little crystal drops of gum. Drop by drop we gathered this nature’s rock-candy, until each of us could boast of a lump the size of a small bird’s egg. Soon satiated with its woody flavor, we tossed away our gum, to return again to the sweet roots.
From “Impressions of an Indian Childhood” by Zitkala-Sa—Public Domain
A BRIEF HISTORY OF BEADWORK IN SOUTH DAKOTA
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 1500s | The Dakota use beads made from bones, shells, stones, and animal teeth. European traders bring glass beads to North America. |
| Late 1600s | The Dakota begin trading with the French in Minnesota. |
| 1830s | The Dakota begin using glass beads in clothing, artwork, and decorations in place of Native-made beads. |
| 1862–1865 | The Dakota are expelled from their homelands in Minnesota as a result of the U.S.-Dakota War. |
| 1900s–1920s | The Dakota create items to sell outside their community. |
Source: MNopedia
1wigwam: hut with an arched framework of poles covered with bark, mats, or animal hides
2buckskin: leather made from the skin of a male deer
3skein: coiled length of yarn or other thread loosely wound on a reel
Question
The author’s use of sequence in paragraphs 1 and 2 contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt by
- Alisting the many steps that are involved in the process of beading in order to explain its difficulty and complexity.
- Bconveying the importance of following the steps of the beading process in a precise order to work most efficiently.
- Cemphasizing the time required to fully prepare for and execute the many large and small tasks in the activity of beading.
- Ddetailing each step in preparation for beading in order to highlight the author’s enthusiasm for the work.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks how the author’s use of sequence in paragraphs 1 and 2 contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. In paragraph 2, the author does list the steps her mother takes in preparation to do beadwork, such as “untying the long tasseled strings” of the bag of beads, spreading the beads beside her on a mat, and using “a long, narrow blade” to trim the buckskin into shape. However, the language used to describe this sequence does not indicate that preparing to work with beads is difficult or complex.
B. Incorrect. Although the author’s description of untying the bag of beads, spreading the beads upon a mat, smoothing out a sheet of buckskin, and trimming the buckskin into shape in paragraph 2 indicates that the mother follows a certain routine, it does not place any emphasis on working most efficiently by following the steps of the beading process in a precise order.
C. Incorrect. In paragraph 2, the author describes her mother “untying the long tasseled strings that bound a small brown buckskin bag,” “spread[ing] upon a mat beside her bunches of colored beads,” “smooth[ing] out a double sheet of soft white buckskin; and drawing from a beaded case that hung on the left of her wide belt a long, narrow blade” to trim the buckskin. Although these descriptions do outline the steps in her process for creating beadwork, they do not emphasize the time required to do so, since the author does not mention in the excerpt how long it took her mother to fully prepare for and complete the large and small tasks in the activity of beading.
D. CORRECT. In paragraph 1, the author describes how the morning begins with her mother rolling up the canvas of the wigwam and allowing the breeze to come in. In paragraph 2, the author uses sensory language and precise sequencing to describe the way her mother prepares the beading materials by untying “the long tasseled strings that bound a small brown buckskin bag,” spreading the “bunches of colored beads” beside her, and smoothing out “a double sheet of soft white buckskin.” This combination of sequence and sensory language highlights the author’s enthusiasm for beadwork by emphasizing that the author pays close attention to her mother’s preparations.
Question analysis
This reading question asks how the step-by-step description of a mother preparing her beadwork, in the opening paragraphs of Zitkala-Sa's memoir, contributes to the excerpt's ideas. Every choice agrees that steps are listed, so students must judge which purpose the text actually supports and resist reasons that only sound likely for a craft.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 structure questions usually ask what a paragraph adds to a topic. This one asks what an ordered description achieves, in dense 1900 prose where the purpose is never stated outright, which goes beyond typical grade 7 work.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what major
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Complex sentences minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 946 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 95 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A misquotation of the excerpt in the explanation was corrected.
- 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
All four choices agree that the paragraphs lay out steps, so the question turns entirely on purpose, and three of the purposes sound like natural reasons to describe a craft. Nothing in paragraphs 1 and 2 calls the work hard, slow or a matter of efficiency; what they do show is a child following every move and becoming intensely interested. Students who look for the narrator's own reaction find the purpose, while those who reason from the steps alone drift to difficulty or time.
How, not what major Working it out
The stem asks what the ordered account of untying the bag, spreading the beads, and smoothing and trimming the buckskin does for the excerpt, a purpose the author never states. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The difficulty choice shares the right one's frame, steps laid out in order to show something, and differs only in what they show: how hard beading is, or how eagerly the girl watched. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The enthusiasm has to be pieced together from the close attention to each step and from “intensely interested” and “a proud, beaming face” in paragraph 2. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
Paragraph 2 uses literary word order, as in “my mother spread upon a mat beside her bunches of colored beads,” which slows the reading of the very steps in question. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Strategy: For each choice, look in paragraphs 1 and 2 for words that would prove its purpose; a purpose that no sentence states or shows can be ruled out.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
A Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Rightly sees that paragraph 2 lists many preparation steps, then decides the list must show that beading is difficult and complex, which nothing in these paragraphs says.
B Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Reads the sequence as instructions about doing the steps in a precise order for efficiency, a purpose a watching child's memories never suggest.
C Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reasons that so many steps must take a long time, perhaps recalling the “many a sunny hour” of paragraph 4, but paragraphs 1 and 2 never mention time.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: In rejecting choice C, the handbook quotes paragraph 2 as “spread[ing them] upon a mat beside her bunches of colored beads.” In the excerpt, the bunches of colored beads are what the mother spreads (“my mother spread upon a mat beside her bunches of colored beads”). The inserted “them” refers to nothing and turns the beads into a place. The quotation now reads “spread[ing] upon a mat beside her bunches of colored beads,” which is how the handbook itself reads the sentence in its reason for rejecting choice A (“spreading the beads beside her on a mat”).
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
Sequence means the order in which things happen. Paragraphs 1 and 2 tell the steps of a morning in order. The question asks why the author tells them step by step. What does that careful order help show?
List the steps
In paragraphs 1 and 2, the mother:
- rolls up the side of the wigwam to let in the breeze,
- unties a bag made of buckskin (soft deer leather),
- spreads her beads on a mat,
- smooths out a sheet of buckskin, and
- trims it into shape with a blade.
Find the author’s reaction
Right after the steps, the author tells how she felt. “Then I became intensely interested in her designing. With a proud, beaming face, I watched her work.” Intensely means very strongly. A beaming face has a big, happy smile. She noticed every little step because she was so excited. The details show her enthusiasm, or eager interest.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. The steps are listed, but nothing says beading is hard or complex.
- B is wrong. Nothing says the steps must go in a set order to save effort.
- C is wrong. Paragraphs 1 and 2 never say how long anything takes.
- D is right. The careful details show how closely the girl watched, with eager interest.
Watch out: A is tempting because there are many steps. But many steps don’t prove a task is hard. The author never calls it difficult.
Choose the answer
The step-by-step order shows a child following every move her mother makes. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong answer. Like D, it says the steps are listed to show something. But no word in paragraphs 1 and 2 calls beading hard. The author does say she was “intensely interested” and had “a proud, beaming face.” That shows enthusiasm, so D fits better.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “Impressions of an Indian Childhood”” as printed (pages 42–43)
Question 51 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 15Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “Impressions of an Indian Childhood””.
Question
Read this sentence from paragraph 7.
Always after these confining lessons I was wild with surplus spirits, and found joyous relief in running loose in the open again.
Which sentence best describes how this sentence fits into the overall structure of the excerpt?
- AIt introduces a shift from the author’s demanding relationship with her mother to her more relaxed relationships with friends.
- BIt signals a change from the challenging aspects of life on the reservation to the advantages of living on the prairie.
- CIt highlights a contrast between the focus and control required while working and the freedom of having fun outside.
- DIt concludes the progression of events in the narrative by describing the sequence of events at the end of the author’s day.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks which sentence best describes how the sentence from paragraph 7 fits into the overall structure of the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. Though the author feels humiliated “when some boldness of mine drew forth a rebuke from” her mother (paragraph 5) and characterizes her lessons with her mother as “confining” (paragraph 7), the overall passage does not portray a demanding relationship between the author and the mother. The shift introduced in the sentence from paragraph 7 is not from one of the author’s relationships to another; it is from work to play.
B. Incorrect. In paragraph 6, the author explains how working with porcupine quills is difficult because the “sharp points were poisonous, and worked into the flesh wherever they lodged.” Although this sentence suggests that working with porcupine quills was challenging, the sentence from paragraph 7 does not signal a change from the challenging aspects of life on the reservation to the advantages of living on the prairie. Most of paragraph 6 describes the author’s pleasure in creating designs in different colors.
C. CORRECT. In the sentence from paragraph 7, the author refers to her beadwork lessons as “confining” and states that after the lessons, she “was wild with surplus spirits” and “found joyous relief” in being outside and running around. The phrases “surplus spirits” and “joyous relief” highlight a sense of freedom that stands in strong contrast to the “confining” nature of the author’s beadwork lessons, which required intense focus and control.
D. Incorrect. In paragraph 7, the author describes how “many a summer afternoon” after her beadwork lessons, she and her friends used “a light sharpened rod” to gather “sweet roots” and “little crystal drops of gum.” She then explains that they later “tossed away our gum, to return again to the sweet roots.” However, the sentence from paragraph 7 does not conclude the progression of events in the narrative by describing the sequence of events at the end of the author’s day; the sentence appears at the beginning of paragraph 7 and provides a contrast with events from the previous paragraph.
Question analysis
This reading question quotes the sentence that opens the last paragraph of Zitkala-Sa's excerpt, where she tells how she felt after her beadwork lessons, and asks how it fits the overall structure. Several choices describe a turn or a contrast, so students must pin down exactly what is being set against what.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how one sentence fits a text's structure is grade 7 reading. The sentence is quoted and its wording is vivid, but the student must connect it to the paragraphs on both sides of it, a typical grade 7 demand.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what moderate
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 946 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 123 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
The sentence clearly marks a change, and every choice names some change, so the work lies in saying exactly what is set against what. The excerpt contrasts careful, controlled work with free play, and the word “confining” carries that contrast. Students lose the point by making the turn about people, reading one rebuke as a hard relationship, or about the day's timeline, when the sentence describes what always happened after lessons.
How, not what moderate Working it out
The stem asks how the sentence works in the excerpt's structure, so students must name the turn it marks, from the “confining” lessons of paragraphs 3–6 to running loose outdoors. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The relationships choice also describes a move from lessons with her mother to play with friends, and differs from the right one only in calling the bond with her mother demanding. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
Old-fashioned phrasing such as “wild with surplus spirits” and “joyous relief” has to be decoded as a burst of energy after hours of holding still. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Compare paragraph 6 with paragraph 7 and name what changes between them in a few words, then pick the choice whose two halves match both sides of that change.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
The wrong answers, classified
A Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Notices the move from lessons with her mother to play with friends, but the excerpt shows a quiet, respectful teacher, not a demanding relationship; the turn is from work to play.
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Inflates the move outdoors into a contrast between hardships of reservation life and the prairie's advantages, a far broader claim than one sentence about lessons supports.
D Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Takes the sentence as closing a day's events, since the excerpt begins after breakfast and paragraph 7 turns to afternoons, though it opens its paragraph with a contrast.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how one sentence fits the structure of the excerpt. Structure means how the parts are put together. You need to know what change this sentence marks.
Read the sentence closely
The sentence opens paragraph 7: “Always after these confining lessons I was wild with surplus spirits, and found joyous relief in running loose in the open again.” Confining means keeping you shut in or held still. “Surplus spirits” means extra energy. “Joyous relief” is a happy feeling of being free at last.
Compare what comes before and after
Paragraphs 3 to 6 show the lessons. The girl sits still and works with care. She learns to knot thread, plan designs and handle sharp quills. The rest of paragraph 7 shows her roaming the hills with friends. So this sentence turns from careful work to free play.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. The mother is a quiet, respectful teacher, not a demanding one. The shift is from work to play.
- B is wrong. The sentence sets lessons against play. It says nothing about reservation life being hard or the prairie being better.
- C is right. “Confining” lessons are set against “running loose in the open.”
- D is wrong. The sentence starts paragraph 7 and tells what always happened after lessons. It doesn’t end the story.
Watch out: A is tempting because the girl goes from her mother to her friends. But the sentence contrasts how she felt during lessons and after them.
Choose the answer
The sentence contrasts the focus that work needs with the freedom of playing outside. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong answer. It also sees a move from lessons with her mother to play with friends. But A calls the relationship demanding. The mother teaches quietly and treats her daughter “as a dignified little individual” (paragraph 5). The real contrast is in the word “confining,” which sets held-still work against free play. That is C.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 52 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 24Passage At Dusk
At Dusk
by Natasha Trethewey
At first I think she is calling a child,
my neighbor, leaning through her doorway
at dusk, street lamps just starting to hum
the backdrop of evening. Then I hear
the high-pitched wheedling1 we send out
to animals who know only sound, not
the meanings of our words—here here—
nor how they sometimes fall short.
In another yard, beyond my neighbor’s
sight, the cat lifts her ears, turns first
toward the voice, then back
to the constellation of fireflies flickering
near her head. It’s as if she can’t decide
whether to leap over the low hedge,
the neat row of flowers, and bound
onto the porch, into the steady circle
of light, or stay where she is: luminous
possibility—all that would keep her
away from home—flitting before her.
I listen as my neighbor’s voice trails off.
She’s given up calling for now, left me
to imagine her inside the house waiting,
perhaps in a chair in front of the TV,
or walking around, doing small tasks;
left me to wonder that I too might lift
my voice, sure of someone out there,
send it over the lines stitching here
to there, certain the sounds I make
are enough to call someone home.
“At Dusk” from NATIVE GUARD by Natasha Trethewey, published by Houghton Mifflin Company. Copyright © 2006 by Natasha Trethewey. All rights reserved.
1wheedling: speaking in a flattering manner
Question
How does the setting affect the events of the poem?
- AIt enables the speaker to regularly overhear the neighbor calling for her cat at dusk.
- BIt allows the speaker to observe the neighbor quietly without interacting with her.
- CIt shows how living in close proximity helps the speaker feel connected to the neighbor.
- DIt shows how feeling isolated causes the speaker to imagine interactions with the neighbor.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks how the setting affects the events discussed in the poem.
A. Incorrect. In line 2, the speaker refers to the woman calling for her cat as “my neighbor,” which clearly suggests that the speaker lives next door to the woman. However, although the two live next door to each other, line 1 suggests that perhaps the speaker does not regularly overhear the neighbor because the speaker initially thinks that the neighbor is “calling a child” and only later realizes the neighbor is calling to a cat. Although the setting places the speaker and the neighbor in close proximity, the poem does not indicate the frequency or regularity with which the speaker overhears the neighbor.
B. CORRECT. In the first four lines, the speaker observes the actions of the neighbor as the neighbor leans out to call for the cat at dusk. Despite the speaker’s observation of the neighbor, there is no indication that the neighbor notices the speaker. The reader can conclude that because of the time of day and the speaker being in the house next door, the speaker can observe the neighbor without being observed by her or having to interact with her.
C. Incorrect. The setting of the poem is a neighborhood at nightfall, as indicated by “at dusk” in line 3, the reference to “another yard” in line 9, and the flickering fireflies in line 12. However, while the speaker is close enough to the neighbor to overhear her calling to the cat, there is no indication that the speaker feels connected to the neighbor. Instead, the speaker expresses curiosity about the neighbor after the neighbor goes inside, and the speaker is “left . . . / to imagine her inside the house waiting” (lines 21–22). The fact the speaker initially thought that the neighbor was calling a child indicates that the speaker is not familiar with the neighbor and her habits, and there is no indication that the speaker feels connected to the neighbor.
D. Incorrect. In lines 22–24, the speaker imagines what the neighbor may be doing while the neighbor is waiting inside for the cat to return, but the speaker is imagining the neighbor’s solitary experience after the neighbor has momentarily “given up” on calling to the cat (line 21). The speaker does not imagine personally interacting with the neighbor but rather briefly imagines what the neighbor is doing at home while the cat is away.
Question analysis
This reading question asks how the setting of At Dusk, a neighborhood at nightfall where a woman leans from her doorway to call her cat, affects the events of the poem. Because so little happens, students must infer the setting's role from small details, and several choices sound reasonable without being supported by the poem.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 students analyze how setting shapes events, usually in a story with a clear plot. This poem has almost no action, so the student must reason from a handful of details about place and time, which is harder than typical grade 7 work.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer major
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: 236 words (a poem; reading level not measured); question and choices: about grade 8, 67 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
Little happens in this poem, so the setting's role must be built from small details: a neighbor at her doorway at dusk, a cat in another yard, a speaker who hears and watches but never speaks. The strongest wrong answer is right about overhearing and wrong only in claiming it happens regularly, which the speaker's first mistaken guess argues against. The other choices supply a feeling of closeness or of isolation that the poem never states.
A very close wrong answer major Choosing the answer
The overhearing choice describes what the setting allows almost as well as the right one and fails on a single word, “regularly,” since the poem records one evening and the speaker first mistakes the call. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The setting's effect is never stated; it has to be inferred from the speaker hearing and watching from nearby while the neighbor, “leaning through her doorway,” never seems to notice anyone. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Picture the scene from the speaker's position, then check each choice word by word against the poem and reject any that claims something the poem never states.
Traps
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Rightly sees that living next door lets the speaker overhear the call, but “regularly” is unsupported, and the first guess about a child suggests the call is unfamiliar.
C Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Connects living close by with the poem's interest in connection and the speaker's “I too,” but the speaker never claims to feel close to the neighbor.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Notices the speaker picturing the neighbor indoors and calls it imagined interaction, but the speaker pictures her alone, waiting or doing small tasks, and never mentions feeling isolated.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
The setting is where and when a story or poem takes place. You need to see how the setting shapes what happens in the poem.
Picture the setting
It is “dusk” (line 3), the dim time just after sunset. The neighbor is “leaning through her doorway” (line 2). The cat is “In another yard” (line 9). The speaker is close enough to hear and watch it all. But the speaker never speaks to the neighbor. Nothing shows the neighbor notices the speaker.
Work out the effect
Living next door puts the speaker close by. In the fading light, the speaker can watch quietly. So the speaker sees the neighbor and the cat without joining in. The whole poem is what the speaker sees, hears and imagines from there.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. The word “regularly” is the problem. The poem shows one evening.
- B is right. The speaker watches from nearby and never talks with the neighbor.
- C is wrong. The speaker never says they feel close to the neighbor.
- D is wrong. The poem never says the speaker feels lonely. The speaker pictures the neighbor alone inside, not the two of them talking.
Watch out: A is almost right, since living nearby does let the speaker overhear. One word makes it wrong.
Choose the answer
The setting lets the speaker watch quietly from close by. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong answer. Living next door does let the speaker hear the call. But nothing says it happens often. The poem tells about one evening. At first the speaker even thinks a child is being called. B fits what the poem shows: the speaker watches without ever talking to the neighbor.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “At Dusk” as printed (page 48)
Question 53 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 28Passage Champion of the Channel
Champion of the Channel
In 1926 an editor at the London Daily News predicted that Gertrude Ederle, an American swimmer with eighteen world records and three Olympic medals, would fail in her attempt to swim across the English Channel. He claimed that “even the most uncompromising champion of the rights and capacities of women must admit that in contests of physical skill, speed and endurance they must remain forever the weaker sex.” Yet, at only nineteen years old, Ederle not only became the first woman to accomplish this feat, she also broke the men’s record by two hours. Gertrude Ederle’s triumphant swim across the English Channel was a testimony to her determination, innovative spirit, and passion for swimming.
Crossing the English Channel is a daunting task for any swimmer. At its narrowest point, the channel measures twenty-one miles across. Its icy waters hover around sixty degrees Fahrenheit, and its unruly tides and currents toss swimmers about like bobbing corks. Stinging jellyfish, seaweed, and floating debris from shipwrecks and lost cargoes present added hazards.
For decades the channel’s perils have defeated countless swimmers. Ederle, too, failed in her first attempt to cross the channel in 1925. Just six miles short of finishing, she became ill, and her coach had to haul her out of the water. Undeterred, Ederle decided to try again. Ederle knew that if she did not complete the challenge this time, she might never get the opportunity to set this record, because a rival female swimmer was preparing to make her second attempt at the crossing as well.
To prepare for the marathon swim, Ederle found ways to improve her equipment. She and her sister Meg discovered that melted candle wax perfectly sealed goggle edges, effectively waterproofing Ederle’s goggles against hammering waves. The sisters also designed a two-piece silk swimsuit for Ederle. During her first channel-crossing attempt she had worn a standard one-piece swimsuit that, after the lengthy hours of swimming across the channel, had stretched out, filling with water and creating drag, making an already challenging task almost insurmountable. Unlike the cumbersome typical bathing suit, this silk invention weighed little and allowed for easy movement.
On August 6, 1926, Ederle waded into the channel near Cape Gris-Nez, France. At first she shivered in the bone-chilling water even though she had covered her body in eight layers of grease for insulation. Her limbs felt stiff. Her strokes were irregular. Driving forward, she fought to clear her mind and find what she called her “sphere,” a place where the sea became her only companion and the shrieks of gulls and the humming of boat engines faded away. Using a new overhand stroke called the American crawl, Ederle eventually settled into a steady pace, briskly breaking through waves.
Throughout Ederle’s swim, two tugboats accompanied her. One carried newspaper reporters who wired dispatches of her progress to shore. The other, displaying a sign that read “This way, ole kid!” with an arrow pointing forward, transported her coach, family, and friends. Her coach played songs, such as “Yes, We Have No Bananas,” on a phonograph so that Ederle could time her strokes to the rhythm. Using a net, her coach also passed her baby bottles of broth for nourishment.
For hours Ederle swam, dodging debris with an amused smile. However, as she neared the English shore, a sudden fierce storm erupted. The tides and waves forced Ederle backward, and she fought the stubborn swells for several hours. The salty water caused her tongue to swell and inflamed her ears. Yet Ederle felt indescribably happy as she churned through the sea. Finally, as she neared the English shore, the storm abated, and the tide turned. No longer fighting against her, the sea pushed her toward the shore and victory.
After fourteen hours and thirty-one minutes, Ederle, on wobbly legs, stepped onto the English shore. The waiting crowd roared, honked their automobile horns, blasted their tugboat whistles, and set off flares that flashed in the sky. Ederle had swum into history.
When Ederle returned to New York, she received a parade, where thousands of people shouted “Trudy!” Not only were everyday American citizens proud of Ederle, but she also inspired them to be more active. Over the next few years, more than 60,000 people credited her with motivating them to earn their American Red Cross swimming certificates. Gertrude Ederle’s accomplishment proved to the world that with determination and passion, it was possible for a person to achieve his or her goals.
SOLO SWIMS ACROSS THE ENGLISH CHANNEL
|
Earliest Speed Records |
||
| Year | Swimmer | Time |
| 1875 | Matthew Webb (M) | 21 hours, 45 minutes |
| 1923 | Enrico Tiraboschi (M) | 16 hours, 33 minutes |
| 1926 | Gertrude Ederle (F) | 14 hours, 31 minutes |
| 1926 | Arnst Vierkotter (M) | 12 hours, 38 minutes |
| Current Speed Records | ||
| Year | Swimmer | Time |
| 2012 | Trent Grimsey (M) | 6 hours, 55 minutes |
| 2006 | Yvetta Hlavacova (F) | 7 hours, 25 minutes |
Question
Which statement describes how the author’s use of a problem-and-solution structure in paragraph 5 contributes to the development of ideas in the passage?
- ADetailing the challenges presented by the cold channel waters highlights the effectiveness of Ederle’s training.
- BDescribing Ederle’s physical difficulties during her swim provides evidence of the team effort required to ensure her safety.
- CExplaining the difficulties that arose early in the effort helps predict the additional obstacles that occurred during Ederle’s attempt.
- DIllustrating Ederle’s process of blocking out her discomfort shows that swimming the channel was both a mental and a physical challenge.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks how a problem-and-solution structure in paragraph 5 contributes to the ideas presented in the passage.
A. Incorrect. The details in paragraph 5 do not provide a connection between the cold temperature of the water and the effectiveness of Ederle’s training.
B. Incorrect. The difficulties Ederle encountered were only partially relieved by her team, and her team’s efforts to ensure Ederle’s safety are not explained in the passage.
C. Incorrect. The paragraph does not focus on the relationship between the problems Ederle encountered at the start of her swim and the problems she encountered during or near the end of her swim.
D. CORRECT. The paragraph describes how the water’s temperature made Ederle uncomfortable and made it difficult for her to regulate her stroke. The paragraph continues with the explanation of how she overcame these issues by focusing her mind on the sea and tuning out the distractions in her surroundings (“the sea became her only companion and the shrieks of gulls and the humming of boat engines faded away” [paragraph 5]).
Question analysis
Gertrude Ederle's cold, stiff first hours in the English Channel are told as problem and solution, and this text-structure question asks what that pattern adds to the passage's ideas. Students must spot the troubles she met in the cold water and how she handled them, then pick the abstract statement that accounts for both halves of the pattern.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 A problem-and-solution question about one paragraph is familiar grade 7 fare, yet these four answers are general claims about the swim, each tied to a real hardship, so students need a clear map of the paragraph before judging them.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what major
- Every choice must be checked moderate
- Figurative or literary language minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 790 words; question and choices: about grade 14, 95 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
The opening halves of the choices are all accurate, which moves the whole decision onto their second halves. Readers who notice only the physical side of the paragraph, the cold and the stiffness, reach for training, teamwork or foreshadowing to explain it. The paragraph's turning point is a mental one, clearing her mind until the noise faded, and only the statement that names both a mental and a physical challenge accounts for the problem and the solution together.
How, not what major Working it out
The question asks what paragraph 5's pairing of problems (bone-chilling water, stiff limbs, irregular strokes) with solutions (finding her “sphere”, the American crawl) does for the passage, so retelling the hardships earns nothing. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Every choice must be checked moderate Choosing the answer
Each choice opens with a fair description of paragraph 5, the cold water, her physical difficulties, the early struggle, so only what each claims that description shows can be tested. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Figurative or literary language minor Understanding the question
The mental half of the solution is told in images, a place where “the sea became her only companion” and gulls and engines “faded away”, which must be read as blocking out discomfort. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Sort paragraph 5 into two lists, what went wrong for Ederle early in the swim and what she did about it, then ask what that pairing shows about the swim as a whole.
Traps
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Assumes that coping with icy water proves good training, a natural idea from sports, but paragraph 5 never mentions training and credits her focus and her stroke.
B Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Brings in the tugboat crew of paragraph 6, the coach passing broth and playing songs, though paragraph 5 shows Ederle coping alone and never raises her safety.
C Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Treats the early shivering and stiffness as a setup for the storm of paragraph 7, a link the paragraph never makes, since it resolves its own problems with a steady pace.
Working it out, step by step
Learn what the question asks
A problem-and-solution structure tells about a difficulty and then how someone deals with it. The question asks what this pattern in paragraph 5 adds to the ideas of the passage. So first sort the paragraph into problems and solutions.
List the problems in paragraph 5
When Ederle waded in, “she shivered in the bone-chilling water.” Next, “Her limbs felt stiff. Her strokes were irregular.” Limbs are arms and legs. Irregular means uneven, not steady. All of these are troubles with her body.
List her solutions
Ederle “fought to clear her mind.” She looked for what she called her “sphere.” There, “the sea became her only companion and the shrieks of gulls and the humming of boat engines faded away.” In other words, she shut out the noise and her discomfort. Then, using the American crawl, she “settled into a steady pace.”
Connect problems and solutions
The problems were physical, which means of the body. A big part of the fix was mental, which means of the mind. She calmed her thoughts so her body could keep working. So the paragraph shows that the swim tested her mind as well as her body.
Check each choice
- D fits: blocking out her discomfort shows the swim was “both a mental and a physical challenge.”
- A is wrong because paragraph 5 never mentions her training.
- B is wrong because her team on the tugboats appears in paragraph 6, and her safety is never discussed.
- C is wrong because the early troubles are solved inside this paragraph instead of setting up later ones.
Watch out: A storm does hit in paragraph 7, so C may look right. But paragraph 5 does not point ahead to it.
Choose the answer
Only D explains both the problem and the way Ederle solved it. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is tempting, since a storm really does strike in paragraph 7. But paragraph 5 never hints at it. The paragraph ends with its problem solved, as Ederle is “briskly breaking through waves.” D explains both halves of the pattern: troubles of the body, eased by the mind.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Champion of the Channel” as printed (pages 56–57)
Question 54 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 33Uses the passage above: “Champion of the Channel”.
Question
The idea that many people were interested in Ederle’s attempt to swim the channel is illustrated in the passage mainly through the
- Ainformation about Ederle’s competition with another female swimmer who was also attempting to cross the channel.
- Bdetails about the reports of Ederle’s progress during the swim and the celebration of her successful completion of the swim.
- Cdetails about how Ederle’s historic swim contributed to an increase in the number of people learning how to swim.
- Dinformation about the resources Ederle used throughout her swim to maintain her motivation and stamina.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks how the idea that many people were interested in Ederle’s attempt to swim the channel is mainly illustrated in the passage.
A. Incorrect. While paragraph 3 states that “a rival female swimmer was preparing to make her second attempt at the crossing as well,” which suggests that Ederle’s competitor was interested in Ederle’s attempt to swim the channel, this information does not establish that many people were interested in Ederle’s attempt.
B. CORRECT. Paragraph 6 includes the detail that newspaper reporters followed Ederle on a tugboat and “wired dispatches of her progress to shore,” which suggests that an audience was waiting for news about Ederle’s progress. Paragraph 8 states that when Ederle reached the shore, “the waiting crowd roared, honked their automobile horns, blasted their tugboat whistles, and set off flares that flashed in the sky.” Further, paragraph 9 states that when Ederle returned to New York, “thousands of people” attended a parade in her honor. These details describing the celebration of Ederle’s feat further illustrate the idea that many people were interested in what she had accomplished.
C. Incorrect. While paragraph 9 states that “more than 60,000 people credited [Ederle] with motivating them to earn their American Red Cross swimming certificates,” this detail describes how Ederle’s historic swim influenced people after the fact but does not illustrate the level of public interest during the attempt itself.
D. Incorrect. Paragraph 6 provides details about how Ederle’s “coach, family, and friends” displayed signs, played songs, and “passed her baby bottles of broth” to help her maintain her motivation and stamina. However, these resources do not suggest the idea that people beyond Ederle’s immediate support team were interested in her attempt to swim the channel.
Question analysis
Public interest in Gertrude Ederle's 1926 English Channel swim is the focus of this reading question, which asks which details in the passage mainly illustrate that many people cared about her attempt. Students must gather signs of attention from several paragraphs, and every choice points to real details that involve other people in her story.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Matching an idea to the details that develop it is standard grade 7 work. The supporting details are spread across several late paragraphs and must be gathered before the choices can be judged, a typical grade 7 demand.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 790 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 92 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
The idea has two parts, many people and interest in the attempt itself, and each wrong choice satisfies one at most. The strongest pull is the 60,000 swimming certificates, a huge number tied to Ederle but describing what people did in the years afterward. Students who hold both parts in mind, and who remember that paragraph 6 carries reporters as well as family, find the details that answer it.
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The right details sit in three places: reporters wiring dispatches from a tugboat in paragraph 6, the roaring crowd and flares in paragraph 8, and the New York parade in paragraph 9. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
No sentence says people were interested; the student must infer an eager audience from reporters sending news to shore and a crowd already “waiting” when she landed. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Hold each choice to both parts of the idea in the stem: the details must involve many people, and they must show interest in the attempt itself, not some other link to Ederle.
Traps
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
The wrong answers, classified
A Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Matches “attempting to cross the channel” to the stem's attempt, but the rival preparing her own crossing in paragraph 3 is one swimmer, not many people following Ederle.
C Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Counts the 60,000 people who earned swimming certificates, which shows many people moved by Ederle but describes her influence after the swim, not interest in the attempt itself.
D Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Points to the coach, family and friends who played songs and passed broth from the tugboat, people who cared about the attempt but a small circle, not a wide public.
Working it out, step by step
Find the two parts of the idea
This asks you to find the details that best show an idea. The idea has two parts. Many people, not just a few, cared about Ederle. And they were interested in the attempt itself, the swim as it happened. The right choice must show both.
Look for news and crowds
Paragraph 6 says reporters on a tugboat “wired dispatches of her progress to shore.” Dispatches are news reports. In paragraph 8, “The waiting crowd roared” as she stepped onto the English shore. In paragraph 9, “thousands of people shouted” her name at a parade in New York.
See what these details show
Reporters send news only when readers want it. So people on land were following the swim as it happened. The crowd was “waiting” before she even arrived. Then thousands cheered her at home. These details show that a great many people cared about her swim.
Check each choice
- B fits: the reports of her progress and the celebration show many people following the swim.
- A is wrong because the rival swimmer in paragraph 3 is one person, not many people.
- C is wrong because the swimming certificates came in later years, after the swim.
- D is wrong because her coach, family and friends were a small group, not the wider public.
Watch out: C has the biggest number, more than 60,000 people. But it tells what people did after the swim was over.
Choose the answer
Only B shows many people paying attention while Ederle swam and when she finished. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong answer, since 60,000 is a huge number of people. But they earned their certificates “over the next few years,” long after the swim. That shows her influence, not interest in the attempt. B shows people following the swim as it happened and cheering when she finished.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 55 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 44Passage Excerpt from The Highest Tide
Excerpt from The Highest Tide
by Jim Lynch
The narrator’s summer job is collecting marine specimens in Puget Sound, Washington. In this excerpt, he is looking for specimens in the mudflats before daybreak. Mudflats, or flats, are coastal landforms created when sediment and silt from tides are deposited as the tides recede.
I rounded the oyster beds, to the far side. . . . It was low tide by then, and I saw the water hesitating at its apex, neither leaving nor returning, patiently waiting for the gravitational gears to shift. Dozens of anxious clams started squirting in unison like they did whenever vibrating grains of sand warned them predators were approaching. I stopped and waited with them, to actually see the moment when the tide started returning with its invisible buffet of plankton for the clams, oysters, mussels and other filter feeders. It was right then, ankle deep in the Sound, feet numbing, eyes relaxed, that I saw the nudibranch.1
In all my time on the flats I’d never seen one before. I’d read about them, sure. I’d handled them at aquariums but never in the wild, and I’d never even seen a photo of one this stunning. It was just three inches long but with dozens of fluorescent, orange-tipped hornlike plumes jutting from the back of its see-through body that appeared to be lit from within.
Nudibranchs are often called the butterflies of the sea, but even that understates their dazzle. Almost everything else in the northern Pacific is dressed to blend with pale surroundings. Nudibranchs don’t bother, in part because they taste so lousy they don’t need camouflage to survive. But also, I decided right then, because their beauty is so startling it earns them a free pass, the same way everyday life brakes for peacocks, parade floats. . . .
The dark mudflats loomed like wet, flattened dunes stretching deep into Skookumchuck Bay in front of our house. From a distance, they looked too barren to support sea life. Up close, they still did, unless you knew where to find the hearty clams, worms and tiny creatures that flourish in mud. . . . I’m not sure why I decided to take a look. It was still an hour before sunrise, and I knew exactly what the bars2 looked like in the moonlight, but for some reason, I couldn’t resist.
I heard it long before I saw it. It was an exhale, a release of sorts, and I instantly wondered if a whale was stranded again. We had a young minke3 stuck out there two summers prior, and it made similar noises until the tide rose high enough for rescuers to help free it. . . . I looked for a hulking silhouette but couldn’t find one. I waited, but there were no more sounds. Still, I went toward what I thought I’d heard, avoiding stepping into the mud until I had to. I knew the flats well enough to know I could get stuck just about anywhere. The general rule was you didn’t venture out past the shells and gravel with an incoming tide. I sank up to my knees twice, and numbing water filled my boots.
. . . I kept stepping toward the one sound I’d heard, a growing part of me hoping I’d find nothing at all. When I stopped to rest and yank up my socks, my headlamp crossed it. My first thought? A giant octopus.
Puget Sound has some of the biggest octopi in the world. They often balloon to a hundred pounds. Even the great Jacques Cousteau4 himself came to study them. But when I saw the long tubular shape of its upper body and the tangle of tentacles below it, I knew it was more than an octopus. I came closer, within fifty feet, close enough to see its large cylindrical siphon5 quiver. I couldn’t tell if it was making any sounds at that point, because it was impossible to hear anything over the blood in my ears. . . .
The creature’s body came to a triangular point above narrow fins that lay flat on the mud like wings, but it was hard to be sure exactly where it all began or ended, or how long its tentacles truly were, because I was afraid to pry my eyes off its jumble of arms for more than half a second. I didn’t know whether I was within reach, and its arms were as big around as my ankle and lined with suckers the size of half-dollars. If they even twitched I would have run. So, I was looking at it and not looking at it while my heart spangled my vision. I saw fragments, pieces, and tried to fuse them in my mind but couldn’t be certain of the whole. I knew what it had to be, but I wouldn’t allow myself to even think the two words. Then I gradually realized the dark shiny disc in the middle of the rubbery mass was too perfectly round to be mud or a reflection.
It was too late to smother my scream. Its eye was the size of a hubcap.6
From THE HIGHEST TIDE by Jim Lynch. Copyright © 2005 by Jim Lynch. Used by permission of Bloomsbury USA. All rights reserved.
1nudibranch: type of sea slug
2bars: sandbars
3minke: species of small whale
4Jacques Cousteau: renowned French oceanographer
5siphon: tube-like organ that is used for drawing in or removing fluids
6hubcap: removable cap over the end of a wheel axle
Question
Read these sentences from paragraph 4.
I’m not sure why I decided to take a look. It was still an hour before sunrise, and I knew exactly what the bars looked like in the moonlight, but for some reason, I couldn’t resist.
The sentences contribute to the overall structure of the excerpt by
- Aintroducing the mysterious creature that the narrator discovers.
- Bindicating a shift from the narrator recalling the past to the narrator reflecting on the present.
- Cestablishing a struggle with fear that the narrator must overcome.
- Dbuilding tension through indicating that the narrator is going to see something unexpected.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks for an explanation of how selected sentences from paragraph 4 contribute to the overall structure of the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. These sentences set a tense and mysterious tone for what is about to happen in the excerpt, but they do not introduce the creature the narrator discovers.
B. Incorrect. While the narrator reveals that he is familiar with the terrain (“I knew exactly what the bars looked like in the moonlight”), this does not show the narrator recalling the past or reflecting on the present; it demonstrates the narrator’s knowledge of the mudflats.
C. Incorrect. These sentences reveal the narrator’s curiosity, which is his prime motivation for venturing out to the mudflats, and his familiarity with the terrain shows that at this point, he does not feel afraid.
D. CORRECT. The narrator creates a feeling of mystery and suspense with language that shows how the situation is unknown. Phrases such as “I couldn’t resist” and “I’m not sure why” reveal the narrator’s curiosity, as well as the tension of feeling drawn to explore the mudflats in the moonlight.
Question analysis
This text-structure question quotes the narrator's admission that he cannot say why he decided to walk out onto the dark mudflats, and asks how these sentences contribute to the structure of the excerpt from The Highest Tide. Students must judge what the sentences do at this point in the story, not just what they say, and the choices name four quite different jobs.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how a piece of narration shapes a story's structure is grade 7 literary work. The sentences are quoted and short, but the student must look past what they say to the effect they create, a typical grade 7 demand.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what moderate
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 6, 902 words; question and choices: about grade 8, 99 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
The sentences say little on their own, the narrator going out before dawn to a place he knows well, so their purpose shows only from where they sit, right before the sound in paragraph 5. Students who know the ending tend to read the fear and the creature back into this moment, which is why the choices about fear and about introducing the creature pull. The narrator's own puzzlement about why he went is what builds the suspense.
How, not what moderate Working it out
The question asks what the two sentences do in the story, so their content, an early hour and a familiar view of the sandbars, matters only as a setup for what comes next. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
Nothing is said to be coming; the tension must be inferred from an unexplained pull, “I'm not sure why” and “for some reason, I couldn't resist”, just before the strange sound. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Place the two sentences in the order of events, what came before and what comes right after, and ask what job they do for a reader at that point in the story.
Traps
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
The wrong answers, classified
A Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Jumps ahead to the creature, which is first heard in paragraph 5 and seen in paragraph 6; these sentences only explain why the narrator went out.
B Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Notices the present-tense “I'm not sure” and reads it as a shift in time, but it is a passing comment, and the narration around it stays in the past.
C Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Reads the fear of paragraphs 6 and 8 into this moment, but here the narrator is pulled by curiosity, and fear arrives only when he hopes to find nothing.
Working it out, step by step
Know what the question asks
This asks about structure: what job these two sentences do in the story. Think about where they sit. Then ask how they make a reader feel about what will happen next.
Look at the sentences closely
The narrator says, “I’m not sure why I decided to take a look.” He knows “exactly what the bars looked like in the moonlight.” The bars are sandbars, so there should be nothing new to see. Yet “for some reason, I couldn’t resist.” He can’t explain why he feels pulled out onto the flats.
See what comes right after
The next paragraph begins, “I heard it long before I saw it.” A strange sound leads him to a giant creature. So his mysterious pull comes just before something unexpected. Tension is the nervous feeling of waiting to find out what happens. These sentences build that feeling.
Check each choice
- D fits: the sentences build tension by hinting that something unexpected is coming.
- A is wrong because the creature doesn’t appear yet, since he first hears it in paragraph 5.
- B is wrong because “I’m not sure” is a short comment, and the story stays in the past.
- C is wrong because he is curious here, and fear comes later, when he hopes he will “find nothing at all.”
Watch out: C reads his later fear back into this moment. Right now he is drawn forward, not scared.
Choose the answer
The sentences make you wonder what is waiting out on the flats. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C comes closest, because the narrator is badly scared by the end. But in these sentences he feels pulled by a curiosity he can’t explain. That unexplained pull, just before a strange sound, builds suspense. D names that job.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from The Highest Tide” as printed (pages 64–65)
Question 56 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 45Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from The Highest Tide”.
Question
The narrator’s actions in paragraph 5 reveal that he is
- Aexpecting to see the familiar sight of a stranded minke.
- Bconfident about exploring farther into the mudflats.
- Cunconcerned about becoming stuck in the mudflats.
- Ddetermined to discover the source of the sound.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks what the narrator’s actions in paragraph 5 reveal about him.
A. Incorrect. The paragraph begins with the narrator wondering “if a whale was stranded again” because of one that had gotten stuck before and had “made similar noises.” However, the narrator explains that he “looked for a hulking silhouette but couldn’t find one” before he “went toward what [he] thought [he’d] heard,” so readers can conclude that he continues to walk through the dangerous mudflats not because he expects to find a whale but because he is curious to find out what made the noise.
B. Incorrect. The fact that the narrator knows about a whale that was stranded on the mudflats “two summers prior” indicates that he is familiar with the area, and he does mention that he has some knowledge of the mudflats. However, in the paragraph, he reveals that his knowledge is of the dangers there: “I knew the flats well enough to know I could get stuck just about anywhere.” He also explains that as he moves, he avoids “stepping into the mud until [he] had to.” The fact that he acknowledges the danger and tries to avoid it indicates that he is cautious rather than confident.
C. Incorrect. In the paragraph, the narrator’s recollection that even though he could not see the silhouette of a whale, “still, [he] went toward what [he] thought [he’d] heard” might make him seem unconcerned about getting stuck. However, even as he continues, he moves carefully, avoiding “stepping into the mud until [he] had to” because he knows the mudflats “well enough to know [he] could get stuck just about anywhere.”
D. CORRECT. In the paragraph, the narrator describes the dangers of walking on the mudflats by stating that he “knew the flats well enough to know [he] could get stuck just about anywhere,” but he continues walking toward the sound. Despite knowing the dangers, he still “went toward what [he] thought [he’d] heard,” and this shows that he is determined to find out what made the sound.
Question analysis
This inference question asks what the narrator's actions reveal about him when he hears a strange sound on the mudflats before dawn and sets off toward it. Students must read what he does alongside what he says he knows about the flats, and several choices fit one detail of the paragraph but not the whole of it.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Inferring a character's trait from actions is core grade 7 literary reading. The evidence sits in one paragraph and the actions are concrete, so the item is typical, though the long paragraph mixes memory, rules and movement.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Much to keep track of minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 6, 902 words; question and choices: about grade 8, 41 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
Paragraph 5 shows two things at once, a narrator who knows exactly how dangerous the flats are and one who keeps walking toward a sound anyway. Choices that see only the walking call him confident or unconcerned, and the one that sees only his first thought has him expecting a whale. The word “Still”, after his search for a silhouette comes up empty, is the hinge that shows determination.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The trait is never named; it must be drawn from what he does, especially “Still, I went toward what I thought I'd heard” after seeing nothing and hearing nothing more. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Much to keep track of minor Working it out
The paragraph mixes a memory of the stranded minke, a rule about incoming tides and his own steps, and the student must keep his caution and his persistence in view together. (Sweller, 1988; Carpenter, Just & Shell, 1990)
Strategy: List what the narrator does in paragraph 5, step by step, and note what he knows while doing it; then ask what those actions, taken together, say about him.
Traps
- Wrong tone or attitude: Misjudges the tone, attitude or point of view, such as reading admiration as criticism, or taking a character's or subject's feelings for the author's.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Builds on his first thought that a whale was stranded again, but he finds no silhouette and keeps going, and one stranding two summers before hardly makes it a familiar sight.
B Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads “I knew the flats well” as confidence, but he knew them well enough to know he could get stuck anywhere, which is wariness, not confidence.
C Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Takes his pressing on as indifference, ignoring that he avoids stepping into the mud until he has to because he knows how easily he could sink.
Working it out, step by step
Know what the question asks
This asks you to make an inference about a character. You judge what the narrator is like from what he does. The text never names the trait, so look closely at his actions.
List his actions in paragraph 5
He hears a sound and wonders if a whale is stranded. He “looked for a hulking silhouette but couldn’t find one.” He waits, but hears nothing more. Then he says, “Still, I went toward what I thought I’d heard.” He sinks to his knees twice, and cold water fills his boots.
Notice what he knows
He knows the danger. He says, “I knew the flats well enough to know I could get stuck just about anywhere.” The word “Still” matters here. It means even so. Even with no whale in sight and no more sounds, he keeps heading toward the noise.
Check each choice
- D fits: he keeps going toward the sound despite the danger, so he is determined to find its source.
- A is wrong because he finds no whale and keeps going, and one stranding two summers ago is not a familiar sight.
- B is wrong because knowing he could get stuck anywhere makes him careful, not confident.
- C is wrong because he avoids “stepping into the mud until I had to,” so he does worry about getting stuck.
Watch out: B and C notice only that he keeps walking. They miss how carefully he moves.
Choose the answer
He presses on toward the sound even though he knows the mud is dangerous. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B comes closest, because he says he knows the flats well. But what he knows is how easily he could get stuck, so he is careful, not confident. Pressing on anyway, after seeing nothing and hearing nothing more, shows determination.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 57 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 46Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from The Highest Tide”.
Question
How does the setting affect the plot of the excerpt?
- AThe darkness of the mudflats before sunrise causes the narrator to pay close attention to his surroundings.
- BThe rugged terrain of the mudflats makes it more difficult for the narrator to do his job.
- CThe slow return of the tide along the mudflats forces the narrator to be patient during his journey.
- DThe barren appearance of the mudflats creates a sense of mystery that unsettles the narrator.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how the setting affects the plot of the excerpt.
A. CORRECT. In paragraph 4, the narrator says that it is an hour before sunrise. It is difficult to see because the mudflats are dark, so the narrator, while familiar with the terrain of the mudflats, is cautious.
B. Incorrect. While the terrain of the mudflats is challenging because of the “wet, flattened dunes” (paragraph 4), the narrator is familiar with the terrain and moves carefully. In addition, the excerpt focuses on the narrator’s curiosity and enjoyment as he explores the mudflats, not on his work collecting specimens.
C. Incorrect. In paragraph 1, the narrator watches the water “hesitating at its apex” and “patiently waiting for the gravitational gears to shift.” This illustrates that the narrator is already familiar with the changes in his surroundings, that the tide is slow to move in, and that he can move carefully through the mudflats without the threat of rising water.
D. Incorrect. While the narrator is on the mudflats for the entire excerpt, the phrase “eyes relaxed” in paragraph 1 indicates that the narrator feels comfortable there. The narrator does not show fear until paragraph 6, when a growing fear about the unknown creature arises.
Question analysis
Set on the mudflats of Puget Sound before daybreak, this excerpt from the novel The Highest Tide is the basis for a question about how setting affects plot. Students must link features of the place and time to what the narrator does across the whole excerpt, and each choice pairs a real feature of the setting with an effect that may or may not be in the text.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Analyzing how setting shapes plot is a grade 7 literary standard, but the excerpt never states the link: the effect must be inferred from scattered details, and every choice names a genuine feature of the flats, which is beyond typical work.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines major
- The right answer is reworded moderate
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 6, 902 words; question and choices: about grade 8, 77 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A statement in the explanation that contradicted the excerpt’s introduction was corrected.
- 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
Every choice names a real feature of the mudflats, so the question turns on which feature the excerpt actually shows shaping events. The darkness never gets a sentence of its own; it is felt in a sound heard before anything is seen, a silhouette that cannot be found and a headlamp beam. The barren look of the flats is the strongest pull, because the scene is eerie, but the narrator knows life hides in the mud and his unease comes from the creature.
Reading between the lines major Working it out
The excerpt never says the darkness changes anything; the effect must be assembled from the hour before sunrise, the sound heard “long before I saw it”, the missing silhouette and the headlamp that finally finds the creature. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
The right answer is reworded moderate Choosing the answer
The right choice uses no words from the text, while the wrong ones echo it: the “barren” look of the flats, the water “patiently waiting”, the narrator's summer job. (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The darkness is established in paragraph 4 and felt in paragraphs 5, 6 and 8, so no single passage shows the setting at work. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Collect the details of time, place and conditions across the excerpt, then for each choice ask whether the text shows that feature of the setting actually changing what the narrator does.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
B Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Combines the introduction's specimen job with his sinking to his knees to infer a harder workday, though the excerpt follows a strange sound and never shows his work suffering.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Borrows paragraph 1's water “patiently waiting” at low tide and has the tide force the narrator to wait, when he chose to stop and watch it turn.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Joins the flats' barren look from a distance to his later fear, but he knows life hides in the mud, and what unsettles him is the creature, not the landscape.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: In rejecting choice B, the handbook says “the excerpt shows that the narrator explores the mudflats for curiosity and enjoyment, not work.” But the introduction says the narrator’s summer job is collecting marine specimens and that “in this excerpt, he is looking for specimens in the mudflats before daybreak.” The explanation now says the excerpt focuses on his curiosity and enjoyment as he explores the mudflats, not on his work collecting specimens. That keeps the handbook’s point (the excerpt is not about the terrain making his job harder) without contradicting the introduction.
Working it out, step by step
Know what setting and plot mean
The setting is where and when a story happens. The plot is the chain of events. This asks which part of the setting changes what happens or what the narrator does.
Find the time of day
Paragraph 4 says, “It was still an hour before sunrise.” The narrator is out on the mudflats in the dark. The only light comes from the moon and his headlamp.
See how the dark shapes events
Because it is dark, he must rely on sounds and small clues. He says, “I heard it long before I saw it.” He looks for “a hulking silhouette,” a dark outline, but can’t find one. He spots the creature only when “my headlamp crossed it.” Then he stares hard, trying to make out its shape. The darkness keeps him alert and watching closely.
Check each choice
- A fits: the dark makes him pay close attention to everything around him.
- B is wrong because the excerpt follows a strange sound and never shows the ground making his job harder.
- C is wrong because in paragraph 1 he chooses to stop and watch the tide, and nothing forces him.
- D is wrong because he knows life hides in the mud, and what scares him is the creature.
Watch out: D feels right because the scene is eerie. But the flats’ empty look never troubles him.
Choose the answer
The darkness before sunrise is what keeps the narrator listening and looking so carefully. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D comes closest, because the dark flats do feel spooky. But the narrator says they only look “too barren to support sea life” from far away, and he knows better. His fear comes from the creature. The darkness, though, shapes every step: he hears before he sees and must watch closely.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 58 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 48Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from The Highest Tide”.
Question
Read this sentence from paragraph 6.
I kept stepping toward the one sound I’d heard, a growing part of me hoping I’d find nothing at all.
How do the narrator’s actions develop a central idea of the excerpt?
- AThe narrator’s concern about the origin of the noise shows dedication to helping preserve sea life in the mudflats.
- BThe narrator’s curiosity about the sea life in the mudflats outweighs any fear about the situation.
- CThe narrator’s knowledge about a variety of sea life encourages a search for more specimens to study.
- DThe narrator’s eagerness about new specimens of sea life outweighs the reality that the area is an unlikely place to find them.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks how the narrator’s actions, as described in the sentence from paragraph 6, develop a central idea of the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. The sentence highlights the narrator’s concern about sea life and the creatures living within the flats. However, these ideas do not develop what is being described in the excerpt.
B. CORRECT. The narrator “kept stepping toward the one sound,” indicating a sense of curiosity. However, the words “a growing part of me hoping I’d find nothing” suggest a rising fear or concern. Ultimately, the narrator’s curiosity outweighs his growing fear and is a central idea in the excerpt, as shown by the fact that the narrator does not run away when finally encountering the creature.
C. Incorrect. While the narrator’s descriptions of the nudibranch and other sea life demonstrate a knowledge of these creatures, as well as a desire to discover more in the mudflats, the knowledge the narrator exhibits is not what is being illustrated in the excerpt.
D. Incorrect. The excerpt does describe the narrator’s enjoyment at seeing a nudibranch in paragraph 2, and in paragraph 4, the narrator clearly states that there is an abundance of life in the seemingly barren mudflats, including “hearty clams, worms and tiny creatures that flourish in mud.” However, the sentence demonstrates the narrator’s curiosity in spite of fear, not an eagerness about or fascination with the mudflats.
Question analysis
This central-idea question quotes a sentence in which the narrator keeps walking toward a mysterious sound while part of him hopes to find nothing, and asks how his actions develop a central idea of the excerpt. Students must read the mixed feelings packed into one sentence and connect them to the larger story of his walk on the flats.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Connecting a character's actions to a central idea is grade 7 work. The quoted sentence states both the action and the feeling, so the task is typical, though the four choices are long and each names a different motive.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Evidence in several places minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 6, 902 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 111 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
The quoted sentence holds both halves of the answer, an action and a wish that pulls against it, but neither is named. The wrong choices each supply a motive the sentence does not show, a rescue, a hunt for specimens, an eagerness for new finds, and two of them borrow real details from elsewhere in the excerpt. Students who split the sentence into what he does and what he hopes avoid all three.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The sentence names neither feeling: curiosity must be read from “kept stepping toward the one sound” and fear from “a growing part of me hoping I'd find nothing at all”. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
To count as a central idea, the pull between curiosity and fear has to recur, from “I couldn't resist” in paragraph 4 to “If they even twitched I would have run” in paragraph 8. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Split the quoted sentence into what the narrator does and what part of him feels, then ask which motive behind those actions runs through the rest of the excerpt.
Traps
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Links the sound to the minke freed two summers before and assumes a mission to help sea life, but the sentence shows him pressing on while hoping to find nothing.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Draws on his specimen job and his knowledge of nudibranchs to turn this moment into a hunt for specimens, when he is following one strange sound with mixed feelings.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Copies the right answer's pattern of one force outweighing another, but pits eagerness for specimens against an “unlikely place” that paragraph 4 says only looks barren from a distance.
Working it out, step by step
Know what the question asks
This asks how the narrator’s actions build a central idea, a main point that runs through the whole excerpt. Start by splitting the sentence into what he does and what he feels.
Split the sentence in two
What he does: “I kept stepping toward the one sound I’d heard.” He keeps moving forward. What he feels: “a growing part of me hoping I’d find nothing at all.” Part of him is afraid of what he might find, and that fear is growing.
Weigh the two feelings
He is scared, but he keeps going anyway. So his curiosity, his wish to know, is stronger than his fear. This pull runs through the excerpt. In paragraph 4 he “couldn’t resist” going out. In paragraph 8 he stays and stares at the creature, though he admits, “If they even twitched I would have run.”
Check each choice
- B fits: his curiosity “outweighs any fear,” since his steps forward win out over his wish to find nothing.
- A is wrong because nothing shows he wants to protect sea life, and he even hopes to find nothing.
- C is wrong because he is following one strange sound, not hunting for specimens to study.
- D is wrong because paragraph 4 says the flats only look empty from far away.
Watch out: D copies B’s pattern of one thing outweighing another. But its details don’t match the excerpt.
Choose the answer
The narrator’s steps show curiosity winning out over a growing fear. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A comes closest, because two summers earlier a stranded whale had needed help. But in this sentence the narrator hopes to find nothing at all. Someone set on a rescue would not hope that. B explains both halves: he is afraid, yet his curiosity keeps him walking.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 59 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 50Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from The Highest Tide”.
Question
The author develops the narrator’s point of view when the narrator sees the creature by
- Adescribing the narrator’s movements as he approaches the creature.
- Bemphasizing the odds of finding the creature in an area inhabited by a rival species.
- Cshowing the narrator’s growing realization of the creature’s identity.
- Dcomparing the size of the creature to the size of a vehicle.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how the author develops the narrator’s point of view when the narrator sees the creature.
A. Incorrect. The author’s description of how the narrator moves toward the creature has to do with the terrain and the narrator’s sense of awe. The narrator’s perspective is not represented through how he approaches the creature; it is presented later in the excerpt when the narrator is studying the creature.
B. Incorrect. In this excerpt, while the narrator does discuss other large animals (minke whale, paragraph 5; octopi, paragraph 7) that have appeared on the mudflats, these are examples to show the variety of animal life that can be discovered on the mudflats, not rivals of the creature discovered at the end of the excerpt.
C. CORRECT. In paragraph 7, the narrator describes the largest octopi in the world and then states that this creature is “more than an octopus.” The narrator then states that it is “impossible to hear anything over the blood in my ears,” and in paragraph 8, he describes the creature’s body in detail, as well as his growing fear and amazement as he begins to realize what the creature really is.
D. Incorrect. While the narrator observes that the creature’s eye is as large as a hubcap in paragraph 9, a comparison to an entire car is never made. This detail is for description but does not give the narrator’s point of view.
Question analysis
This point-of-view question asks how the author develops the narrator's perspective at the moment he comes upon a huge, unknown sea creature at the end of the excerpt from The Highest Tide. Students must track the narration over the last paragraphs and decide which technique shapes what readers see through his eyes.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Analyzing how an author develops a narrator's point of view is a grade 7 standard. The key paragraphs are dense with description and suspense, but the choices are fairly distinct, so the overall demand is typical of grade 7 work.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what moderate
- Evidence in several places minor
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 6, 902 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 60 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
The narrator's guesses change from paragraph to paragraph, octopus, then something more, then a name he refuses to say, and the answer is that progression rather than any single detail. The wrong choices fasten on details, his approach across the mud, the octopi of Puget Sound, the hubcap, and each misdescribes or misplaces it. Readers who track what he believes at each step see the growing realization.
How, not what moderate Working it out
The question asks how the author builds the narrator's point of view, so the student must name a technique, a step-by-step realization, rather than any single thing he sees or does. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
The realization unfolds across paragraphs 6 to 9: “A giant octopus” becomes “more than an octopus”, then “I knew what it had to be”, and finally an eye the size of a hubcap. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The creature is never named; “the two words” the narrator will not let himself think have to be understood as a name he already suspects. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Reread paragraphs 6 through 9 and track what the narrator notices, thinks and feels at each step, then pick the choice that describes the technique the author uses across those steps.
Traps
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Looks to paragraphs 5 and 6, where he wades and sinks toward the sound, but the question is about the moment he sees the creature, when moving gives way to looking.
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Turns the octopi of paragraph 7 into a rival species and talks of odds, though the narrator mentions octopi only as his first guess and never weighs any chances.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Misremembers the last line, where the creature's eye, not its body, is compared to a hubcap, a part of a wheel, not a whole vehicle.
Working it out, step by step
Know what the question asks
Point of view here means how the narrator sees and understands what is happening. The question asks how the author shows his view once the creature appears. Look for a method the author uses across several paragraphs.
Track his guesses
Follow what the narrator thinks the creature is:
- Paragraph 6: “My first thought? A giant octopus.”
- Paragraph 7: “I knew it was more than an octopus.”
- Paragraph 8: “I knew what it had to be, but I wouldn’t allow myself to even think the two words.”
- Paragraph 9: “Its eye was the size of a hubcap.”
See the pattern
Each step brings him closer to knowing what the creature is. First comes a guess, then a doubt, then a name he won’t let himself think. Finally a huge eye makes him scream. The author shows his growing realization, his slow understanding, one step at a time.
Check each choice
- C fits: “growing realization of the creature’s identity” matches his changing guesses, and identity means what something is.
- A is wrong because his steps closer reveal little, while his thoughts change from paragraph to paragraph.
- B is wrong because the octopus is only his first guess, not a rival, and he never talks about odds.
- D is wrong because only the eye is compared to a hubcap, a cover on a car wheel.
Watch out: D uses a real detail but gets it wrong. A hubcap is part of a wheel, not a whole vehicle.
Choose the answer
The author builds the narrator’s view by showing him slowly work out what he is looking at. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A comes closest, because the narrator does move closer after he sees the creature, to “within fifty feet.” But his steps tell little about how he sees it. What changes from paragraph to paragraph is his thinking: his guesses grow until he understands. That is C.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 60 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 53Passage Excerpt from “It’s Time to Stop Thinking That All Non-Native Species Are Evil”
Excerpt from “It’s Time to Stop Thinking That All Non-Native Species Are Evil”
by Emma Marris
The author of this opinion article attended a symposium, or conference, in Missoula, Montana, at which biologists and other scientists discussed species of plants and animals that are not native to the areas in which they live.
Invasive species are scary. It was ecologist Charles Elton, back in the 1950s, who introduced the militaristic “invasion” metaphor to describe exotic plants and animals—but there’s no question some can be extremely destructive.
The brown tree snake has eaten a dozen kinds of forest birds in Guam to extinction; zebra mussels clog pipes around the Great Lakes; the common house cat turns out to be, in Australia, a mercilessly effective killer of cute, fluffy marsupials like the bilby and the numbat.
As scientists have sounded the alarm about these pests, the public has gotten the message. Citizen groups rip out non-native plants. Native gardens have become increasingly popular, both as ways to celebrate the unique flora of each region and as tiny hot spots of diversity. Native trees provide food for native bugs, which feed native birds. Food chains developed over thousands of years of co-evolution unfold in our backyards. . . .
So we’ve learned, scientists and laypeople alike, that native species are good and non-natives are bad.
Julian Olden, a biologist at the University of Washington, Seattle, who co-organized the symposium, recently polled nearly 2,000 ecologists. Among his findings: a substantial number of them said they would immediately eradicate a hypothetical non-native forest plant, even if it were shown to have no effect on the forest. Olden calls this the “guilty even when proven innocent” approach.
That kind of approach is not very useful on a rapidly changing planet.
Exotics Are Everywhere
Climate change is making it harder even to decide who the invaders are.
How, scientists at the symposium wondered, do you define “native” on a warming planet, when plants and animals are already moving toward the poles or up mountainsides in search of climate conditions they can tolerate? Should we consider them “invasive” in their new homes? Regardless of what we label them, conservationists will be reluctant to remove them from their new environs—to do so would stymie1 their chances of adapting to the warmer future we’re creating.
And then there are the non-natives that we actually like. Most domestic crops are exotic in most of the places they’re grown, but there are even wild exotics that “do good,” forming useful relationships with native species.
Edwin Grosholz of the University of California, Davis, told the recent symposium about one such relationship. On beaches in his state, non-native spartina grass has become important habitat for the endangered California clapper rail, a plump shorebird with a downward curving bill more at home on land than in the air. A project to rip out and poison the spartina—which grows in dense swaths that exclude many other shorebirds—saw clapper rail numbers go tumbling downward.
There are other examples like that. The endangered southwestern willow flycatcher nests in “invasive” tamarisk shrubs. Many native (and beautiful) Hawaiian flowers are now pollinated by the Japanese white-eye bird—because the native pollinators have been driven extinct by other non-native species.
Should we impose further risk on already endangered natives by severing these relationships? Or should we admire the resilience of nature and let such “well-behaved” exotics stay? . . .
Leave them alone, more and more conservationists are arguing, and stop focusing obsessively on categorizing species as native or non-native. Mark Davis, an ecologist at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, once considered himself an “invasion biologist”—but not anymore. “I am actively trying to get the field to retire the invader narrative,” he said in Missoula.
A Good Thing, Not the Only Thing
After all, nativeness is just one environmental value, and arguably not as important as preventing extinctions and preserving biodiversity. In some cases we can best serve biodiversity by leaving the non-natives alone or even—brace yourself, now—introducing them on purpose.
This is the thinking behind, for example, installing the Aldabra tortoise on the islands of Mauritius. The islands lost their own large tortoises, and the fruiting plants that formerly had their seeds moved around by these fruit-loving reptiles have been on the decline. A tortoise that’s related to the island’s large tortoises—a non-native from the Seychelles in the Indian Ocean that was intentionally introduced in 2004—is now handling some of that work.
Most of the time, for the time being, conserving species still means focusing on supporting them in their historical habitats, planting natives and removing non-natives. We can and should do that in places where it is feasible and important to us.
From “It’s Time to Stop Thinking That All Non-Native Species Are Evil” by Emma Marris from NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE, July 24, 2014. Copyright © 2014 by National Geographic Society.
1stymie: hinder or interfere with
Question
The author’s use of cause and effect in paragraphs 10–11 mainly emphasizes the idea that
- Asome non-native species have helped their environments while others have had harmful impacts.
- Battempts to remove non-native species have seldom produced desired results.
- Csome endangered native species have flourished because of the presence of non-native species.
- Dinteractions between endangered native species and non-native species must be carefully monitored.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks what the author’s use of cause and effect in paragraphs 10–11 mainly emphasizes.
A. Incorrect. The examples of cause and effect discussed in paragraphs 10–11, such as the spartina grass helping the clapper rail and the Japanese white-eye bird pollinating Hawaiian flowers, are all instances in which non-native species have helped their new environments.
B. Incorrect. While paragraph 10 does mention that efforts to eradicate the non-native spartina grass hurt the native clapper rail shorebird, the main emphasis in both paragraphs 10–11 is on the fact that certain non-native species have helped native species.
C. CORRECT. Paragraphs 10–11 focus on several examples of non-native species that have helped endangered native species flourish: non-native spartina grass providing “important habitat for the endangered California clapper rail” (paragraph 10), non-native tamarisk shrubs providing nesting places for the endangered southwestern willow flycatcher (paragraph 11), and the non-native Japanese white-eye bird pollinating Hawaiian flowers (paragraph 11).
D. Incorrect. While paragraphs 10–11 describe several interactions between non-native and native species, they never discuss monitoring these interactions.
Question analysis
This text-structure question asks what the cause-and-effect examples in two paragraphs of an article about non-native species mainly emphasize. The paragraphs describe a shorebird, a flycatcher and Hawaiian flowers, and students must decide what the examples have in common rather than fixing on any one of them.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Analyzing what a cause-and-effect structure emphasizes is grade 7 work, but these examples involve unfamiliar species and endangered status, and more than one choice is partly supported by the paragraphs, which raises the demand above typical.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer major
- Reading between the lines moderate
- An unfamiliar subject minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 815 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 62 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
The paragraphs mention harm as well as help, so a balanced statement about both looks accurate and even fair-minded. What the cause-and-effect pairs stress, though, is endangered natives depending on non-natives, and the right answer captures that while overstating it, since a bird whose numbers held up only with spartina's help can hardly be said to have flourished. Students must prefer the statement of the main emphasis to one that is partly supported but off the point.
A very close wrong answer major Choosing the answer
The right choice and the help-and-harm choice both say non-natives have aided their surroundings; they part on harm, which the paragraphs do mention, spartina crowding out shorebirds and other non-natives killing Hawaii's pollinators, but only in passing. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
Paragraph 10 states its cause and effect backwards, removing spartina sent clapper rail numbers “tumbling downward”, and the student must turn that around into the grass's presence helping the bird. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
An unfamiliar subject minor Understanding the question
Five unfamiliar species crowd two paragraphs, spartina grass, the California clapper rail, tamarisk shrubs, the southwestern willow flycatcher and the Japanese white-eye, and each one's role must be kept straight. (Recht & Leslie, 1988; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: List each cause-and-effect pair in paragraphs 10 and 11, the species involved and what happened to them, then pick the statement that holds for the examples taken together.
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.
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Accurately notes helpful and harmful non-natives, but the harm is mentioned only in passing, and it leaves out what every example stresses, endangered natives depending on non-natives.
B Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Generalizes from the single spartina project in paragraph 10 to removal attempts in general, a “seldom” claim that neither paragraph makes.
D Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Adds a sensible-sounding call for careful monitoring, the kind of advice scientists often give, but neither paragraph says anything about watching over these relationships.
Working it out, step by step
Know what the question asks
In a cause-and-effect pattern, one thing makes another happen. You need the main idea that the causes and effects in paragraphs 10 and 11 stress. Start by listing each pair.
List each cause and effect
- Paragraph 10: non-native spartina grass gives the endangered clapper rail a home, so when people ripped out the grass, clapper rail numbers went “tumbling downward.”
- Paragraph 11: the endangered willow flycatcher nests in non-native tamarisk shrubs.
- Paragraph 11: native Hawaiian flowers are now pollinated by a non-native bird, the Japanese white-eye.
Find the common thread
Endangered means at risk of dying out. Pollinated means a bird or bug carries pollen between flowers so they can make seeds. In every pair, a native species depends on a non-native one. The newcomer gives it a home, a place to nest or a pollinator. Two of the natives, the clapper rail and the flycatcher, are endangered. So the paragraphs stress that some endangered natives do better because non-natives are there.
Check each choice
- C fits: some endangered natives have “flourished,” or done well, because non-natives are present.
- A is wrong because harm comes up only in passing, while every example stresses a native getting help.
- B is wrong because one removal project is not enough to say removal “seldom” works.
- D is wrong because the paragraphs never mention monitoring, or watching over, these relationships.
Watch out: The paragraphs do mention harm. Spartina crowds out some other shorebirds, and other non-natives wiped out Hawaii’s native pollinators. So A sounds balanced, but it misses the main point.
Choose the answer
The causes and effects show struggling natives, two of them endangered, helped by non-natives. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A comes closest, because the paragraphs mention harm as well as help. But the harm is only a side note. Every cause and effect shows a native relying on a non-native, and two of those natives are endangered birds. C names that main point, even though “flourished” is a strong word for birds that are still endangered.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “It’s Time to Stop Thinking That All Non-Native Species Are Evil”” as printed (pages 68–70)
Question 61 of 92
2024 Test A English, question 56Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “It’s Time to Stop Thinking That All Non-Native Species Are Evil””.
Question
Climate change has affected efforts to manage invasive species mainly by causing ecologists to
- Acall upon the public to be more tolerant of the presence of non-native species.
- Badmit that past attempts to eliminate non-native species have damaged the environment.
- Cfind ways of ensuring that native species are not harmed by the arrival of new species.
- Dacknowledge that it is not realistic for some species to remain in their native habitats.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
This question asks how climate change has mainly affected efforts to manage invasive species.
A. Incorrect. While ecologists are now arguing for some non-native species to be left alone (paragraph 13), they are arguing specifically on behalf of “well-behaved” non-native species (paragraph 12), not non-native species in general.
B. Incorrect. While paragraph 10 describes how removing a non-native species negatively affected a native species, the excerpt never discusses the idea that attempts to eliminate non-native species might have damaged the environment.
C. Incorrect. While the excerpt refers to climate change causing plants and animals to move to more tolerable environments (paragraph 8), it does not specifically discuss ways to ensure that the arrival of these non-native species does not harm native species.
D. CORRECT. As paragraph 8 says, “plants and animals are already moving toward the poles” because of climate change, and ecologists recognize that those species need to do so to adapt “to the warmer future we’re creating.”
Question analysis
This question asks how climate change has mainly affected efforts to manage invasive species, according to an article arguing that not all non-native species are harmful. Students must locate the article's brief discussion of a warming planet and recognize its point when it is restated in different words.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Tracing how one factor shapes an idea is grade 7 work. The relevant discussion is a single paragraph, but it is built from long questions rather than statements, and the choices restate it abstractly, so the item sits at a typical grade 7 level.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- The right answer is reworded moderate
- Complex sentences minor
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 815 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 71 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
Climate change is discussed in only one paragraph, and that paragraph mostly asks questions, so the student has to work out what the scientists concluded from what they wondered. The wrong choices borrow ideas from later in the article, leaving well-behaved exotics alone and the spartina project, or bring in a common conservation goal, and none of them is tied to a warming planet. Finding paragraph 8 first makes the rest straightforward.
The right answer is reworded moderate Choosing the answer
The right choice's “not realistic for some species to remain in their native habitats” shares no words with paragraph 8, which speaks of plants and animals “moving toward the poles or up mountainsides”. (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
Paragraph 8 makes its point through questions, the first broken by “scientists at the symposium wondered”, so what ecologists accept has to be pulled out of what they ask. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The acknowledgment is implied: reluctance to remove species that would otherwise lose their chance of “adapting to the warmer future” shows that staying put is no longer an option. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Find where the article actually discusses a warming planet and what the scientists there are wondering about, then match a choice to that discussion.
Traps
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
The wrong answers, classified
A Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Borrows paragraph 13's plea to leave non-natives alone, which concerns well-behaved exotics and is made within the field, not to the public, and has no link to climate.
B Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Stretches one failed removal, the spartina project of paragraph 10, into ecologists admitting that past removals harmed the environment, and that example has nothing to do with climate.
C Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Assumes the rule the article questions, that newcomers threaten natives, so protecting natives seems the obvious response, but paragraph 8 talks of letting moving species adapt.
Working it out, step by step
Know what the question asks
This asks how climate change has changed the way scientists handle non-native species. First find the part of the article that talks about climate. Then see what the scientists there accept.
Find the climate paragraph
Paragraphs 7 and 8 are about climate change. Paragraph 8 says that on “a warming planet,” plants and animals “are already moving toward the poles or up mountainsides.” They are looking for “climate conditions they can tolerate,” which means weather they can survive.
See what the scientists accept
Paragraph 8 says conservationists “will be reluctant to remove them.” Reluctant means unwilling. Removing them “would stymie” their “chances of adapting to the warmer future.” The footnote says stymie means to hinder, or hold back. In other words, scientists accept that these species can’t stay where they were. To survive, they have to move.
Check each choice
- D fits: ecologists admit that some species can’t realistically stay in their native homes.
- A is wrong because the call to leave non-natives alone in paragraphs 12 and 13 is about “well-behaved” ones, not climate.
- B is wrong because the one failed removal in paragraph 10 has nothing to do with climate.
- C is wrong because paragraph 8 talks about letting moving species adapt, not shielding natives from newcomers.
Watch out: A sounds close because it is also about putting up with non-natives. But it comes from a part of the article that never mentions climate.
Choose the answer
Climate change has made ecologists accept that some species must leave their old homes. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A comes closest, because the article does argue for leaving some non-natives alone. But that argument is about helpful newcomers, and it never mentions climate. Paragraphs 7 and 8 are where climate change comes up. There, scientists accept that many species must leave their old homes to survive, which is D.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 62 of 92
2024 Test B English, question 16Passage Excerpt from “How Exercise Could Help You Learn a New Language”
Excerpt from “How Exercise Could Help You Learn a New Language”
by Gretchen Reynolds
Many scientists suspect that exercise alters the biology of the brain in ways that make it more malleable and receptive to new information, a process that scientists refer to as plasticity.
But many questions have remained unanswered about movement and learning, including whether exercise is most beneficial before, during or after instruction and how much and what types of exercise might be best.
So for a new study, which was published recently in PLOS One, researchers in China and Italy decided to home in on language learning and the adult brain.
Language learning is interesting. As young children, almost all of us picked up our first language easily. We didn’t have to be formally taught; we simply absorbed words and concepts.
But by early adulthood, the brain generally begins to lose some of its innate language capability. It displays less plasticity in areas of the brain related to language. As a result, for most of us, it becomes harder to learn a second language after childhood.
To see what effects exercise might have on this process, the researchers first recruited 40 college-age Chinese men and women who were trying to learn English. The students had some facility with this second language but were far from proficient.
The researchers then divided the students into two groups. Those in one group would continue to learn English as they had before, primarily while seated in rote vocabulary-memorization sessions.
The others would supplement these sessions with exercise.
Specifically, the students would ride exercise bikes at a gentle pace (about 60 percent of their maximum aerobic capacity) beginning 20 minutes before the start of the lessons and continuing throughout the 15 minutes or so of instruction.
Both groups learned their new vocabulary by watching words projected onto large screens, together with comparable pictures, such as “apple” and a Red Delicious. They were shown 40 words per session, with the sequence repeated several times.
Afterward, the students all rested briefly and then completed a vocabulary quiz, using computer keys to note as quickly as possible whether a word was with its correct picture. They also responded to sentences using the new words, marking whether the sentences were accurate or, in the case of “The apple is a dentist,” nonsensical. Most linguists1 feel that understanding sentences shows greater mastery of a new language than does simple vocabulary improvement.
The students completed eight vocabulary sessions over the course of two months.
And at the end of each lesson, the students who had ridden bikes performed better on the subsequent vocabulary tests than did the students who sat still.
They also became more proficient at recognizing proper sentences than the sedentary students, although that difference did not emerge until after several weeks of instruction.
Perhaps most interesting, the gains in vocabulary and comprehension lingered longest for the cyclists. When the researchers asked the students to return to the lab for a final round of testing a month after the lessons—without practicing in the meantime—the cyclists remembered words and understood them in sentences more accurately than did the students who had not moved.
“The results suggest that physical activity during learning improves that learning,” says Simone Sulpizio, a professor of psychology and linguistics at the University Vita-Salute San Raffaele in Milan, Italy, and a study co-author.
These improvements extend beyond simply aiding in memorization, she added. The exercise also deepened language learners’ grasp of how to use their newly acquired words.
This study involved college students performing relatively light exercise, though, and cannot tell us whether other people completing other types of exercise would achieve the same results.
It also offers no clues about what is occurring inside the brain that might be contributing to the benefits of the exercise. But many past studies have shown that exercise prompts the release of multiple neurochemicals in the brain that increase the number of new brain cells and the connections between neurons, Dr. Sulpizio says. These effects improve the brain’s plasticity and augment the ability to learn.
From a real-world standpoint, the study’s implications might seem at first to be impractical. Few classrooms are equipped with stationary bicycles. But specialized equipment is probably unnecessary, Dr. Sulpizio says.
“We are not suggesting that schools or teachers buy lots of bicycles,” she says. “A simpler take-home message may be that instruction should be flanked by physical activity.”
From “How Exercise Could Help You Learn a New Language” by Gretchen Reynolds from THE NEW YORK TIMES, August 16, 2017. Copyright © 2017 The New York Times Company.
1linguists: scientists who study language
Question
How does the author’s use of comparison in paragraphs 4 and 5 contribute to the development of ideas in the excerpt?
- AIt identifies why many adults are never able to learn a second language.
- BIt demonstrates why the study of adult language learning tries to include physical activity.
- CIt highlights why more is known about language learning in children than about language learning in adults.
- DIt explains why adults were the subjects of the study rather than children.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks how the author’s use of comparison in paragraphs 4 and 5 contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. Paragraph 5 does not claim that adults are never able to learn a second language, only that “it becomes harder to learn a second language after childhood.”
B. Incorrect. The issue of physical activity is never addressed in these paragraphs. They compare the relative ease with which children and adults learn languages.
C. Incorrect. Paragraph 4 does not claim that more is known about language learning in children; in fact, it says that children simply absorb language easily and does not attempt to explain how.
D. CORRECT. Because adult brains lose the “innate language capability” of children and have less plasticity when it comes to language learning, the study chose to focus on adults and how exercise might help them learn new languages.
Question analysis
This text structure question asks how the comparison in paragraphs 4 and 5 of Gretchen Reynolds’s article about exercise and learning a new language moves the article forward. Students must connect what those paragraphs say about children’s and adults’ language learning to the study that follows, and judge four explanations of why the comparison matters.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how a section fits into an article is grade 7 work. Here students must link a comparison of children and adults to the study described later, and the article never states that link outright, which keeps it a solid grade 7 task.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- How, not what moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 764 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 76 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
Paragraphs 4 and 5 are easy to summarize, children pick up a language easily and adults do not, but the question asks what that contrast sets up. Students who connect it to the article’s opening, about exercise and plasticity, decide it explains the exercise, while paragraph 6 shows it explains the choice of subjects. Reading the sentence right after the comparison, which recruits college-age learners to study “this process,” is the decisive step.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The article never says why the study used adults; the reader must join paragraph 5’s point that adult brains lose plasticity for language to paragraph 3’s “adult brain” and paragraph 6’s “this process.” (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
How, not what moderate Working it out
The stem asks what the comparison of children and adults does in the excerpt, so a fair summary of paragraphs 4 and 5 is not enough; its job in setting up the study must be named. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Strategy: Sum up what paragraphs 4 and 5 compare, then read the paragraphs just before and after them and ask what that comparison sets up for the rest of the article.
Traps
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Turns paragraph 5’s point that a second language “becomes harder” to learn after childhood into the absolute claim that many adults are never able to learn one.
B Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Links paragraph 5’s lost plasticity to the exercise idea of paragraph 1, but the reason for adding exercise comes from paragraphs 1 and 2; paragraphs 4 and 5 never mention it.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Reads the contrast between children and adults as a claim about how much scientists know, though paragraph 4 says only that children absorb language without being taught.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks why the author compares two things in paragraphs 4 and 5. A comparison shows how two things are alike or different. You need to say what this comparison does for the rest of the article. So find what is compared. Then see what comes next.
Find the comparison
Paragraph 4 is about children: “As young children, almost all of us picked up our first language easily.” Paragraph 5 is about adults: “by early adulthood, the brain generally begins to lose some of its innate language capability.” Innate means something you are born with. Then it says “it becomes harder to learn a second language after childhood.” So children learn languages easily, and adults find it harder.
See what the comparison sets up
In paragraph 3, “language learning and the adult brain” is named as the study’s focus. Right after the comparison, paragraph 6 says: “To see what effects exercise might have on this process, the researchers first recruited 40 college-age Chinese men and women.” This process means the way adults lose some of that easy learning. So the comparison explains why the study used adults. Adults are the ones who need the help.
Check each choice
- D fits. Adults lose some of their skill with language, so the study tested adults.
- A says adults are “never able” to learn. Paragraph 5 only says it “becomes harder.”
- B brings in exercise. But paragraphs 4 and 5 never mention exercise.
- C says scientists know more about children. Paragraph 4 says nothing about what scientists know.
Watch out: B is tempting because the whole article is about exercise. But the reason to try exercise comes from paragraphs 1 and 2, not from this comparison.
Pick the answer
The comparison shows that adults struggle with new languages more than children do. That is why the researchers studied adults. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong answer, because exercise is the study’s big idea. But paragraphs 4 and 5 compare only children and adults. They never mention exercise. Their job is to show why adults, not children, were the people studied. That is D.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “How Exercise Could Help You Learn a New Language”” as printed (pages 171–172)
Question 63 of 92
2024 Test B English, question 23Passage Excerpt from Do Them No Harm!
Excerpt from Do Them No Harm!
by Zoa L. Swayne
This narrative is about the Nez Perce, an American Indian tribe, in what is now northern Idaho. The tribe is preparing for a gathering before the coming winter.
In the moon of Ta-Yum, the hottest days of summer, when salmon spawn in the little streams and huckleberries ripen in the high mountains, people from many villages of the Chopunnish Nation gathered in the Oyaip Prairie for the work and festivities of their annual camas1 harvest.
From far and near The People came. . . .
Should a stranger enter their homeland and ask, “Where are you from?” the reply was always, “We are Nee-mee-poo, The People who live here in this place.”
It was a time of Lawtiwa-mah-ton—a time of being friends together—when The People came for this last chance to enjoy being together before the Cold Moons kept them close to their fires. The visiting and trading, the foot racing and horse racing, and the gambling and stick games would be remembered and talked about long after they had forgotten the drudgery of digging and roasting camas, picking berries, or drying meat and fish. Lawtiwa-mah-ton! It was good to be friends together.
As was their custom since wahk-kee-ma, a time far back beyond the memory of man, they set up their camps in the same locations their parents and grandparents had occupied before them. Red Bear’s people, from Kamiah, made their camp near the trail that came out of the mountains. Their neighbors in Kamiah Valley, The People from Tee-e-lap-a-lo, had their camp close by. Across the wide meadow, by the great roasting pits, the camps of the Te-wap-poo and Ask-kah-poo were located. The tepees and ish-nash, brush shelters, of other groups nestled in their accustomed areas in and among the pines in such numbers that they encircled the entire meadow land.
Red Bear’s people had traveled all summer with neighboring bands, gathering and preparing roots, picking and drying berries, drying and smoking meat and fish for their winter food supply. Now they were at the Oyaip camp. The women worked hard to dig and cure as many bags of roots as they could during the warm, sunny days, for the sharp night air brought warnings that WARM was going and COLD was coming.
Everyone helped in some way. Most of the men fished or hunted for meat. While many of the women dug and roasted camas, other women and older children picked and dried berries.
And the younger children played. They played at hunting. They played with the babies. They played with their horses and puppies. They learned how to live through their play.
This sun, happiness, peace, and quiet blessed the Red Bear camp. All were busy with their daily tasks, until sudden cries came from the children playing by the trail.
“People coming! People coming! People coming on the trail from the high mountains!” they called as they ran to their elders, who looked sharply at the figures of approaching horsemen.
Were they friends or enemies? Did they bring good news or bad?
“Who can it be? What brings them here?” were the questions in every mind.
“Could they be the four hunters who had gone to Buffalo Country two summers past? Would they have news of the families who had gone long ago to Buffalo Country and never returned?”
It was customary for a hunting party to be gone for more than one season.
“Looks like hunters,” the older men agreed. “Looks like they had good hunting. Maybe our four hunters. [They have] been gone many moons.”
“Looks like five people—not four,” others observed.
Excitement grew as the riders came close enough to be recognized.
“A-a-a-a-a, they are our four hunters! But who is the fifth person?” they asked.
“Looks like a woman. Who is she?”
The hunters rode up to the welcoming crowd, proud to show off the loads of meat, hides, and other trophies of their hunt. They paraded around the encampment for all to see how strong their Hunting Power had been—what great hunters they, themselves, were.
Red Bear’s people rejoiced at their hunters’ success. Good hunters brought good to everybody. The meat meant plenty of food and the hides meant soft-tanned robes to give comfort through the Cold Moons. But it was the sight of the frail figure of the woman that aroused their curiosity. Who was she? Where had she come from? . . .
“Belongs to Red Bear people. Gone then come back,” the hunters said, as they dismounted and unloaded their packs. . . .
Now they could see! She was the daughter of the family gone so long ago! The girl-child who had left came back now—a grown woman.
“Wat-ku-ese!” the women cried. “Gone-from-Home-then-Come-Back. Wat-ku-ese!” And Wat-ku-ese was her name from that time on.
Gentle arms lifted Wat-ku-ese from her horse. The women brought her food and made a place for her to rest. For many suns they cared for her until she became stronger.
One evening Wat-ku-ese told her story for all to hear.
From DO THEM NO HARM!: Lewis and Clark Among the Nez Perce by Zoa L. Swayne. Published by Caxton Press. Copyright © 1990 by Zoa L. Swayne. Orofino, Idaho and Legacy House, Inc. Orofino, Idaho. All rights reserved.
1camas: a wild, edible plant
Question
Paragraph 1 contributes to the setting of the excerpt by establishing that
- Athe story’s location is a plentiful place that allows The People to enjoy a comfortable gathering.
- Bthe events in the story occurred in the past and are being remembered by The People.
- Cthe camp in the story is changing and that the changes are causing problems for The People.
- Dthe story’s plot begins as The People are observing their land and what it offers them.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how paragraph 1 contributes to the setting of the excerpt.
A. CORRECT. Paragraph 1 describes summer “when salmon spawn,” “huckleberries ripen,” and The People gather for “their annual camas harvest.” These descriptions show the abundance of food in the place where the excerpt occurs.
B. Incorrect. Although the setting refers to past events, the narration is not by The People. In addition, the voice narrating the excerpt is not an element of the setting.
C. Incorrect. Nothing in paragraph 1 suggests that the camp is changing in any way. The People gather annually in this place. In addition, the language used to describe the setting does not suggest any problems.
D. Incorrect. The People are not making observations about the setting in paragraph 1. They are described as performing actions, such as gathering “for the work and festivities of their annual . . . harvest.”
Question analysis
This setting question asks what the opening paragraph of Zoa L. Swayne’s narrative Do Them No Harm! establishes about the time and place of the Nez Perce camas harvest. The paragraph is one long sentence crowded with unfamiliar names, so students must look past them to the details and decide what kind of place and season they describe.
- Grade level
- Grade 6 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Below grade 7 Seeing how an opening paragraph sets the scene matches the grade 6 standard, which names setting directly. The paragraph is one long sentence with unfamiliar Nez Perce names, but its details are concrete and the task is a single inference.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Complex sentences minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 5, 885 words; question and choices: about grade 8, 76 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
The paragraph is crowded with names, but its details are concrete: fish, berries, a harvest, festivities. Students who add them up see abundance and a happy gathering; those who look past them reach for ideas about who tells the story or about changes to come. The choice about The People observing their land is the subtle one, because the land’s gifts are there but no one in the paragraph is watching them.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
Paragraph 1 never calls the place plentiful; that has to be inferred from salmon that “spawn in the little streams,” huckleberries that “ripen,” and many villages gathering for the camas harvest. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
Paragraph 1 is a single sentence that opens with “In the moon of Ta-Yum,” a second time phrase and a “when” clause, so its subject, “people from many villages,” arrives only halfway through. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Strategy: Underline every detail in paragraph 1 about time, place and activity, then decide what overall impression of the setting they create before reading the choices.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
B Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Rightly notes that the story is set in the past, then adds that The People are remembering it, though an outside narrator tells the story.
C Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Senses change in the coming cold of later paragraphs and reads trouble into the opening, though paragraph 1 describes a yearly gathering with no hint of problems.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Sees what the land offers, salmon, berries and camas, but has The People surveying it, when paragraph 1 shows them gathering to work and celebrate, not observing.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
The setting of a story is where and when it takes place. This asks what paragraph 1 tells you about the setting. The paragraph is one long sentence with many new names. Look past the names to the details.
Find the details
Paragraph 1 says it is “the hottest days of summer.” It is a time “when salmon spawn in the little streams and huckleberries ripen in the high mountains.” To spawn means to lay eggs. To ripen means to get ready to eat. People from many villages come to the Oyaip Prairie “for the work and festivities” of their yearly harvest. Festivities are celebrations.
Decide what the details show
Fish, berries and a harvest all mean food. So this is a place with plenty to eat. Many villages come together to work and to celebrate. So it is a happy gathering, too. The paragraph shows a rich, friendly place.
Check each choice
- A fits: a plentiful place where The People gather in comfort. Plentiful means having a lot.
- B: the story does happen in the past. But a narrator tells it. A narrator is the voice telling the story. The People are not remembering it.
- C: nothing in paragraph 1 is changing or causing problems. The gathering happens every year.
- D: The People are not studying the land. They have come to work and celebrate.
Watch out: D mentions what the land offers, which is in paragraph 1. But no one in the paragraph is watching the land.
Pick the answer
Paragraph 1 sets up a place full of food and good company. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is a close wrong answer, because the land’s gifts, fish, berries and camas, are all in paragraph 1. But D says The People are observing the land. They are not. They have come “for the work and festivities” of the harvest. A sums up what the details show: plenty of food and a happy gathering.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from Do Them No Harm!” as printed (pages 177–178)
Question 64 of 92
2024 Test B English, question 24Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from Do Them No Harm!”.
Question
In paragraphs 4 and 6, the beginning of the change in seasons affects the characters mainly by
- Acausing them to collect their bounty and feel eager to celebrate before it becomes cold.
- Bmaking them want to rest and relax before the challenging work of the harvest begins.
- Cforcing them to give up leisure time to prepare their camp for the coming winter.
- Dallowing them to trade the goods they have prepared during the warm months.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how the beginning of the change of seasons mainly affects the characters.
A. CORRECT. Paragraph 4 describes the time as the last chance for The People to be together “before the Cold Moons kept them close to their fires.” Paragraph 6 tells about how the women were working hard to dig and cure roots, because “WARM was going and COLD was coming.” These paragraphs describe both celebration and preparation before the winter comes.
B. Incorrect. Paragraphs 4 and 6 describe the characters working hard, but there is no discussion of them wanting to rest and relax.
C. Incorrect. While both paragraphs describe some of the work involved in the harvest, paragraph 4 also lists a number of leisure activities, such as visiting, foot racing, horse racing, gambling, and stick games. The characters are still taking the time to relax.
D. Incorrect. While paragraph 4 mentions trading in a list of activities that the characters are doing, this is just one of many activities. Allowing the characters to trade goods is not the way the change in seasons mainly affects them.
Question analysis
This question on how setting shapes characters asks how the first signs of winter mainly affect The People in paragraphs 4 and 6 of Do Them No Harm!, a narrative about a Nez Perce harvest gathering. Students must draw on two separate paragraphs and pick the effect both support, among choices that each borrow real activities from the story.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how setting shapes what characters do is typical grade 7 work on story elements. Students combine details from two separate paragraphs, a step beyond reading one, but the language is plain and the details concrete.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Evidence in several places minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 5, 885 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 73 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
Each paragraph shows a different response to the coming winter, play in paragraph 4 and hard work in paragraph 6, and only one choice keeps both. Students who read paragraph 6 alone see work under pressure and decide the cold costs The People their free time, though paragraph 4 lists races and games. The question rewards checking each choice against both paragraphs, not just the one read last.
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The right choice and the one about giving up leisure both have The People preparing before the cold; they differ only in whether the season brings celebration or takes it away. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
The answer must fit both paragraphs: paragraph 4’s racing, gambling and stick games before “the Cold Moons” and paragraph 6’s women digging roots because “COLD was coming.” (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Find what paragraphs 4 and 6 each say about the approaching cold, then note what The People do because of it, and choose the effect that fits both paragraphs.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- 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.
- Reversed relationship: Cause and effect, or the order of events, turned around.
The wrong answers, classified
B Reversed relationship (King et al., 2004)
Puts rest before work, though the harvest is already under way at the Oyaip camp, and nothing shows The People wanting to relax before it begins.
C Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Sees the hard work of digging and curing roots before winter but misses paragraph 4’s racing, games and visiting, so the loss of leisure is invented.
D Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Seizes on trading, one item in paragraph 4’s list of activities, and treats that single detail as the main effect of the coming cold.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
Summer is ending and winter is coming. This asks how that change mainly affects the characters in paragraphs 4 and 6. Your answer has to fit both paragraphs, not just one.
Read paragraph 4
Paragraph 4 calls this time “this last chance to enjoy being together before the Cold Moons kept them close to their fires.” The Cold Moons are the winter months. The People enjoy “the foot racing and horse racing, and the gambling and stick games.” So, before winter, they celebrate together.
Read paragraph 6
Paragraph 6 says “The women worked hard to dig and cure as many bags of roots as they could during the warm, sunny days.” To cure food means to dry it so it keeps. Why rush? Because “the sharp night air brought warnings that WARM was going and COLD was coming.” So, before winter, they also gather and store food.
Check each choice
- A fits both: they collect their bounty and celebrate before the cold. Bounty means a large supply of good things, like food.
- B: no one wants to rest before the work. The harvest work is already going on.
- C: they don’t give up leisure, which is free time for fun. Paragraph 4 is full of races and games.
- D: trading is only one item in paragraph 4’s list. It is not the main effect.
Pick the answer
Watch out: C is tempting if you read only paragraph 6, which is all hard work. But paragraph 4 shows play. Only one choice fits both paragraphs. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong answer. Like A, it has The People getting ready for winter. But C says they give up their free time. Paragraph 4 says the opposite: races, games and visiting fill this “last chance to enjoy being together.” A keeps both the work and the fun.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 65 of 92
2024 Test B English, question 27Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from Do Them No Harm!”.
Question
How do paragraphs 11–13 affect the plot of the excerpt?
- AThey establish a feeling of mystery by presenting different points of view about the arriving people.
- BThey contribute to the rising action by developing the idea that the arriving people could present a problem.
- CThey lead to a turning point by describing the moment that the crowd realizes why the strangers have come.
- DThey explain the cause of the main conflict by providing background information about the strangers.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks how paragraphs 11–13 affect the plot of the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. The paragraphs contain questions about the arriving people. They do not present differing points of view.
B. CORRECT. The paragraphs ask questions in which the characters wonder whether the arriving people are friends or enemies, or whether they might be bringing good news or bad news. By suggesting that the arriving people could present problems such as these, the paragraphs contribute to the rising action.
C. Incorrect. The paragraphs do not lead to a turning point. Instead, they lead to the climax—the moment the characters discover who the visitors are. This means the paragraphs contribute to the rising action.
D. Incorrect. Paragraphs 11–13 ask questions. They do not provide background information about the strangers; instead, they ask for it.
Question analysis
This plot question asks how paragraphs 11–13, a series of questions the villagers ask as riders approach their camp, affect the plot of the Nez Perce narrative. Students must know terms such as rising action and turning point and apply them precisely, since several choices describe these paragraphs in ways that sound right but place them wrongly in the story.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 plot questions usually ask what one event causes. Here students apply terms such as rising action and turning point to three short paragraphs of questions, which matches the grade 8 focus on how parts of a story propel the action.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer major
- How, not what moderate
- Something you must already know minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 5, 885 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 77 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
Paragraphs 11–13 contain nothing but questions, so the answer depends on what questions do in a plot. Friends or enemies, good news or bad, they raise the chance of trouble and build toward the arrival. The trap is that they also create mystery, and the choice that says so fails only on one phrase about differing viewpoints. A second risk is jumping ahead: at this point no one even knows who the riders are, let alone why they came.
A very close wrong answer major Choosing the answer
The right choice and the one about mystery both see the questions building uncertainty about the riders; only the claim of “different points of view,” when the questions are “in every mind,” separates them. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
How, not what moderate Working it out
The stem asks what paragraphs 11–13 do for the plot, so students must place a run of unanswered questions in the story’s shape rather than retell them. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Something you must already know minor Working it out
The choices rely on plot terms the excerpt never explains, rising action, turning point and main conflict, and judging them means knowing what each one names. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Strategy: Note what the villagers know and do not yet know in paragraphs 11–13, then compare that with what happens later in the excerpt to place these paragraphs in the plot.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
The wrong answers, classified
A Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Rightly feels the mystery in the villagers’ questions but adds “different points of view,” though the whole camp shares the same questions.
C Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Jumps ahead to the recognition in paragraphs 17–23; in paragraphs 11–13 the crowd does not yet know who the riders are, let alone why they came.
D Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Notices the hunters gone two summers and the families who never returned, but those details arrive as questions, and the excerpt has no conflict they explain.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how paragraphs 11–13 move the story along. You need some plot words. The plot is the order of events in a story. The rising action is the part where tension builds. Tension is the feeling that something big may happen. A turning point is the moment when things change.
Read paragraphs 11 to 13
These paragraphs are all questions. Paragraph 11 asks: “Were they friends or enemies? Did they bring good news or bad?” In paragraph 12, “Who can it be?” is one of “the questions in every mind.” Paragraph 13 asks if the riders are the hunters who left “two summers past.”
Decide what the questions do
The words “enemies” and “bad” news show the camp is worried. The riders might bring trouble. No one knows yet. So the questions build tension as the riders get closer. That is rising action. The answers come later. The crowd knows the hunters in paragraph 18. They learn who the woman is in paragraphs 22 and 23.
Check each choice
- B fits. The questions raise the chance of a problem and build tension.
- A: there is mystery, but not “different points of view.” Everyone asks the same questions.
- C: in these paragraphs, no one knows who the riders are yet, let alone why they came. So nothing here is the moment the crowd realizes anything.
- D: the paragraphs ask about the strangers. They give no background facts about them.
Pick the answer
Watch out: A is very close. The questions do create mystery. But one wrong phrase, “different points of view,” rules it out. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong answer, because the questions do make the scene mysterious. But the questions are “in every mind,” so there are no different points of view. B names what the questions do for the plot: they hint that the riders could bring trouble, and they build tension.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 66 of 92
2024 Test B English, question 30Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from Do Them No Harm!”.
Question
Read these sentences from paragraph 22.
“Belongs to Red Bear people. Gone then come back.”
How does this statement affect the villagers in the excerpt?
- AIt increases their concern about why the woman is in their camp.
- BIt makes them hopeful that more lost members will return before the winter.
- CIt causes shock, leading them to grieve for the loss of the woman and her family.
- DIt inspires amazement, making them want to reconnect with their returned family member.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks how the statement from paragraph 22 affects the villagers in the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. In paragraph 21, the villagers question who the woman is and from where she has come, but they are merely curious about her and not necessarily concerned, as there is no indication in paragraph 22 that she might be a threat.
B. Incorrect. This statement reveals that the woman is a member of the Red Bear people who has returned, and in paragraph 15 there is a reference to four hunters who have been gone a long time. However, this statement serves only to satisfy the villagers’ curiosity about who this woman is; it does not make the villagers hopeful that other people will also return.
C. Incorrect. Though paragraph 23 reveals that the villagers are somewhat surprised because the girl has grown into a woman, paragraph 24 suggests they are excited to receive her. There is no reason given in paragraph 22 for them to grieve for her loss, since she has returned.
D. CORRECT. The hunters’ words from paragraph 22 amaze the villagers, who do not at first recognize the woman. Once they know she is one of their own, they are eager to interact with her, as revealed in paragraphs 24 and 25, where they give her a new name and care for her.
Question analysis
This question quotes the hunters’ brief words about the frail woman who rides into camp with them, “Belongs to Red Bear people. Gone then come back,” and asks how the statement affects the villagers. Students must follow the scene that comes next and judge the villagers’ feelings from what they shout and do, since the excerpt never names those feelings directly.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how a line of dialogue affects characters is grade 7 story analysis. The hunters’ words are short and the response follows at once, so the main demand is inferring the villagers’ state of mind, a routine grade 7 step.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 5, 885 words; question and choices: about grade 6, 78 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
The hunters’ words answer the question the crowd has been asking, who the woman is, and what follows is recognition and welcome. Students who carry over an earlier mood, worry about strangers or sadness at a long absence, misread the moment. The hopeful-sounding choice about more members returning goes one step past the text, which shows joy over this return and nothing about others.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The villagers’ reaction is never named; it is shown in paragraphs 23–25, where “Now they could see!”, the women cry out her new name and gentle arms lift her from her horse. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Read the paragraphs right after the hunters speak and note what the villagers say and do. Then choose the reaction those words and actions show.
Traps
- Wrong tone or attitude: Misjudges the tone, attitude or point of view, such as reading admiration as criticism, or taking a character's or subject's feelings for the author's.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
A Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Carries over the worry of paragraph 11, friends or enemies, though by now the hunters vouch for the woman and the statement removes any reason for concern.
B Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Connects the return to paragraph 13’s wish for news of families who never came back, then assumes hope that others will follow, which the excerpt never shows.
C Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Rightly senses surprise but reads it as grief, prompted by the woman’s frail figure and long absence, though the women cry out her new name and care for her.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
The hunters say: “Belongs to Red Bear people. Gone then come back.” This asks how those words affect the villagers. The story doesn’t name their feelings. So look at what they say and do next.
See what happens next
- Paragraph 23: “Now they could see! She was the daughter of the family gone so long ago!”
- Paragraph 24: the women cry out “Wat-ku-ese!” This becomes her new name.
- Paragraph 25: “Gentle arms lifted Wat-ku-ese from her horse.” The women bring her food and care for her.
Name the feelings
The exclamation points in paragraph 23 show surprise and wonder. A little girl has come back as a grown woman, and they can hardly believe it. That is amazement. Then they give her a name, feed her and care for her. They want to bring her back into the family. That is reconnecting, or becoming close again.
Check each choice
- D fits: amazement, then wanting to reconnect.
- A: the hunters say she belongs to the Red Bear people. That ends any worry.
- B: nothing says they hope others will return before winter.
- C: they are surprised, but they don’t grieve, or feel deep sadness. They cheer and care for her.
Watch out: C is tempting because she is frail and was gone a long time. But the women’s actions are happy and gentle.
Pick the answer
The villagers are amazed, and they rush to welcome her back home. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong answer, because the news is a shock and the woman is frail. But nobody mourns. The women shout her new name, and “Gentle arms lifted Wat-ku-ese from her horse.” Those are signs of joy and care. That matches D, amazement and a wish to reconnect.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 67 of 92
2024 Test B English, question 35Passage Invention of the Telegraph
Samuel Morse, an American inventor, is credited with creating the electronic telegraph, a communication device that allows users to send messages using a system of short and long pulses that represent letters, numbers, and punctuation. In 1843 the United States Congress passed the Telegraph Bill, which provided Morse with the funds to build an electric telegraph system.
Invention of the Telegraph
Earlier Signal Systems
Long before Samuel F. B. Morse electrically transmitted his famous message “What hath God wrought?” from Washington to Baltimore on May 24, 1844, there were signaling systems that enabled people to communicate over distances. Most were visual or “semaphore” systems using flags or lights. In the eighteenth century, such systems used an observer who would decipher a signal from a high tower on a distant hill and then send it on to the next station. The young American republic wanted just such a system along its entire Atlantic coast and offered a prize of $30,000 for a workable proposal. The framers of this legislation had no way of knowing that when they used the word “telegraph” to refer to this visual semaphore system, they would be offered an entirely new and revolutionary means of communication—electricity.
The Growth of an Idea
The idea of using electricity to communicate over distance is said to have occurred to Morse during a conversation aboard ship when he was returning from Europe in 1832. Michael Faraday’s recently invented electromagnet was much discussed by the ship’s passengers, and when Morse came to understand how it worked, he speculated that it might be possible to send a coded message over a wire. While a student at Yale College years before, he had written his parents a letter about how interesting he found the lectures on electricity. Despite what he had learned at Yale, Morse found when he began to develop his idea that he had little real understanding of the nature of electricity, and after sporadic attempts to work with batteries, magnets, and wires, he finally turned for help to a colleague at the University of the City of New York, Leonard D. Gale.
Gale was a professor of chemistry and familiar with the electrical work of Princeton’s Joseph Henry, a true pioneer in the new field. Well before Morse had his shipboard idea about a telegraph, Henry rang a bell at a distance by opening and closing an electric circuit. In 1831, he had published an article, of which Morse was unaware, that contained details suggesting the idea of an electric telegraph. Gale’s help and his knowledge of this article proved crucial to Morse’s telegraph system because Gale not only pointed out flaws in the system but showed Morse how he could regularly boost the strength of a signal and overcome the distance problems he had encountered by using a relay system Henry had invented. Henry’s experiments, Gale’s assistance, and, soon after, hiring the young technician Alfred Vail were keys to Morse’s success.
Obstacles and Opportunities
By December 1837, Morse had enough confidence in his new system to apply for the federal government’s appropriation, and during the next year he conducted demonstrations of his telegraph both in New York and Washington.
However, when the economic disaster known as the Panic of 1837 took hold of the nation and caused a long depression, Morse was forced to wait for better times. It was during this period that Morse visited Europe again and tried not only to secure patent protection overseas but to examine competing telegraph systems in England. . . .
By 1843, the country was beginning to recover economically, and Morse again asked Congress for the $30,000 that would allow him to build a telegraph line from Washington to Baltimore, forty miles away. The House of Representatives eventually passed the bill containing the Morse appropriation, and the Senate approved it in the final hours of that Congress’s last session. With President Tyler’s signature, Morse received the cash he needed and began to carry out plans for an underground telegraph line.
Realizing a Great Invention
Morse had hired the ingenious construction engineer Ezra Cornell to lay the pipe carrying the wire, and although Cornell did his job superbly, one of Morse’s partners, Congressman F. O. J. Smith, had purchased wire with defective insulation. Too much time had been wasted laying bad wire, and with the project on a rigid deadline, something had to be done quickly. Cornell suggested that the fastest and cheapest way of connecting Washington and Baltimore was to string wires overhead on trees and poles. The desperate Morse gave the go-ahead, and the line was completed in time for the dramatic and spectacularly successful link between the Supreme Court chamber of the Capitol building and the railroad station in Baltimore.
Soon, as overhead wires connected cities up and down the Atlantic coast, the dots-and-dashes method that recorded messages on a long moving strip of paper was replaced by the operator’s ability to interpret the code in real time. . . . Telegraph lines soon extended westward, and within Morse’s own lifetime they connected the continents of Europe and America.
“Invention of the Telegraph”—Public Domain/Library of Congress
legislation: Telegraph Bill
dots-and-dashes method: the short and long pulses of Morse code that are sent and received by telegraph operators
The first transatlantic electric telegraph message was sent in 1858, and by 1902 the British All-Red Line connected most of the world.
Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census. Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970, Bicentennial Edition, Part 2. Washington, D.C., 1975.
Question
Which sentence is the best summary of how Morse obtained the funding necessary to build his telegraph system?
- AMorse’s application for a federal grant was delayed until 1843, so he spent time traveling in Europe, where he concentrated on obtaining a patent for his system.
- BMorse applied for a government grant that required both houses of Congress and the president to pass a bill awarding him $30,000 for his telegraph project.
- CMorse applied for a government appropriation and conducted telegraph demonstrations to show that his system could work, and after a delay caused by a financial depression, Congress approved the $30,000 appropriation in 1843.
- DWorking with Gale and Vail allowed Morse to find flaws in Henry’s work and to develop his own ideas before applying for the federal government appropriation.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks for the best summary of how Morse obtained the funding necessary to build his telegraph system.
A. Incorrect. This summary focuses mostly on what Morse did while his application for funding was delayed in the United States rather than on how Morse acquired the funding, because during this period, Morse tried “not only to secure patent protection overseas but to examine competing telegraph systems in England” (paragraph 5). Therefore, it is not the best summary of how Morse obtained the funding necessary to build his telegraph system.
B. Incorrect. Although this summary mentions how Morse applied for the “federal government’s appropriation” (paragraph 4), it primarily focuses on the actions of the House of Representatives and the Senate, not on Morse’s efforts to obtain funding. Therefore, it is not the best summary of how Morse obtained the funding necessary to build his telegraph system.
C. CORRECT. This summary best describes how Morse obtained the funding that he needed for his telegraph system, because it explains that Morse applied “for the federal government’s appropriation, and during the next year he conducted demonstrations of his telegraph” (paragraph 4). In paragraph 5, the author explains the impact that the Panic of 1837 had on Morse’s request. In paragraph 6, the author describes how by 1843, economic times had improved, so Morse again “asked Congress for the $30,000” and was awarded the funds after “the Senate approved it.”
D. Incorrect. This summary is not the best summary of how Morse obtained the funding necessary to build his telegraph system, because it relates how Morse worked with others to develop his ideas about the telegraph and how Gale and Vail were the “keys to Morse’s success” (paragraph 3) before he applied for funding.
Question analysis
Students read “Invention of the Telegraph” and pick the best one-sentence summary of how Samuel Morse secured federal funding for his telegraph line. The money story is spread over several paragraphs alongside other events in Morse’s life, and the four long choices each blend true details, so students must decide what a good summary of this one process includes.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Summarizing a short chain of events is everyday grade 7 work, and every fact needed is stated plainly. The main demand is patience with long choices rather than any hard inference.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Evidence in several places moderate
- A lot to read minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 910 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 126 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A date in the passage introduction was corrected.
- A wrong word in the explanation was corrected.
- 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
Every choice is built from real events, so the question is less about spotting a false statement than about judging what a summary of the funding must contain. Students who accept the first accurate sentence they meet stop at the account of Congress and the president, which skips the years between application and approval. Listing the stages first, application, demonstrations, delay and vote, turns the long choices into a quick checklist.
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The summary about both houses and the president is accurate and ends where the key does, with the $30,000 approved; what separates them is the middle stretch, the demonstrations and the depression’s delay, which only the key covers. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The funding story is split over paragraphs 4 to 6: the December 1837 application, demonstrations in New York and Washington, the Panic of 1837 with a trip to Europe, and the 1843 request and vote. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
A lot to read minor Understanding the question
Each choice is a single sentence of 26 to 33 words carrying dates, a dollar amount, Congress and several people, and every piece has to be checked against the passage. (Kintsch, 1998; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Find the part of the passage about paying for the telegraph and jot down each step in order; then pick the summary that matches your list from start to finish without wandering off 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.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Builds the summary on Morse’s European patent trip, something he did while the money stalled, and drops the demonstrations and the 1843 vote that actually produced the funds.
B Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Gives only the final step, a bill passed by the House and Senate and signed by the president, and omits the demonstrations and the depression that held the money up for years.
D Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Pulls in paragraph 3, where Gale and Vail help Morse build the system, which concerns the invention, not the money, and puts the flaws in Henry’s work, though Gale found them in Morse’s system.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Passage: The 2024–2025 handbook’s introduction says “In 1844, the United States Congress passed the Telegraph Bill.” Congress passed the $30,000 appropriation in March 1843; 1844 is the year of Morse’s first message. Paragraph 6 describes the 1843 approval, and Option C, the correct answer, says 1843, so the introduction reads “In 1843.” The site shares this passage with 2018 Test B English, where the same correction is recorded.
- Explanation: The handbook says Option A focuses on what Morse did while his application was delayed “rather than on how Morse acquired the patent.” The question asks how Morse obtained his funding, and the patent is what Option A does focus on, so the site now says “rather than on how Morse acquired the funding.”
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This question wants a summary. A summary is a short retelling that keeps only the main points, in the order they happen. The topic is narrow: how Morse got the money for his telegraph. So the best choice must be true, stay on the money, and tell that story from beginning to end.
Find where the money story is told
The funding story runs through paragraphs 4, 5 and 6. By December 1837, Morse felt ready “to apply for the federal government’s appropriation” (paragraph 4). The next year, “he conducted demonstrations of his telegraph both in New York and Washington” (paragraph 4). Then a money crisis “caused a long depression,” and Morse “was forced to wait for better times” (paragraph 5). In 1843 he “again asked Congress for the $30,000,” and this time he got it (paragraph 6).
Explain the words and list the steps
Some words may be new. An appropriation is money that lawmakers agree to pay out for a planned project. Demonstrations are public shows that prove a machine works. A depression is a long period when businesses struggle and cash is scarce. Now put the story in order:
- Morse asked for the money.
- He showed people his telegraph working.
- Hard times made him wait.
- In 1843 Congress said yes to the $30,000.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. It is mostly about a trip to Europe for a patent (a legal right that stops others from copying an invention). Morse made that trip while he waited. A leaves out the demonstrations and the vote.
- B does not fit. It is true, but it gives only the final step, when the House, the Senate and the president approved the bill. It skips the demonstrations and the years of waiting.
- C fits. It covers the request, the demonstrations, the delay from the depression and the 1843 approval, in that order.
- D does not fit. Gale and Vail helped Morse build the telegraph, not pay for it. And the flaws Gale pointed out were in Morse’s system, while D puts them in Henry’s work.
Choose the answer
Only one choice tells the whole funding story, from the first request to the final yes, without drifting to other topics. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the hardest choice to rule out, because nothing in it is false. But it starts at the very end of the story. It drops the demonstrations Morse gave and the long wait during the depression. A summary must hold all the main steps, and C is the only choice that does.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Invention of the Telegraph” as printed (pages 146–148)
Question 68 of 92
2024 Test B English, question 51Passage Excerpt from “The Past and the Future of the Earth’s Oldest Trees”
Excerpt from “The Past and the Future of the Earth’s Oldest Trees”
by Alex Ross
About forty-five hundred years ago, not long after the completion of the Great Pyramid at Giza, a seed of Pinus longaeva, the Great Basin bristlecone pine, landed on a steep slope in what are now known as the White Mountains, in eastern California. The seed may have travelled there on a gust of wind, its flight aided by a winglike attachment to the nut. Or it could have been planted by a bird known as the Clark’s nutcracker, which likes to hide pine seeds in caches; nutcrackers have phenomenal spatial1 memory and can recall thousands of such caches. This seed, however, lay undisturbed. On a moist day in fall, or in the wake of melting snows in spring, a seedling appeared above ground—a stubby one-inch stem with a tuft of bright-green shoots.
Most seedlings die within a year; the mortality rate is more than ninety-nine percent. The survivors are sometimes seen growing in the shadow of a fallen tree. The landscape of the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest, as this area of the White Mountains is called, is littered with fragments of dead trees—trunks, limbs, roots, and smaller chunks. Pinus longaeva grows exclusively in subalpine regions of the Great Basin, which stretches from the eastern slopes of the Sierra Nevada to the Wasatch Range, in Utah. Conditions are generally too arid for the dead wood to rot; instead, it erodes, sanded down like rock. The remnants may harbor nutrients and fungi that help new trees grow. Bristlecones rise from the bones of their ancestors—a city within a cemetery.
Coast redwoods and giant sequoias, California’s gargantuan world-record-holding trees, can grow fifty feet or more in their first twenty years. Bristlecones rise agonizingly slowly. After four or five years, the seedling on the steep slope would have been just a few inches higher, sprouting needles in place of the embryonic shoots. The needles are a deep green, tough, resinous, and closely bunched in groups of five. On a mature tree, they live for fifty years or more. Decades may have passed before the tree was human height, and decades more before it resembled a conventional pine. Bristlecone saplings grow straight up, with relatively sparse foliage, looking like undernourished Christmas trees. After a few hundred years—by which time the Old Kingdom of Egypt had fallen—it was probably forty or fifty feet in height.
Many tree species live for hundreds of years. A smaller but not inconsiderable number, including the sequoias and certain yews, oaks, cypresses, and junipers, survive for thousands. Once a bristlecone has established itself in the unforgiving conditions of the White Mountains, it can last almost indefinitely. The trees tend to grow some distance from one another, so fires almost never destroy an entire stand. Because only a few other plant species can handle the dry, cold climate, the bristlecones face little competition. Unlike most plants, they tolerate dolomite soil, which is composed of a chalky type of limestone that is heavily alkaline and low in nutrients. As for insect threats, bristlecone wood is so dense that mountain-pine beetles and other pests can rarely burrow their way into it.
Empires rose and fell; wars raged; . . . and the tree from 2500 B.C. continued its implacable slow-motion existence, adding about two-hundredths of an inch to the diameter of its trunk each year. Minute changes in the tree-ring record make bristlecones an exceptionally useful source of data about changing conditions on Earth. When rains are heavier than normal, the rings widen. When volcanic eruptions cause global cooling, frost rings make the anomaly2 visible. . . .
As the millennia go by, bristlecones become contorted and wraithlike.3 The main stem, or leader, dies back. Entire branches, even the trunk itself, become fossils. At first glance, the tree may look dead. Such is the case of the forty-five-hundred-year-old tree that clings to life near the tourist path that now runs through the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest. Spears of dead wood jut into the air. The trunk is a marbled hulk stripped of bark, like driftwood thrown from a vanished ocean. A ribbon of live bark runs up one side, funneling water and nutrients to clumps of green needles high above. All told, the tree is an unprepossessing specimen; most people march past it without giving it a second glance. . . .
. . . No two super-elderly trees look alike, to the point where they have acquired the characteristics of individuals. Trees are prone to anthropomorphism; we project our dreams and our anxieties onto them. Bristlecones have been called elders, sentinels, sages. The possibility that climate change will cause their extinction has inspired a spate4 of alarmed news stories, although tree scientists tend to discount the idea that the bristlecones are in immediate danger. They have survived any number of catastrophes in the past; they may survive humanity.
From “The Past and the Future of the Earth’s Oldest Trees” by Alex Ross from THE NEW YORKER, January 20, 2020. Copyright © 2020 by Condé Nast. All rights reserved.
1spatial: relating to physical space
2anomaly: oddity
3wraithlike: ghostly
4spate: sudden abundance
Question
In paragraph 4, the idea that the bristlecone pine can withstand difficult conditions is illustrated mainly through
- Aa comparison of the bristlecone pine with similar trees that are known for their long lives.
- Ba description of specific qualities of the bristlecone pine that make it suited to its environment.
- Can explanation of why the White Mountains are the best place for the bristlecone pine to grow.
- Dan examination of why the bristlecone pine has few competitors in the White Mountains.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks how paragraph 4 mainly conveys the idea that the bristlecone pine can withstand difficult conditions.
A. Incorrect. While paragraph 4 does mention the bristlecone pine in conjunction with other long-living trees, this does not explain in any way how the bristlecone pine can survive difficult conditions.
B. CORRECT. Paragraph 4 mentions several qualities that help the bristlecone pine survive a difficult environment: it can survive in a “dry, cold climate” as few plants can, it tolerates a soil that is heavily alkaline and low in nutrients, and the density of its wood protects it from insects.
C. Incorrect. Paragraph 4 focuses on the qualities of the bristlecone pine that make it well suited to the White Mountains rather than on why the White Mountains are well suited to bristlecone pines.
D. Incorrect. While paragraph 4 does acknowledge that the bristlecone pine has few competitors because the pine can stand conditions few other plants can stand, it is the examination of the pine’s unique qualities that explains how the pine survives those conditions.
Question analysis
Students examine paragraph 4 of an article about the bristlecone pine and decide how it mainly illustrates the idea that this tree can withstand harsh conditions. The paragraph mixes comparisons with other species, facts about the White Mountains and facts about the tree, so students must recognize the main way the author builds the idea.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Grade 7 students often identify how a paragraph supports an idea, and this one is typical in demand: one plainly written paragraph of seven sentences, with a few unfamiliar terms such as “dolomite” and “alkaline.”
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what moderate
- The right answer is reworded minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 851 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 79 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
Paragraph 4 opens with other long-lived trees and then lists what lets the bristlecone last: spacing that keeps fires from spreading, tolerance of dry cold and poor soil, and wood too dense for beetles. The strongest lure lifts one item from that list and calls it the paragraph’s method. Students who step back and ask what most of the sentences describe see a set of the tree’s own traits.
How, not what moderate Working it out
The stem asks how paragraph 4 makes its case, so its sentences have to be sorted by kind: a comparison with other long-lived trees, the setting, and the bristlecone’s own traits. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
The right answer is reworded minor Choosing the answer
The key names no detail, only “specific qualities” that suit the tree to “its environment,” while the wrong choices echo the paragraph’s long-lived trees, the White Mountains and “little competition.” (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Strategy: Reread paragraph 4 and label each sentence by what it tells you, then ask which kind of detail carries most of the paragraph’s case that the tree is tough.
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.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Reversed relationship: Cause and effect, or the order of events, turned around.
The wrong answers, classified
A True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Notices that the paragraph opens by naming sequoias, yews and other trees that live for thousands of years, but that comparison sets the scene and shows nothing about surviving hardship.
C Reversed relationship (King et al., 2004)
Turns the relationship around: the paragraph shows the tree fitted to “unforgiving conditions,” not the White Mountains suiting the tree, let alone being the best place for it.
D Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Takes one result, little competition because few plants handle the dry, cold climate, for the paragraph’s main method, when it is one item in a list of survival traits.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how paragraph 4 mainly shows that the bristlecone can survive harsh conditions. Mainly means the method used in most of the paragraph, not in a single sentence. So sort the sentences by what they do.
Sort what paragraph 4 tells you
Here is what the paragraph covers, in order:
- Many trees live hundreds or even thousands of years.
- Once settled, a bristlecone “can last almost indefinitely,” or with no set end.
- The trees grow apart, so a fire rarely burns a whole group.
- Few plants can stand the dry, cold climate, so there is little competition.
- They can live in dolomite soil, which is chalky and low in nutrients.
- Their wood is so dense, or tightly packed, that beetles can rarely bore in.
Find the pattern
After the first two sentences, nearly every sentence describes the tree itself. It grows spread out. It handles cold, dry air and poor soil. Its wood is too hard for insects. Each of these is a quality, or trait, that fits the tree to its tough home. That list of traits is how the paragraph shows the tree’s toughness.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. Other long-lived trees are named only at the start. That sets the scene but shows nothing about surviving hardship.
- B fits. Most of the paragraph lists the tree’s own traits that help it survive.
- C does not fit. It turns things around. The paragraph shows the tree suited to harsh mountains, not the mountains being the best place for it.
- D does not fit. Little competition is one item in the list, not the main method.
Choose the answer
Paragraph 4 mainly works by describing what lets the bristlecone handle its harsh home. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest trap, since paragraph 4 does say the trees face little competition. But that is just one result. The paragraph also points to spacing, tolerance of poor soil and dense wood. B covers all of these traits together, so it names the main method.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “The Past and the Future of the Earth’s Oldest Trees”” as printed (pages 193–194)
Question 69 of 92
2024 Test B English, question 56Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “The Past and the Future of the Earth’s Oldest Trees””.
Question
What is the best summary of the bristlecone pine’s life cycle?
- AThe bristlecone pine takes root as a stubby seedling in the mountains. Over time, it grows slowly in a hostile environment with alkaline soil that ensures little competition from other trees.
- BThe bristlecone pine grows up slowly from the fragments of its dead ancestors. Over time, it begins to become contorted in appearance but continues to funnel water and nutrients to its stem.
- CThe bristlecone pine grows slowly in an environment hostile to other trees. Over time, its trunk and some branches fossilize, but it funnels water and nutrients to other parts that are still alive.
- DThe bristlecone pine grows only in one location in the mountains. Over time, it develops sparse foliage that fossilizes slowly, but the trunk and branches stay alive, as revealed by ribbons of live bark.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks for the best summary of the bristlecone pine’s life cycle.
A. Incorrect. Though the summary in this option covers key points in the life cycle, it focuses on minor details (“stubby seedling” and “alkaline soil”) while leaving out major details of the life cycle (for example, the fact that parts of the trees become fossilized over time).
B. Incorrect. This option addresses the unique quality of the pine growing from “fragments of its dead ancestors”; however, it does not address the fossilization phase, which is a major part of the life cycle. In addition, this option incorrectly states that the tree continues to funnel nutrients to its stem.
C. CORRECT. The option describes the key phases of the pine’s life cycle without focusing on minor details. The organization of the summary is chronological, and the information presented is accurate.
D. Incorrect. The option focuses more on the location and the appearance of the pine than on the phases of the pine’s life cycle. The option also describes the pine’s appearance inaccurately: it says that the foliage fossilizes and the trunk and branches stay alive, but paragraph 6 says that “entire branches, even the trunk itself, become fossils.” It provides little information about the main phases of the pine’s life cycle.
Question analysis
This summary question asks students to choose the best summary of the life cycle of the Great Basin bristlecone pine, as described across Alex Ross’s excerpt about the Earth’s oldest trees. Each choice is two sentences long and sounds accurate, and the differences lie in which stages of the tree’s long life each one includes and how faithfully it reports them.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Summarizing a process is regular grade 7 work, but this life cycle unfolds across six paragraphs of dense description, and each choice is a two-sentence summary with accurate-sounding details, so spotting small omissions and errors takes more than typical care.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- Every choice must be checked major
- Evidence in several places moderate
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 851 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 141 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- An inaccurate statement in the explanation was corrected.
- 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
A good summary of this life cycle has to reach old age, when the trunk and branches turn to fossil while a strip of bark keeps the tree alive, and it has to get that stage right. One wrong choice never gets past youth, another reaches old age but keeps the wrong part alive, and a third mixes up which parts fossilize. Recalling paragraph 6 exactly, with every choice two sentences long, is what makes the question slow.
Every choice must be checked major Choosing the answer
Each two-sentence summary sounds accurate, and its flaw is an omission or a wrong detail, such as nutrients sent to a stem that dies back or foliage that fossilizes, so every clause must be checked. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The life cycle runs across six paragraphs: the seedling in paragraph 1, the dead ancestors in 2, slow growth in 3, harsh conditions in 4, and fossilized wood with a live ribbon of bark in 6. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The ancestors-and-stem summary has the key’s shape, slow growth, then decline, then water and nutrients still funneled; it differs in where they go, the stem, which paragraph 6 says “dies back.” (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Strategy: Before reading the choices, list the stages of the tree’s life from seed to old age with one detail each, then check every sentence of each summary against the passage.
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.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Covers only the tree’s youth, the stubby seedling and slow growth in poor alkaline soil, and stops before the fossilizing and the live strip of bark that mark its old age.
B Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Starts accurately with growth among dead ancestors and a contorted old age, but sends water and nutrients to the stem, which dies back, and leaves out fossilization.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Assembles real words from the excerpt, sparse foliage, fossils and live bark, but swaps which parts fossilize and shrinks a range across the Great Basin to one location.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The handbook says Option D “contains an accurate description of the pine’s appearance.” It does not: Option D says the foliage fossilizes and the trunk and branches stay alive, but paragraph 6 says that “entire branches, even the trunk itself, become fossils,” as the correct answer, Option C, also says. The site now says that the option describes the pine’s appearance inaccurately.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks for the best summary of the bristlecone’s life cycle. A life cycle is the stages of a living thing’s life, from its start to old age. A good summary covers the main stages in order and gets each one right.
List the stages from the excerpt
- Young: the seedling grows “agonizingly slowly” (paragraph 3).
- Settled: it lives where few plants “can handle the dry, cold climate” (paragraph 4).
- Old: “The main stem, or leader, dies back,” and “Entire branches, even the trunk itself, become fossils” (paragraph 6).
- Still alive: “A ribbon of live bark runs up one side, funneling water and nutrients to clumps of green needles high above” (paragraph 6).
Explain the hard words
Hostile means unfriendly or harsh. To fossilize here means to turn into hard, dead wood, almost like stone. To funnel is to carry something along a narrow path. Contorted means twisted out of shape. Nutrients are the things a plant needs to grow. Foliage means leaves, which for a pine are its needles.
Check each choice
- A does not fit. It stops while the tree is young. It never reaches old age, when parts of the tree turn to fossil.
- B does not fit. The main stem “dies back,” so water is not sent to the stem. B also leaves out the fossil stage.
- C fits. It gives slow growth in a harsh place, then a fossilized trunk and branches, with water still carried to the living parts.
- D does not fit. Paragraph 2 says bristlecones grow in high areas across the Great Basin, a region that stretches into Utah. That is not one location. D also mixes up the parts: the trunk and branches turn to fossil, not the foliage.
Choose the answer
Only one summary reaches old age and gets every stage right. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B looks the most like the right answer. Like C, it moves from young growth to old age and has water and nutrients still flowing. But it sends them to the stem, and paragraph 6 says the stem “dies back.” C sends them to the parts still alive, which matches the ribbon of live bark.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 70 of 92
2023 Test A English, question 15Passage A Memory Revolution
A Memory Revolution
A high school senior logs on to a computer at the library to double-check the application due date listed on a college admissions website. Nearby, a librarian helps a group of biology students use a database to search for recent studies about mammals. In the past few decades, the Internet has become an integral component of daily life for many people. The seemingly limitless power of search engines made the Internet search extremely common, and today people increasingly rely on the Internet’s vast accumulation of sources to access all types of information. Scientists are beginning to examine how this reliance is modifying the strategies people use to store and prioritize information in their mind.
A Dependable and Valuable Asset
Psychologist Benjamin Storm from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and researchers Sean Stone and Aaron Benjamin devised an experiment to study students’ tendency to depend on the Internet for facts. To begin, the scientists divided sixty participants into multiple groups, including an “Internet” group and a “memory” group, and placed them in front of computers. The Internet group was required to use the search engine Google to answer eight challenging trivia questions. In contrast, participants in the memory group were permitted to use only their personal knowledge to answer the questions. In the second round, the researchers administered notably easier questions. This time, they allowed each group the option of using Google as they answered. Their results showed that 83 percent of the Internet group continued to consult Google in the second round, while only 63 percent of the memory group chose to do so.
People’s growing inclination to rely on the Internet in order to retrieve information, particularly facts and figures, is called cognitive offloading. Canadian researcher Evan F. Risko and British researcher Sam Gilbert, who have written extensively about the topic, say a similar process has been taking place for centuries. In the past, people used resources like encyclopedias to assist their memories; however, today the Internet, serving as a vast extended memory, allows people to digitally access and retrieve much larger volumes of information. Consequently, people’s minds are free for other cognitive feats, such as connecting data, learning new information, or solving problems.
Filing Information Away
The use of the Internet also appears to be modifying the strategies people use to store information in their mind. Researchers Betsy Sparrow from Columbia University, Jenny Liu from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Daniel Wegner from Harvard University conducted several studies to discover how people efficiently manage their information intake.
To begin, the researchers examined how people evaluate which information deserves their effort to remember. For this experiment, participants read forty trivia facts, such as “An ostrich’s eye is bigger than its brain,” and typed the statements into a computer file. Half the participants had been previously told the file would be saved, while half believed it would be erased. Next, the participants wrote down every fact they could recall. Those who believed the information would be erased and no longer available could recall 40 percent more facts than those who thought the information would be saved.
In another experiment, the same researchers tested the ability of study participants to remember where to access information. For this trial, participants read and typed trivia statements, which they saved in folders with generic names such as “Facts” and “Items.” After spending ten minutes writing down all the facts they could recall from memory, participants were asked which folder contained a particular fact based on a keyword. For example, “Which folder has the fact about ostriches?” Overall, participants recalled the information’s location more often than the content itself, correctly identifying 49 percent of the folders for specific facts while remembering only 23 percent of the actual trivia. The researchers concluded that our memory is adapting to the Internet age by prioritizing where to locate information even when the specific details are forgotten. According to Sparrow, the Internet has become an important form of transactive memory, an external source of the recollections and associative networks that constitute memory.
As the Internet’s resources continue to expand our “external” memory, some question whether the process may cause people to depend too heavily on technology. However, Steven Pinker, a professor of psychology at Harvard University, says, “Knowledge is increasing exponentially; human brainpower and waking hours are not. Fortunately, the Internet and information technologies are helping us manage, search and retrieve our collective intellectual output at different scales, from Twitter and previews to e-books and online encyclopedias. Far from making us stupid, these technologies are the only things that will keep us smart.”
Question
Which sentence from the passage suggests that using Internet search engines may lead people to rely less on their own ability to recall information?
- A“In the past few decades, the Internet has become an integral component of daily life for many people.” (paragraph 1)
- B“The Internet group was required to use the search engine Google to answer eight challenging trivia questions.” (paragraph 2)
- C“Their results showed that 83 percent of the Internet group continued to consult Google in the second round, while only 63 percent of the memory group chose to do so.” (paragraph 2)
- D“For this experiment, participants read forty trivia facts, such as ‘An ostrich’s eye is bigger than its brain,’ and typed the statements into a computer file.” (paragraph 5)
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks which sentence from the passage suggests that using Internet search engines may lead people to rely less on their own ability to recall information.
A. Incorrect. While the sentence in paragraph 1 refers to the increase in use that has made the Internet “an integral component” of everyday life for many people, it does not address memory or explain the effect of Internet use on a person’s ability to recall information.
B. Incorrect. Although the sentence in paragraph 2 refers to research that was conducted to determine how the use of the Internet affects a person’s memory, the sentence simply explains one guideline of the study. The fact that the study required one group of participants to use Google does not indicate whether using a search engine affects the degree to which people rely on their own ability to recall information.
C. CORRECT. The sentence in paragraph 2 states that “83 percent of the Internet group continued to consult Google in the second round” and that “only 63 percent of the memory group chose to do so.” These statistics suggest that using Google in the first round resulted in participants in the Internet group relying more heavily on the Internet search engine to recall information in the second round, whereas participants who had not used Google in the first round were more likely to rely on their own ability to recall information.
D. Incorrect. The sentence in paragraph 5 describes a task presented to participants in a research study. Although the study was designed to examine “how people evaluate which information deserves their effort to remember” (paragraph 5), the sentence does not indicate that use of Internet search engines prompted people to rely less on their own ability to recall information.
Question analysis
This evidence question on “A Memory Revolution,” an article about how search engines are changing the ways people store and find information, asks which sentence suggests that searching online may lead people to depend less on their own recall. The four quotations come from paragraphs 1, 2 and 5, and each touches on the Internet, a study or memory, so students must test what each one actually shows.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Choosing the sentence that supports an idea is routine grade 7 evidence work. Here the idea appears in the question but in none of the quotations, so students must infer which one implies it from what the passage says around each.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- A very close wrong answer minor
- Much to keep track of minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 14, 763 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 117 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
None of the four quotations states the idea in the question, so each has to be judged by what it implies. Paragraph 2’s experiment supplies both the most tempting wrong sentence and the right one, and they differ as a study’s setup differs from its findings. Students who settle for the sentence that names a search engine, or for any line about remembering trivia, overlook that only a measured result can show an effect on how people recall.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The right sentence gives only two percentages and never mentions memory; students must infer that reaching for Google on “notably easier questions” shows less trust in one’s own recall, and that first-round searching set the Internet group apart. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
A very close wrong answer minor Choosing the answer
Two quotations come from paragraph 2’s Google study and both name the Internet group; one states the rule for the first round, the other what the group chose once Google was optional. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Much to keep track of minor Working it out
Reading 83 and 63 percent correctly means holding two groups and two rounds in mind: which group had to search at first, and that in round two both could choose Google. (Sweller, 1988; Carpenter, Just & Shell, 1990)
Strategy: Put the idea in your own words, then reread each quoted sentence in its paragraph and ask whether it shows people relying more on a search engine and less on their own memory.
Traps
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
The wrong answers, classified
A True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Takes the opening claim that the Internet is “an integral component of daily life” as a sign of dependence, but the sentence only sets the scene and says nothing about recall.
B Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Finds the right study and the words “search engine Google,” but this sentence states only what the Internet group had to do in round one, not how it behaved afterward.
D Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Recalls that the ostrich-fact experiment found people remembered less when they expected a file to be saved, but this sentence only describes the typing task, and no search engine is involved.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This is an evidence question. You need the sentence that best supports an idea. The idea is that using search engines may make people lean less on their own memory. To recall means to bring back to mind. A search engine is a website, like Google, that finds information for you. Look for a sentence that shows people trusting Google more than their own memory.
Find the study in paragraph 2
Paragraph 2 tells about an experiment with two groups. “The Internet group was required to use the search engine Google to answer eight challenging trivia questions.” The memory group could use only what they already knew. Then came a second round of “notably easier questions.” This time, each group could choose whether to use Google.
Read the results
Group Round 1 Round 2: chose Google Internet group had to use Google 83 percent Memory group memory only 63 percent The round 2 questions were easier. People had a better chance of knowing the answers on their own. Yet the Internet group still turned to Google more often. That is 20 more people out of every 100. Using Google first seems to have made them lean on it instead of their own memory.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. It says the Internet is “an integral component,” or a key part, of daily life. It says nothing about memory.
- B is wrong. It gives a rule of the study: what the Internet group had to do in round 1. A rule is not a result, so it can’t show an effect.
- C is right. It gives the result. The group that had used Google kept choosing it, even when the questions got easier.
- D is wrong. It tells about the typing task in a different study. That study tested memory, but no search engine was used.
Watch out: B is tempting because it names Google and the same study. But it only tells what people were told to do, not what they chose.
Choose the answer
Only C shows what people did once they were free to choose. The Internet group leaned on Google more than the memory group did. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong answer, since it comes from the same study. But B only tells what the Internet group had to do at the start. C shows what happened next. Given a choice, 83 percent of that group still used Google, but only 63 percent of the memory group did. That gap is the evidence.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “A Memory Revolution” as printed (pages 3–4)
Question 71 of 92
2023 Test A English, question 48Passage Excerpt from Winter Wheat
Excerpt from Winter Wheat
by Mildred Walker
Ellen, the narrator, is preparing to leave her parents and the family farm for college the next day.
I love Dad’s way of talking that makes him seem different from other ranchers. He’s lived here twenty-three years, but he still says “back East where I come from.” He’s the one who gets excited when I do about spring coming or a serial running in the magazine we’re both reading, but it’s what Mom says that I depend on. When Mom used to say “Don’t worry” about my pet chicken or dog or new calf, it always got well. Dad is always talking of going some place, not now, but next year, maybe. Mom seems to think of nothing farther away than today or perhaps yesterday or tomorrow morning.
Mom folded the ironing board and put it inside their bedroom that was just off the kitchen. She carried in the freshly ironed clothes. Dad went back to his paper. When Mom came back she took beans from the cupboard to soak for tomorrow. Dad always said Mom could make all the dishes he’d had back in Vermont as well as though she were a New Englander herself, instead of a Russian. All of a sudden, I realized that tomorrow when those beans would be ready to eat I’d be going away. It gave me a funny feeling.
“I’ll be taking the train tomorrow night,” I said aloud, more to hear it myself.
“We can drive you into town in the afternoon,” Dad said, dropping his paper on the floor.
“There’s no need to go to town; she can catch the train at Gotham just as well. We haven’t nothing to take us into town for,” Mom said.
“Well, we don’t have to decide tonight,” Dad said, but I knew he wanted to go into Clark City. It wouldn’t be so flat as just seeing me go off on the train from Gotham. My going away was hard on both of them; they were so different—and I was part of them both. It made me uncomfortable to think of leaving them.
While I was getting ready for bed in my room that’s off the front room, I saw how it would be if I left from town. We’d go in right after dinner and go around to the stores, Dad going one way and Mom and I another. Dad would probably have his hair cut at the barbershop and stop in the bank and meet someone he knew to talk to. Then we’d meet at the big store on the corner and go to the cafeteria for supper. The train stops ten minutes or so at the station in town and there are other people and excitement and you have time to wave from the platform and then again from your window by your seat. We went to the station in Clark City to see the Goodals off when they went back to Iowa.
If I left from Gotham, we’d just drive down in the truck and wait till the train came. It only stops long enough for you to get on and you hardly have time to taste the flavor of going away.
I sat on the bed in my pyjamas with my arms around my knees. I couldn’t keep from thinking of that time Dad went back East. I tried to, and then I just sat still and looked straight at it. Sometimes that’s better than working so hard to keep from looking at what’s in your mind.
Dad went all the way back to Vermont. . . . It was in November and it was already dark when the train came through Gotham. Even now, I could feel how cold and dark it was. I held Mom’s hand. Dad was so dressed-up he seemed strange. . . . We stood there without saying anything until Dad told Mom to remember to call Mr. Bardich, our neighbor, if the cow didn’t calve tomorrow.
“I’ll manage,” Mom snapped back.
“I wish you could go, Anna,” Dad said to Mom, “and we could take Ellen.” . . .
“Good-by, Anna Petrovna,” he said, looking at Mom. I had never heard him call her by two names before.
“Good-by,” Mom said, standing still, without smiling.
Then he was gone and the crossroads were darker than ever. The train light shone on the high window in the top of the grain elevator for a moment and then that too was dark. We got into our old Ford and Mom drove back to the house. My throat ached all the way. The name Dad had called Mom kept saying itself in my ears: “Anna Petrovna, Anna Petrovna.” . . .
Our house seemed lonely when we came back to it. It seemed to be hiding under the coulee. I went with Mom to put the truck in the barn that was bigger than the house. I think Mom was prouder of our barn than the house, anyway. We walked back to look at the cow that was going to calve. She was just a big light blob in the dark, waiting. I had thought she was exciting this morning, but now she seemed sad, too.
The wind blew when we walked across the open space to the house and I couldn’t help shivering with the cold. Inside the house it was warm, but empty.
“Bring your nightgown in here and I heat you some milk,” Mom said.
I drank the milk sitting on a stool in front of the stove. It tasted good, but the lonely ache in my throat was still there. I picked up my clothes and hung them neatly behind the stove and put my cup on the sink board. Mom was fixing oatmeal for tomorrow morning.
“Good night, Mom,” I said almost timidly, standing beside her. She seemed wrapped around in a kind of strangeness. Then she turned around and drew me to her. The front of her dress was warm from the stove. I felt the comfortable heat through my gown. She laid her hand against my face and it felt rough and hard but firm. I dared ask her something I wanted to know.
“Mom, was that really your name—what Dad called you?”
Her voice sounded surprised. “Why, Yeléna, you know that; Anna Petrovna. You know I am born in Russia, in Seletskoe.”
“Yes, but I didn’t know your other name,” I said.
“Anna Petrovna Webb.” She pronounced it slowly. “Once I think what a funny name Ben Webb is!” She laughed. Her laugh was warm and low like our kitchen, and comfortable. The house seemed natural and right again. . . .
But now that I am grown, I feel the wall of strangeness between them, more than when I was a child. I wondered how they would get along without me.
From WINTER WHEAT by Mildred Walker, published by University of Nebraska Press. Copyright © 1944 by Harcourt, Brace and Company, Inc. Copyright renewed 1971 by Mildred Walker. All rights reserved.
serial: story published in short segments at regular intervals
coulee: small gulch or ravine
Question
Which sentence from the excerpt provides evidence that Ellen has a lot in common with her father?
- A“He’s the one who gets excited when I do about spring coming or a serial running in the magazine we’re both reading. . . .” (paragraph 1)
- B“ ‘We can drive you into town in the afternoon,’ Dad said, dropping his paper on the floor.” (paragraph 4)
- C“ ‘Well, we don’t have to decide tonight,’ Dad said, but I knew he wanted to go into Clark City.” (paragraph 6)
- D“I wondered how they would get along without me.” (paragraph 25)
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks which sentence from the excerpt provides evidence that Ellen has a lot in common with her father.
A. CORRECT. This sentence from paragraph 1 shows that Ellen and her father both get excited about the coming of spring and share an interest in reading magazine serials (stories published in serial installments). The sentence implies that Ellen and her father have shared likes and interests, and therefore, it provides clear evidence that they have a lot in common.
B. Incorrect. While this sentence from paragraph 4 highlights the warm relationship between Ellen and her father and shows that he would like to take her to the train station in town, it does not provide clear evidence that they share a lot in common.
C. Incorrect. Although this sentence from paragraph 6 implies that Ellen understands her father well enough to intuit his preference to go to the train station in town (“but I knew he wanted to go into Clark City”), their closeness is not clear evidence that Ellen and her father have a lot in common.
D. Incorrect. While this sentence from paragraph 25 shows Ellen’s concern about the effect that her leaving the farm will have on her parents, it does not provide clear evidence that Ellen and her father have a lot in common.
Question analysis
This evidence question on an excerpt from Mildred Walker’s novel Winter Wheat, in which Ellen gets ready to leave her parents’ farm for college, asks which sentence shows that Ellen has a lot in common with her father. The four quotations, from paragraphs 1, 4, 6 and 25, all involve Ellen and her family, so each must be checked for what it really shows.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Finding the sentence that supports an idea about a character is standard grade 7 evidence work. The novel’s language is plain and the idea concrete, but every quotation involves Ellen’s family, so each must be read in its paragraph before it is judged.
- 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
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 6, 80 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 88 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
The question asks for likeness, not affection, and three of the quotations show Ellen’s ties to her family in other ways: her father offers to drive her into town, she knows a wish he does not voice, and she wonders how her parents will manage once she is gone. Only one sentence shows father and daughter reacting the same way to the same things, the coming of spring and a magazine story. Students who read “a lot in common” as “close” are drawn to the line where Ellen reads his mind.
Every choice must be checked minor Choosing the answer
Every quotation involves Ellen and her parents, and three show a bond of another kind, an offer of a ride, a guessed wish, a worry about leaving, so each must be tested for shared tastes rather than care. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The right sentence neither names Dad nor says “in common”: students must trace “He’s” back to Dad earlier in paragraph 1 and hear shared interests in “when I do” and “we’re both reading.” (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Decide what having a lot in common would mean for two people, then reread each quotation in its paragraph and ask whether it shows that or some other side of how Ellen and her father relate.
Traps
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
The wrong answers, classified
B Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Takes Dad’s quick offer to drive Ellen into town, made as he drops his paper, as a sign that the two are alike, but it shows his care for her, not tastes they share.
C Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Sees Ellen reading Dad’s unspoken wish to go into Clark City, a send-off she also prefers, but one shared preference shows that she understands him, not that they have a lot in common.
D True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Picks Ellen’s closing worry about how her parents will manage without her, a true picture of her concern, but it covers both parents and shows nothing she shares with Dad.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This is an evidence question. You need the sentence that shows Ellen has “a lot in common” with her father. Two people have a lot in common when they like the same things and share the same interests. Being close, or caring about each other, is not the same thing. Keep that difference in mind.
Look at the sentence in paragraph 1
In paragraph 1, Ellen is telling about her dad, so “He’s” means Dad. She says he “gets excited when I do about spring coming or a serial running in the magazine we’re both reading.” A serial is a story printed in parts, with a new part in each issue of a magazine.
Work out what it means
The words “when I do” mean Dad gets excited at the same times Ellen does. They both look forward to spring. They both read the same magazine story and enjoy it. Those are two interests they share. In the same paragraph, Ellen compares her parents. Dad is the one who shares her excitement. Mom is the one whose words she counts on.
Check each choice
- A is right. It names two things that excite both of them: spring and a magazine story.
- B is wrong. In paragraph 4, Dad quickly offers to drive Ellen into town for her train. That shows he cares, not that they like the same things.
- C is wrong. In paragraph 6, Ellen says, “but I knew he wanted to go into Clark City.” She understands him well. But knowing what someone wants is not sharing his interests.
- D is wrong. In paragraph 25, “they” means Mom and Dad. Ellen worries about both. That is not something she shares with Dad.
Watch out: C is tempting because it shows Ellen and Dad are close. But being close is not having a lot in common.
Choose the answer
Only A shows Ellen and her dad getting excited about the same things: spring and a story they both read. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong answer. It shows that Ellen can tell what her dad wants without his saying it. That proves they are close. But the question asks what they have in common. A names two shared interests: spring coming and a serial “we’re both reading.”
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from Winter Wheat” as shown on the test
Question 72 of 92
2023 Test B English, question 11Passage Excerpt from “The Food Business Incubator”
Excerpt from “The Food Business Incubator”
by Mandalit Del Barco
“La Cocina” means “the kitchen” in Spanish. It’s also the name of a business incubator1 based in San Francisco’s Mission District. Since it began in 2005, it’s been helping local food entrepreneurs, many of whom are low-income immigrant women, develop their small businesses.
Over the years, many of its alumni have found success: more than 50 chefs in its program have become self-sufficient business owners, and many of them have opened their own brick-and-mortar restaurants. Two alumnae of its culinary program . . . were even recognized as semi-finalists for prestigious James Beard awards.2
A new cookbook, We Are La Cocina: Recipes in Pursuit of the American Dream, tells some of their stories.
Executive director Caleb Zigas says the nonprofit La Cocina grew out of two grassroots economic development organizations3 who found many people cooking at their homes and selling food on the streets. The vendors needed an affordable commercial kitchen space and technical assistance in order for their businesses to be legally viable. La Cocina provided just such a space, in addition to helping them develop business plans, pull city permits and more.
Zigas says as many as eight businesses can work in the kitchen space at La Cocina at any one time. Some can prep for a farmers’ market sale, corporate catering gigs or weddings, while others might be making and packaging their food products.
“It’s just an incredible and exciting range of techniques, flavors, perspectives, age, language. And that’s a really beautiful thing,” he says. . . .
Twice a year, La Cocina hosts “F&B: Voices from the Kitchen,” a storytelling project where their chefs can tell their own stories, as they do in the new cookbook. Some of the chefs will be on tour to promote the book, whose proceeds will go to support La Cocina entrepreneurs.
NPR4 caught up with . . . La Cocina chefs, who shared their stories:
Mariko Grady, Aedan Fermented Foods
At La Cocina, you can often hear Mariko Grady singing or humming as she prepares miso, koji, and amasake. Her fermented products come in four different flavors, including mushroom and chicken, to be used in soups and sauces. She originally brought the fermenting rice and barley koji seeds from Japan, where she had a 30-year career as a singer and dancer with the prestigious modern theatrical dance group she founded, Pappa Tarahumara. They performed around the world, and 16 years ago, had a one-night show in San Francisco. The man who would become her husband was in the audience. She soon joined him in San Francisco, often returning to Tokyo to rehearse. But after the earthquake and tsunami hit Japan in 2011, her company disbanded. . . . Grady focused on nourishing her family and creating a line of fermented products that she sells online, at local Bay Area stores and at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market. She began at La Cocina in 2012 and named her business after her son, Aedan. (Written in Kanji characters, the name means “wisdom” and “handed down from generation to generation.”) . . . Her fermented products are “also full of wisdom about how to relate to nature and how to create a healthy life,” she says. . . .
Shani Jones, Peaches Patties
Shani Jones is a native San Franciscan. Her father was born in New Orleans, her mother, in Jamaica. She says their home was always filled with a variety of spices and dishes like jerk chicken and Jamaican patties—savory pastries filled with beef or chicken. Jones says she learned to cook from her mother, whose nickname was Peaches. After returning from college in Atlanta, Jones worked on her doctorate in organizational leadership and management while driving a Lyft5 car. She often told passengers about her idea of opening a catering company with her mom’s recipes. They steered her to La Cocina, where she developed her own business, named after her mother. Five years later, she caters and runs a kiosk6 at a small food cooperative in Bernal Heights, where some of her handmade patties have an Ethiopian twist, “because my husband is Ethiopian.” Jones has big aspirations for Peaches Patties: “The ultimate goal,” she says, “is to be the patty kingpin7 of the West Coast.”
From “The Food Business Incubator That Helps Immigrant Women Pursue The American Dream” by Mandalit Del Barco from WEEKEND EDITION SUNDAY, June 19, 2019. Copyright © 2019 NPR.
QUALIFICATIONS FOR LA COCINA APPLICANTS
| Level of Income | La Cocina considers assets and access to opportunity when screening applicants. La Cocina’s mission is to support entrepreneurs who face barriers to becoming successful in the food industry. Applicants must be classified as low- or very-low-income earners according to the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Guidelines for San Francisco. |
|---|---|
| Business Plan | Applicants must have a business plan that is ready to be put into action. La Cocina will help applicants refine an existing business plan. Applicants without a business plan should contact one of La Cocina’s partner organizations for guidance in developing one. |
| Viable Product | The applicant’s food must not only be delicious but also stand out. For a business to make a profit, there also has to be a market for the food. |
| Entrepreneurial Work Ethic | La Cocina is excited to work with entrepreneurs who are motivated and passionate about growing their business. Succeeding in the food industry requires a lot of heart and hard work. |
| Community Spirit | The 30+ entrepreneurs who share La Cocina’s kitchen are from many different backgrounds. La Cocina values the community it has created and expects each entrepreneur to be active in bringing the spirit of La Cocina to the wider world. In order to succeed in the La Cocina kitchen, accepted applicants must be flexible and willing to work closely with others. |
Source: La Cocina
1business incubator: company that helps new and startup companies develop by providing services such as management training and office space
2James Beard awards: an award named after American cook and author James Beard, considered one of the highest honors in the culinary industry
3economic development organizations: organizations whose mission is to promote economic improvement within a specific geographical area
4NPR: National Public Radio, a nonprofit media organization that produces and distributes news and cultural programming
5Lyft: ride-sharing company where people use their own cars to provide rides to customers
6kiosk: cart or small structure with one or more open sides that is used to vend merchandise or services
7kingpin: the leader in a group or undertaking
Question
Paragraph 4 contributes to the development of ideas about La Cocina in paragraph 1 by
- Aspecifying how La Cocina helps local food entrepreneurs become successful.
- Bexplaining what kind of goals La Cocina tries to set for local food entrepreneurs.
- Cproviding background information about local food entrepreneurs in San Francisco.
- Ddescribing how Caleb Zigas discovered the need to provide assistance to local food entrepreneurs.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how paragraph 4 contributes to the development of ideas about La Cocina in paragraph 1.
A. CORRECT. Paragraph 4 lists ways that La Cocina provides support to local food entrepreneurs. This supports the statement in paragraph 1 that La Cocina has been “helping local food entrepreneurs, many of whom are low-income immigrant women, develop their small businesses.”
B. Incorrect. Paragraph 1 simply states that La Cocina tries to help local food entrepreneurs develop their businesses, but neither paragraph describes or mentions any goals that La Cocina sets for local food entrepreneurs.
C. Incorrect. While paragraph 4 mentions some background information on where local food entrepreneurs were found, these details do not directly support any ideas in paragraph 1.
D. Incorrect. The description of the process by which Caleb Zigas realized there was a need for La Cocina provides background for the organization, but it does not directly support any ideas in paragraph 1.
Question analysis
This text-structure question asks how paragraph 4 of the La Cocina article contributes to the development of ideas about the nonprofit in paragraph 1. Paragraph 4 gives executive director Caleb Zigas’s account of how La Cocina started and whom it served, so students must set the two paragraphs side by side and decide what the later one adds.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how one paragraph develops an idea from another is core grade 7 structure work. Both paragraphs are short and plain, but paragraph 4 holds several kinds of information and several choices echo its details, so close checking is needed.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what moderate
- Every choice must be checked minor
- Evidence in several places minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 1057 words; question and choices: about grade 12, 61 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
Paragraph 4 opens with background, the grassroots groups that found people cooking at home and selling on the streets, and only its last sentence says what La Cocina provided. Students who stop at the opening find the background choice accurate and the Zigas choice plausible, since his name leads the paragraph. The question rewards asking which part of paragraph 4 builds on paragraph 1’s claim about helping entrepreneurs develop businesses, and that part is the list of services.
How, not what moderate Working it out
The stem asks how paragraph 4 develops paragraph 1, so students must match paragraph 1’s general “helping local food entrepreneurs … develop their small businesses” to paragraph 4’s specifics: kitchen space, business plans, city permits. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Every choice must be checked minor Choosing the answer
Paragraph 4 mixes an origin story told by Zigas, the vendors’ needs and La Cocina’s services, and the wrong choices draw on the first two, so each must be checked for who did what. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Evidence in several places minor Working it out
The two paragraphs are separated by the alumni successes and the cookbook, so paragraph 1’s statement of what La Cocina does must be carried across them and set beside paragraph 4. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Write down what paragraph 1 says La Cocina does, then go through paragraph 4 sentence by sentence and ask which sentences expand on that statement; check who does what in each choice.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
The wrong answers, classified
B Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Equates help with “business plans” with setting goals and so credits paragraph 4 with explaining La Cocina’s targets for entrepreneurs, a purpose neither paragraph serves.
C True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Rightly notes that paragraph 4 describes people cooking at home and selling food on the streets, but that background is about the vendors and adds nothing to paragraph 1’s point about La Cocina.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Reads “Caleb Zigas says” as Zigas making the discovery, but in paragraph 4 two grassroots organizations found the home cooks, and Zigas only tells how La Cocina grew out of them.
Working it out, step by step
Understand the question
This is a question about how a text is put together. You need to see how paragraph 4 builds on an idea from paragraph 1. Find the idea in paragraph 1 first. Then ask what paragraph 4 adds to it.
Find the idea in paragraph 1
Paragraph 1 says that since 2005, La Cocina has been “helping local food entrepreneurs, many of whom are low-income immigrant women, develop their small businesses.” An entrepreneur is a person who starts a business. Notice that this statement is general. It tells you that La Cocina helps, but not how.
See what paragraph 4 adds
Paragraph 4 opens with a little history. Two grassroots groups “found many people cooking at their homes and selling food on the streets.” (Grassroots means started by ordinary people in a community.) Then the paragraph gets specific. La Cocina gave those cooks a kitchen, “in addition to helping them develop business plans, pull city permits and more.” Those are the actual ways it helps.
Check each choice
- A is right. Paragraph 4 names the help: a kitchen, business plans and city permits. That shows how La Cocina helps cooks succeed.
- B is wrong. Neither paragraph mentions goals that La Cocina sets for the cooks.
- C is wrong. Paragraph 4 does describe the cooks selling on the streets. But that is background about the cooks. It doesn’t build on paragraph 1’s idea about La Cocina.
- D is wrong. Zigas only tells the story. In paragraph 4, it is the two grassroots groups that found the cooks. Zigas discovers nothing there.
Watch out: C is tempting because its facts are true. A true detail is still wrong if it doesn’t answer the question.
Choose the answer
Paragraph 1 says that La Cocina helps. Paragraph 4 spells out exactly how it helps. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
The strongest wrong choice is C. It describes the start of paragraph 4 correctly. But the question asks how paragraph 4 develops an idea about La Cocina. Only the list of services does that. It turns paragraph 1’s general word, helping, into real examples.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “The Food Business Incubator”” as printed (pages 158–160)
Question 73 of 92
2023 Test B English, question 13Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from “The Food Business Incubator””.
Question
The description of Mariko Grady’s background in paragraph 9 contributes to a central idea in the excerpt by
- Ademonstrating what people are looking for when they come to La Cocina.
- Bexplaining why La Cocina is the best option for people starting out in the food business.
- Cshowing how La Cocina can help people find success in the food business even though they have a background in something different.
- Dconfirming that La Cocina was originally established for small business owners who are looking to expand their services.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how the description of Mariko Grady’s background in paragraph 9 contributes to a central idea in the excerpt.
A. Incorrect. The paragraph about Mariko Grady describes her earlier success in the field of theatrical dance and how she later started her own small cooking business. It does not describe what she was looking for when she came to La Cocina.
B. Incorrect. The excerpt does not argue that La Cocina is the best option for people starting out in the food business, and the description in paragraph 9 does not support that idea.
C. CORRECT. The detailed background story of Mariko Grady describes that Grady started a small food business after working as “a singer and dancer with the prestigious modern theatrical dance group she founded” and then, after that ended, created a fermented food product line. This information contributes to a central idea in the excerpt that many of the people working with La Cocina, like Grady, “needed an affordable commercial kitchen space and technical assistance in order for their businesses to be legally viable. La Cocina provided just such a space, in addition to helping them develop business plans, pull city permits and more” (paragraph 4).
D. Incorrect. While Mariko Grady is now a food business owner that La Cocina has helped since 2012, Grady’s story does more to illustrate how people from non-business backgrounds can receive special support from La Cocina in order to do more with their business.
Question analysis
This central-idea question turns to paragraph 9 of the La Cocina article, the profile of Mariko Grady, who makes miso, koji and other fermented foods for her company, Aedan Fermented Foods. It asks how the description of her background contributes to a central idea of the excerpt, so students must sum up a long life story and decide what it illustrates about the incubator.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Connecting one person’s story to a central idea is regular grade 7 reading work. Paragraph 9 is long and packed with names, places and Japanese food words, but the four choices differ clearly once the story is summed up.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A lot to read moderate
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 10, 1057 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 85 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
Grady’s profile is a life story, and the question asks what it shows about La Cocina, which the paragraph mentions only at its start and in one dated sentence. Students who sum it up as a dancer turned food maker find the answer quickly. Those who skim may pick a choice that sounds like a fair lesson about the program, such as what newcomers seek or why it was founded, without checking that the paragraph shows it.
A lot to read moderate Understanding the question
Paragraph 9 runs about 215 words and packs in miso, koji and amasake, a 30-year stage career, a husband met at a show, the 2011 tsunami and the meaning of “Aedan,” so its point must be sifted from many facts. (Kintsch, 1998; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The paragraph never says that La Cocina helped someone from another field succeed; students must set Grady’s career as “a singer and dancer” beside the business she built after joining in 2012 and draw that conclusion. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Sum up paragraph 9 in a sentence of your own, then test each choice twice: does Grady’s story actually show it, and does the rest of the excerpt treat it as a central idea?
Traps
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Assumes that a profile of one member reveals what everyone hopes to find at La Cocina, but paragraph 9 tells Grady’s past and her products, never what she was seeking when she joined.
B Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Inflates one success story into a ranking, though the excerpt never compares La Cocina with any other path into the food business, so “the best option” goes beyond it.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Echoes paragraph 1’s help for small businesses but makes Grady’s story proof of La Cocina’s founding purpose, though paragraph 4 traces it to home cooks and street vendors who needed kitchen space.
Working it out, step by step
Decide what to look for
Paragraph 9 tells the life story of Mariko Grady. You need to decide what her story adds to a central idea, a big idea of the whole excerpt. First, sum up her story in one sentence. Then see what it shows about La Cocina.
Pick out the key facts
Paragraph 9 is long, so look for the main facts. In Japan, Grady had “a 30-year career as a singer and dancer.” After the 2011 earthquake and tsunami, her dance company broke up. Then she began making fermented foods, like miso. These foods are left to change slowly, with help from tiny living things. “She began at La Cocina in 2012.” Now she sells her products “online, at local Bay Area stores and at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market.”
Sum up her story
Here is her story in one sentence: Grady was a singer and dancer for 30 years, then built a food business with La Cocina’s help. Food was not her first career. Yet she now sells a whole line of products. Her story is one example of a central idea: La Cocina helps people grow food businesses.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. The paragraph never says what Grady hoped to find when she joined.
- B is wrong. The excerpt never compares La Cocina with other programs, so it can’t call it “the best option.”
- C is right. Grady came from dance, a very different field, and she found success in food.
- D is wrong. Paragraph 4 explains how La Cocina began: groups found home cooks and street sellers who needed a kitchen. Grady’s story says nothing about that start.
Watch out: A sounds like a fair lesson. But check that the paragraph actually shows it, and this one does not.
Choose the answer
Grady’s story shows someone from a whole different career succeeding in food with La Cocina behind her. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong answer, because one member’s story can seem to show what all members want. But paragraph 9 tells Grady’s past and her products, not her hopes. C matches what the paragraph does show: a dancer who built a food business.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 74 of 92
2023 Test B English, question 32Passage Excerpt from “How We Made the First Flight”
Excerpt from “How We Made the First Flight”
by Orville Wright
In 1903 brothers Wilbur and Orville Wright conducted experiments related to flying machines. These experiments would eventually lead to air travel becoming a reliable form of transportation.
During the night of December 16, 1903, a strong cold wind blew from the north. When we arose on the morning of the 17th, the puddles of water, which had been standing about camp since the recent rains, were covered with ice. The wind had a velocity of 10 to 12 meters per second (22 to 27 miles an hour). We thought it would die down before long, and so remained indoors the early part of the morning. But when ten o’clock arrived, and the wind was as brisk as ever, we decided that we had better get the machine out and attempt a flight. We hung out the signal for the men of the Life Saving Station.1 We thought that by facing the flyer into a strong wind, there ought to be no trouble in launching it from the level ground about camp. We realized the difficulties of flying in so high a wind, but estimated that the added dangers in flight would be partly compensated for by the slower speed in landing.
Final Preparations
We laid the track on a smooth stretch of ground about one hundred feet north of the new building. The biting cold wind made work difficult, and we had to warm up frequently in our living room, where we had a good fire in an improvised stove made of a large carbide2 can. By the time all was ready, J. T. Daniels, W. S. Dough and A. D. Etheridge, members of the Kill Devil3 Life Saving Station; W. C. Brinkley of Manteo, and Johnny Moore, a boy from Nags Head,4 had arrived.
We had a “Richard” hand anemometer with which we measured the velocity of the wind. Measurements made just before starting the first flight showed velocities of 11 to 12 meters per second, or 24 to 27 miles per hour. . . .
Audacity—and Calculation
Wilbur having used his turn in the unsuccessful attempt on the 14th, the right to the first trial now belonged to me. After running the motor a few minutes to heat it up, I released the wire that held the machine to the track, and the machine started forward in the wind. Wilbur ran at the side of the machine, holding the wing to balance it on the track. Unlike the start on the 14th, made in a calm, the machine, facing a 27-mile wind, started very slowly. Wilbur was able to stay with it till it lifted from the track after a forty-foot run. One of the Life Saving men snapped the camera for us, taking a picture just as the machine had reached the end of the track and had risen to a height of about two feet. The slow forward speed of the machine over the ground is clearly shown in the picture by Wilbur’s attitude. He stayed along beside the machine without any effort.
Flight
The course of the flight up and down was exceedingly erratic, partly due to the irregularity of the air, and partly to lack of experience in handling this machine. The control of the front rudder was difficult on account of its being balanced too near the center. This gave it a tendency to turn itself when started; so that it turned too far on one side and then too far on the other. As a result the machine would rise suddenly to about ten feet, and then as suddenly dart for the ground. A sudden dart when a little over a hundred feet from the end of the track, or a little over 120 feet from the point at which it rose into the air, ended the flight. As the velocity of the wind was over 35 feet per second and the speed of the machine over the ground against this wind ten feet per second, the speed of the machine relative to the air was over 45 feet per second, and the length of the flight was equivalent to a flight of 540 feet made in calm air. This flight lasted only 12 seconds, but it was nevertheless the first in the history of the world in which a machine carrying a man had raised itself by its own power into the air in full flight, had sailed forward without reduction of speed and had finally landed at a point as high as that from which it started.
From “How We Made the First Flight” by Orville Wright—Public Domain/Federal Aviation Administration
1Life Saving Station: one of the rescue stations along the Atlantic coastline that provided assistance to mariners in distress
2carbide: a very hard material composed of carbon and other heavy metals
3Kill Devil: the town of Kill Devil Hills in eastern North Carolina
4Nags Head: a town in eastern North Carolina
Question
Read this sentence from paragraph 5.
A sudden dart when a little over a hundred feet from the end of the track, or a little over 120 feet from the point at which it rose into the air, ended the flight.
How does the sentence contribute to the paragraph?
- AIt details the need for the pilot to have quick reflexes while flying the machine.
- BIt presents the idea that the difficulty of operating the machine shortened the flight.
- CIt describes the shift in wind speed that made flying nearly impossible.
- DIt provides an overview of the flight’s progression from takeoff to landing.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks how the sentence contributes to paragraph 5.
A. Incorrect. The sentence focuses on the “sudden dart” of the plane, which ended the flight. According to the paragraph, this sudden dart was caused by the difficulty of controlling the front rudder “on account of its being balanced too near the center.” The sentence does not detail the need for the pilot to have quick reflexes.
B. CORRECT. The sentence presents the idea that the difficulty of operating the machine brought the flight to a quicker end than it might otherwise have had. According to paragraph 5, “control of the front rudder was difficult on account of its being balanced too near the center. This gave it a tendency to turn itself when started.” These sentences show that one such “dart” shortened the flight.
C. Incorrect. Although it describes the abrupt end of the flight, the sentence does not describe the shift in wind speed. The word “dart” refers instead to a change in the height, or altitude, of the machine.
D. Incorrect. Although it includes the detail that the flight ended “a little over 120 feet from the point at which it rose into the air,” the sentence does not provide an overview of the entire flight’s progression. The sentence from paragraph 5 omits the flight’s takeoff and only describes its rather abrupt ending.
Question analysis
This question on “How We Made the First Flight,” Orville Wright’s account of the first airplane flight in 1903, quotes the sentence from paragraph 5 reporting that a sudden dart ended the flight a little over 120 feet from where the machine rose into the air. Students must decide what the sentence contributes to the paragraph, which also traces the machine’s erratic course and its speed against the wind.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining what one sentence adds to its paragraph is regular grade 7 work. This sentence is long, measured in feet and written in early twentieth-century prose, and its role becomes clear only within the paragraph, which keeps the task typical but careful.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what moderate
- Complex sentences minor
- Reading between the lines minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 7, 816 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 100 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
Read alone, the sentence is just a report of where the flight stopped, so its contribution has to come from the paragraph around it. The two distances, from the end of the track and from the point of liftoff, make it look like a start-to-finish summary, which is the strongest pull. Students who reread the sentences about the badly balanced rudder see that the dart ending the flight was one of those control problems, so the sentence shows the flight cut short by them.
How, not what moderate Working it out
The question asks what the sentence does in paragraph 5, and its role shows only beside the sentences before it: the rudder balanced “too near the center,” its tendency to turn itself, and the darts toward the ground. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Complex sentences minor Understanding the question
The sentence’s subject, “A sudden dart,” and its verb, “ended,” are 29 words apart, separated by two distance phrases joined by “or,” so a reader can lose sight of the main statement. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
The sentence names no cause; students must infer from “As a result the machine would rise suddenly … and then as suddenly dart for the ground” that this dart came from the hard-to-control rudder. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Reread the sentences on either side of the quoted one, say in your own words what this sentence adds to them, and reject any choice that claims details the sentence does not contain.
Traps
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reasons from the erratic course and the “lack of experience” that piloting needed quick reflexes, but the sentence reports only how the flight ended and says nothing about the pilot’s reactions.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Connects the dart with the “irregularity of the air” and the wind figures that follow, but the dart was the machine diving toward the ground, and the sentence mentions no wind.
D Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Sees the end of the track and the point of liftoff named in the sentence and takes it for an overview of the whole flight, though both serve only to locate where it ended.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what one sentence does for its paragraph. The sentence says a “sudden dart” ended the flight. To see its job, read the sentences just before it.
Read the sentences before it
Paragraph 5 explains why the flight was hard to control. “The control of the front rudder was difficult on account of its being balanced too near the center.” A rudder is a flat part that swings to steer. Because it was badly balanced, it turned too far one way, then too far the other. “As a result the machine would rise suddenly to about ten feet, and then as suddenly dart for the ground.”
Work out what the sentence adds
Here, a dart is a quick dive toward the ground. The sentence says one of these dives, a little over 120 feet from where the machine took off, “ended the flight.” So the dart was not just bad luck. It came from the steering problem just described. The sentence shows the result: the hard-to-control machine cut its own flight short.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. Reflexes are quick, automatic reactions. The sentence never mentions the pilot or how fast he reacts.
- B is right. The dart came from the hard steering, and it ended the flight early.
- C is wrong. The sentence says nothing about wind. The dart was the machine diving, not the wind changing.
- D is wrong. The sentence tells only how the flight ended. The two distances just show where it stopped.
Watch out: D is tempting because the sentence names both the end of the track and the point where the machine “rose into the air.” But those places only measure where the flight ended.
Choose the answer
The sentence shows that the machine’s steering problem brought the flight to a quick end. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest wrong answer, since the sentence gives two distances that seem to cover the whole flight. But it skips the takeoff and the time in the air. B explains why the sentence matters in paragraph 5: it shows the result of the hard-to-control rudder.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “How We Made the First Flight”” as printed (pages 13–14)
Question 75 of 92
2018 Test A English, question 15Passage An Early Warning
An Early Warning
One of the books that has done the most to alert the world to the dangers of environmental degradation is George Perkins Marsh’s Man and Nature. Its message—that Western society is in the process of causing irreparable harm to the environment—greatly influenced ecologists during the beginning of the modern environmentalist movement in the 1960s. Marsh was not, however, part of this movement. Surprisingly, Man and Nature was first published in 1864.
Marsh first observed the environmentally destructive effects of human activities while growing up in Vermont in the early nineteenth century. The heavy demand for firewood had depleted the forests, and extensive sheep grazing had stripped the land. The result was flooding and soil erosion. Furthermore, streams were fouled by wastes dumped from numerous mills and dye houses.
Much later in his life, after careers in law, business, farming, and politics, Marsh served as ambassador to Italy. There he noticed land abuse similar to what he had seen in Vermont. Overgrazing and forest mismanagement had rendered areas that had been productive farmland since the days of the Roman Empire desolate. Marsh attributed this to what he called “man’s ignorant disregard for the laws of nature.”
In Italy, Marsh began to organize his observations and theories. He wrote in a way intended to educate readers about the impact of industrial and agricultural practices on the environment. In Man and Nature, he evaluated the important relationships between animals and plants, discussed forestry practices in great detail, and analyzed the ways natural water supplies are affected by human use.
Man and Nature challenged the popular belief that nature can heal any damage that people inflict upon it. Marsh argued that people may use and enjoy, but not destroy, the riches of the earth.
Furthermore, he asserted that everything in nature is significant and that even the tiniest organism affects the fragile environmental balance. His belief that drastic alteration of this balance would be dangerous is now accepted as a fundamental principle of modern environmental science.
Although he pointed out environmental damage caused by irresponsible human activities, Marsh did not oppose every human alteration to the environment. To him, the goal was proper management, not a return to wilderness conditions. People should consider the consequences of their actions, he wrote, and become “co-worker[s] with nature.” Marsh praised the Suez Canal, the human-made waterway between the Mediterranean Sea and the Gulf of Aden, as “the greatest and most truly cosmopolite physical improvement ever undertaken by man.” He believed that the advantages of the canal— improved transportation and commerce—would outweigh any environmental damage. Yet he also warned of possible unintended consequences, such as destructive plants and animals spreading from one body of water to the other.
Marsh was considered a radical thinker during his lifetime. By the late nineteenth century, however, his writings, along with those of John Muir, Henry David Thoreau, and others, had inspired what became known as the conservation movement. The conservationists of that time sought to educate the public that wilderness areas were worth preserving and were responsible for creating the National Park Service and the National Forest Service.
Question
Which of Marsh’s ideas most influenced the environmental movement of the 1960s?
- ASome human alterations to the environment are necessary.
- BPeople lack an understanding of the environment.
- CHuman activities could damage the environment.
- DEnvironmental degradation has been occurring for many years.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The answer is (C)
The question asks for the idea Marsh had that was the most influential on the movement in the 1960s. Marsh’s main contribution to the modern environmental movement—the idea that Western society is causing irreversible harm to the environment—is given in paragraph 1, making Option C correct.
Option A is incorrect because, while Marsh did believe that some human alterations to the environment are necessary (paragraph 7), the negative impact of human activity was his most influential idea.
Option B is incorrect because, while Marsh believed that people lacked an understanding of nature (paragraph 3), this belief is a detail in support of his overall claim.
Option D is incorrect because, while Marsh observed firsthand that environmental degradation had been occurring for many years (paragraph 3), that was not the focus of his most influential idea.
Question analysis
This reading question asks which of George Perkins Marsh's ideas most influenced the environmental movement of the 1960s, according to a passage about his book Man and Nature. All four choices are ideas the passage connects to Marsh, so students must find the one the text links to that later movement.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Identifying an idea that a text says shaped later events is routine grade 7 reading. Each choice is one of Marsh's real ideas, so the demand is matching the question to the passage's exact statement, not interpretation.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 1, recall and reproduction · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- The right answer is reworded moderate
- Every choice must be checked minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 12, 523 words; question and choices: about grade 12, 41 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
The link to the 1960s is stated outright in the second sentence of the passage, so a student who goes back to it can answer quickly. Points are lost by answering from memory, since every choice is a genuine Marsh idea, including his view that people misunderstand nature. Matching the paraphrase rather than the familiar wording is the whole task.
The right answer is reworded moderate Choosing the answer
The right choice restates paragraph 1's message, “causing irreparable harm to the environment”, in plain words, while wrong ones echo “environmental degradation” and “human alteration to the environment”. (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Every choice must be checked minor Choosing the answer
All four choices are ideas the passage connects to Marsh, so recognizing one as his is not enough; each must be checked for a link to the 1960s. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Strategy: Find where the passage mentions the movement of the 1960s and read exactly what it says influenced it, then match that wording to a choice.
Traps
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Word match: Repeats striking words or phrases from the text, so it looks supported, but its meaning does not fit the question.
The wrong answers, classified
A True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Recalls paragraph 7's point that Marsh accepted some changes to nature, such as the Suez Canal, a real view of his but not the message credited with shaping the 1960s.
B True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Remembers Marsh blaming “man's ignorant disregard for the laws of nature”, a real belief, but the passage ties the 1960s to his warning about harm, not to ignorance.
D Word match (Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Repeats “environmental degradation” from the passage's first sentence, so it looks anchored in paragraph 1, but long-standing damage is an observation, not the message that influenced ecologists.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
All four choices are ideas linked to Marsh. You need the one the passage says shaped the environmental movement of the 1960s. So find where the passage talks about the 1960s.
Find the 1960s in the passage
Paragraph 1 says: “Its message—that Western society is in the process of causing irreparable harm to the environment—greatly influenced ecologists during the beginning of the modern environmentalist movement in the 1960s.”
Put the sentence in plain words
“Its message” means the book’s main point. Irreparable means it can’t be repaired. Western society means the countries of Europe and North America. So the message was: people are doing damage to nature that can’t be undone. That message is what influenced the 1960s ecologists.
Check each choice
- C: “Human activities could damage the environment.” This says the same thing in simpler words.
- A: Marsh did accept some changes, like the Suez Canal (paragraph 7). But the passage doesn’t link that to the 1960s.
- B: Marsh did blame “man’s ignorant disregard for the laws of nature” (paragraph 3). But that is a reason for the harm, not the message that shaped the 1960s.
- D: “environmental degradation,” or damage, appears in paragraph 1. But saying damage has gone on for years is only an observation.
Watch out: B is a real belief of Marsh’s, so it feels right. Make sure a choice answers this question, about the 1960s.
Pick the answer
The passage directly says the message about harm influenced the 1960s. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong answer, because Marsh really did think people didn’t understand nature. But paragraph 1 says the message that influenced the 1960s was about harm: people were “causing irreparable harm to the environment.” C states that idea.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “An Early Warning” as printed (page 52)
Question 76 of 92
2018 Test A English, question 18Passage Champion of the Channel
Champion of the Channel
In 1926 an editor at the London Daily News predicted that Gertrude Ederle, an American swimmer with eighteen world records and three Olympic medals, would fail in her attempt to swim across the English Channel. He claimed that “even the most uncompromising champion of the rights and capacities of women must admit that in contests of physical skill, speed and endurance they must remain forever the weaker sex.” Yet, at only nineteen years old, Ederle not only became the first woman to accomplish this feat, she also broke the men’s record by two hours. Gertrude Ederle’s triumphant swim across the English Channel was a testimony to her determination, innovative spirit, and passion for swimming.
Crossing the English Channel is a daunting task for any swimmer. At its narrowest point, the channel measures twenty-one miles across. Its icy waters hover around sixty degrees Fahrenheit, and its unruly tides and currents toss swimmers about like bobbing corks. Stinging jellyfish, seaweed, and floating debris from shipwrecks and lost cargoes present added hazards.
For decades the channel’s perils have defeated countless swimmers. Ederle, too, failed in her first attempt to cross the channel in 1925. Just six miles short of finishing, she became ill, and her coach had to haul her out of the water. Undeterred, Ederle decided to try again. Ederle knew that if she did not complete the challenge this time, she might never get the opportunity to set this record, because a rival female swimmer was preparing to make her second attempt at the crossing as well.
To prepare for the marathon swim, Ederle found ways to improve her equipment. She and her sister Meg discovered that melted candle wax perfectly sealed goggle edges, effectively waterproofing Ederle’s goggles against hammering waves. The sisters also designed a two-piece silk swimsuit for Ederle. During her first channel-crossing attempt she had worn a standard one-piece swimsuit that, after the lengthy hours of swimming across the channel, had stretched out, filling with water and creating drag, making an already challenging task almost insurmountable. Unlike the cumbersome typical bathing suit, this silk invention weighed little and allowed for easy movement.
On August 6, 1926, Ederle waded into the channel near Cape Gris-Nez, France. At first she shivered in the bone-chilling water even though she had covered her body in eight layers of grease for insulation. Her limbs felt stiff. Her strokes were irregular. Driving forward, she fought to clear her mind and find what she called her “sphere,” a place where the sea became her only companion and the shrieks of gulls and the humming of boat engines faded away. Using a new overhand stroke called the American crawl, Ederle eventually settled into a steady pace, briskly breaking through waves.
Throughout Ederle’s swim, two tugboats accompanied her. One carried newspaper reporters who wired dispatches of her progress to shore. The other, displaying a sign that read “This way, ole kid!” with an arrow pointing forward, transported her coach, family, and friends. Her coach played songs, such as “Yes, We Have No Bananas,” on a phonograph so that Ederle could time her strokes to the rhythm. Using a net, her coach also passed her baby bottles of broth for nourishment.
For hours Ederle swam, dodging debris with an amused smile. However, as she neared the English shore, a sudden fierce storm erupted. The tides and waves forced Ederle backward, and she fought the stubborn swells for several hours. The salty water caused her tongue to swell and inflamed her ears. Yet Ederle felt indescribably happy as she churned through the sea. Finally, as she neared the English shore, the storm abated, and the tide turned. No longer fighting against her, the sea pushed her toward the shore and victory.
After fourteen hours and thirty-one minutes, Ederle, on wobbly legs, stepped onto the English shore. The waiting crowd roared, honked their automobile horns, blasted their tugboat whistles, and set off flares that flashed in the sky. Ederle had swum into history.
When Ederle returned to New York, she received a parade, where thousands of people shouted “Trudy!” Not only were everyday American citizens proud of Ederle, but she also inspired them to be more active. Over the next few years, more than 60,000 people credited her with motivating them to earn their American Red Cross swimming certificates. Gertrude Ederle’s accomplishment proved to the world that with determination and passion, it was possible for a person to achieve his or her goals.
SOLO SWIMS ACROSS THE ENGLISH CHANNEL
|
Earliest Speed Records |
||
| Year | Swimmer | Time |
| 1875 | Matthew Webb (M) | 21 hours, 45 minutes |
| 1923 | Enrico Tiraboschi (M) | 16 hours, 33 minutes |
| 1926 | Gertrude Ederle (F) | 14 hours, 31 minutes |
| 1926 | Arnst Vierkotter (M) | 12 hours, 38 minutes |
| Current Speed Records | ||
| Year | Swimmer | Time |
| 2012 | Trent Grimsey (M) | 6 hours, 55 minutes |
| 2006 | Yvetta Hlavacova (F) | 7 hours, 25 minutes |
Question
Read this sentence from paragraph 3.
Ederle knew that if she did not complete the challenge this time, she might never get the opportunity to set this record, because a rival female swimmer was preparing to make her second attempt at the crossing as well.
How does this sentence fit into the overall structure of the passage?
- AIt emphasizes that Ederle’s attempt to swim across the channel led other female swimmers to attempt the challenge.
- BIt presents the reason why Ederle prepared to cross the channel again immediately after her initial failure.
- CIt shows Ederle’s realization that she had to rethink her methods if she wanted to be the first woman to cross the channel.
- DIt indicates that Ederle had learned from her mistakes and was working to fix them before her next attempt.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The answer is (B)
The question asks how the sentence from paragraph 3 fits into the overall structure of the passage.
Option B is correct because it explains that Ederle’s awareness of another female swimmer preparing to make an attempt to swim the channel directly influenced Ederle’s decision to make her second attempt as quickly as possible. Ederle wanted to be the first woman to successfully swim across the channel.
Option A is incorrect because the passage does not provide information about other female swimmers who were inspired by Ederle to swim across the channel.
Option C is incorrect because, although Ederle did rethink her methods between her first and second attempts, the sentence does not show any sort of realization nor does it address her reasoning for rethinking her methods.
Option D is incorrect because the sentence is not related to Ederle’s process for learning from her mistakes.
Question analysis
This reading question quotes a sentence about a rival swimmer from a passage on Gertrude Ederle's English Channel swim and asks how it fits the passage's overall structure. Students must see how the sentence connects her failed first attempt to what came next, and the choices differ in small but important ways.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Explaining how one sentence fits a passage's structure is a grade 7 standard, but the choices differ by shades of meaning and the sentence must be read against the paragraphs on either side, which goes beyond typical grade 7 work.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer major
- How, not what moderate
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 790 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 133 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- The handbook’s answer key was corrected, because its own explanation supports a different choice.
- 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
The sentence sits at a hinge, right before a paragraph about new goggles and a new swimsuit, so it is easy to read that paragraph's content back into it. What the sentence itself offers is a motive, the rival's plans, for trying again without delay. Students who paraphrase the sentence before reading the choices avoid the trap; those who match choices to the surrounding story fall into it.
A very close wrong answer major Choosing the answer
The right choice and the rethinking-methods one both tie the sentence to her next attempt and to being first across; only the sentence's silence about methods separates them, and even the DOE handbook keyed the wrong one. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
How, not what moderate Working it out
The question asks what the sentence does in the passage, bridging the failed 1925 attempt and the new equipment of paragraph 4, rather than what it says. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The “because” clause gives a motive for urgency, a rival preparing her second attempt, which the student must connect to Ederle's decision to try again. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Reread the sentence along with the two sentences before it, put what this sentence itself says into your own words, and only then compare the choices with it.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Reversed relationship: Cause and effect, or the order of events, turned around.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reversed relationship (King et al., 2004)
Reads the rival's attempt as a result of Ederle's, reversing the sentence, in which the rival's plans come first and spur Ederle on.
C Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Gets the aim right, being the first woman to cross, but adds a realization about rethinking her methods that the sentence never mentions and paragraph 4 only implies.
D Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Brings in the fixes of paragraph 4, the waxed goggles and the silk suit, though this sentence is about a rival's threat and says nothing about past mistakes.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Answer key: The handbook keys this question G (C on this site). But its explanation of the correct answer, that knowing a rival was preparing her own attempt made Ederle decide to make her second attempt as quickly as possible, describes F (B here), and its reason for rejecting F, that the sentence shows no realization about rethinking her methods, describes G (C here). The quoted sentence gives a reason for urgency and says nothing about her methods, which the passage turns to in paragraph 4. The key is now B, and the explanation’s option letters were swapped to match its reasoning.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what job the sentence does in the passage. It’s not just what the sentence says, but why it is there. So look at what comes right before it and right after it.
Read the sentence in its place
Paragraph 3 says Ederle failed in 1925. Then: “Undeterred, Ederle decided to try again.” Undeterred means not discouraged. Next comes the sentence: “Ederle knew that if she did not complete the challenge this time, she might never get the opportunity to set this record, because a rival female swimmer was preparing to make her second attempt at the crossing as well.”
Put it in your own words
A rival is someone trying to reach the same goal. Another woman was getting ready to try again too. If she made it first, Ederle could never be the first woman across. So Ederle had to try again, and soon. The sentence gives the reason she hurried to try again.
Notice what the sentence leaves out
The sentence says nothing about her goggles, her swimsuit, or her methods. It doesn’t mention any mistakes she made. Those ideas come later, in paragraph 4. So any choice about fixing her methods goes beyond this sentence.
Check each choice
- B: it gives the reason she got ready to cross again so soon. A rival might beat her.
- A has it backward. Here the rival’s plan pushes Ederle, not the other way around. Nothing says Ederle led other women to try.
- C is about rethinking her methods. The sentence never mentions methods.
- D is about learning from mistakes. The sentence never mentions mistakes either.
Watch out: C is the trickiest. It gets her goal right, to be the first woman across. But “rethink her methods” is not in this sentence.
Pick the answer
The sentence explains why Ederle rushed to try again after she failed. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong answer. Ederle did improve her gear later, and she did want to be first. But this sentence never says she needed new methods. It gives only her reason to hurry: a rival was about to try again. That is exactly what B says.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Champion of the Channel” as printed (pages 56–57)
Question 77 of 92
2018 Test A English, question 21Uses the passage above: “Champion of the Channel”.
Question
Which statement describes how the author’s use of problem-and-solution in paragraph 5 contributes to the development of ideas in the passage?
- ADetailing the challenges that the cold channel waters presented highlights how effective Ederle’s training was.
- BDescribing Ederle’s physical difficulties during her swim provides evidence of the team effort required in order to ensure her safety.
- CExplaining the difficulties that arose early in the effort helps predict the additional problems that occurred during Ederle’s attempt.
- DIllustrating Ederle’s process of blocking out her discomfort shows that swimming the channel was both a mental and a physical challenge.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The answer is (D)
The question asks how a problem-and-solution structure in paragraph 5 contributes to the ideas presented in the passage.
Option D is correct because the paragraph describes how the water’s temperature made Ederle uncomfortable and made it difficult for her to regulate her stroke. The paragraph continues with the explanation of how she overcame these issues by focusing her mind on the sea and tuning out the distractions in her surroundings (paragraph 5: “. . . the sea became her only companion and the shrieks of gulls and the humming of boat engines faded away.”).
Option A is incorrect because the details in paragraph 5 do not provide a connection between the cold temperature of the water and the effectiveness of Ederle’s training.
Option B is incorrect because the difficulties Ederle encountered were only partially relieved by her team, and her team’s efforts to ensure Ederle’s safety are not explained in the passage.
Option C is incorrect because the paragraph does not focus on the relationship between the problems Ederle encountered at the start of her swim and the problems she encountered during or near the end of her swim.
Question analysis
This reading question asks how the problem-and-solution structure of one paragraph about Gertrude Ederle's English Channel swim helps develop the passage's ideas. Students must identify the difficulties she faced at the start of the swim and how she overcame them, then judge which abstract statement describes that pattern without adding details the paragraph lacks.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Analyzing how a paragraph's structure develops ideas is grade 7 content, but the choices are abstract claims about purpose, the paragraph's problems and solutions must be identified first, and every choice mentions real difficulties, more than typical grade 7 work.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what major
- Every choice must be checked moderate
- Figurative or literary language minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 790 words; question and choices: about grade 14, 95 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A grammar slip in the explanation was corrected.
- 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
The first halves of the choices are all true, which pushes the whole judgment onto what each says the paragraph accomplishes. The paragraph's solution is mental, clearing her mind until the noise faded, so a reading that sees only physical problems reaches for training, teamwork or foreshadowing. Students who list the problems and the fixes before reading the choices see that only one statement accounts for both.
How, not what major Working it out
The question asks how a problem-and-solution pattern in paragraph 5 develops the passage's ideas, so the student must name the pattern's effect, not retell the cold and the stiffness. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Every choice must be checked moderate Choosing the answer
Every choice opens with an accurate phrase about paragraph 5's difficulties, the cold water or the early struggle, so only each choice's second half can be tested. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Figurative or literary language minor Understanding the question
The solution is told in images, finding her “sphere”, where “the sea became her only companion”, which must be read as a mental strategy. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: List the problems paragraph 5 names and how Ederle got past each one, then choose the statement that accounts for the problems and the solutions alike.
Traps
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Assumes that getting through the cold shows good training, a natural idea from sports, but paragraph 5 never mentions training and credits her mind and stroke instead.
B Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Imports the support team from paragraph 6's tugboats, while paragraph 5 centres on Ederle's own body and mind and says nothing about a team or her safety.
C Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Reads the early stiffness and shivering as foreshadowing of the later storm, a structural link the paragraph never makes, while ignoring how she overcame the cold.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The handbook reads “her team’s efforts to ensure Ederle’s safety is not explained”. It now reads “are not explained”, since the subject is “efforts”.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
In a problem-and-solution pattern, the author shows a problem and then how someone deals with it. You need to say what this pattern in paragraph 5 adds to the passage. So first find the problems. Then find the solutions.
Find the problems
At first Ederle “shivered in the bone-chilling water.” Then: “Her limbs felt stiff. Her strokes were irregular.” Limbs are arms and legs. Irregular means uneven. These are problems with her body.
Find the solutions
Next, “she fought to clear her mind” and find her “sphere.” Her sphere was “a place where the sea became her only companion and the shrieks of gulls and the humming of boat engines faded away.” That is a calm place in her mind. She shut out the noise and her discomfort. Then, with the American crawl, she “settled into a steady pace.”
Decide what the pattern shows
The problems are in her body: cold, stiff, and uneven. Much of the solution is in her mind: focusing and shutting out the world. So the paragraph shows that the swim tested both her body and her mind.
Check each choice
- D: blocking out her discomfort shows the swim was “both a mental and a physical challenge.” Mental means of the mind.
- A: paragraph 5 never mentions her training.
- B: the team on the tugboats is in paragraph 6. Paragraph 5 is about Ederle alone.
- C: paragraph 5 doesn’t use the early trouble to hint at later problems. It shows her getting past it.
Watch out: A storm does come later, in paragraph 7, so C can seem right. But paragraph 5 ends with her solving the problem, not with a warning.
Pick the answer
Only D explains both the problems and the way she solved them. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest wrong answer, because more trouble does come later, in the storm. But paragraph 5 doesn’t hint at the storm. It ends with Ederle “briskly breaking through waves.” D explains the whole pattern: body problems solved partly by the mind.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 78 of 92
2018 Test A English, question 23Uses the passage above: “Champion of the Channel”.
Question
Ederle’s victorious swim across the English Channel influenced American attitudes mainly by
- Asparking interest in physical activity and in seeking swimming certification.
- Bencouraging other swimmers to seek out and achieve challenging feats.
- Cdemonstrating that women could achieve and even surpass feats accomplished by men.
- Dshowing that determination and perseverance are necessary to overcome previous failures.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The answer is (A)
The question asks for an explanation of how Ederle’s successful swim across the channel affected American attitudes.
Option A is correct because the passage indicates that there was a large increase in the number of American men and women who became physically active and who obtained swimming certificates shortly after Ederle’s swim (paragraph 9: “Over the next few years, more than 60,000 people credited her with motivating them to earn their American Red Cross swimming certificates.”).
Option B is incorrect because, although there was an increase in the number of people learning to swim, the passage does not provide details about people who were inspired by Ederle to take on extreme challenges such as swimming across the channel.
Option C is incorrect because, although Ederle did, in fact, surpass the men’s time for the swim by two hours, the passage does not provide information about how this achievement affected the American people’s perception of the capabilities of men and women.
Option D is incorrect because, although the passage does explain how Ederle’s determination and perseverance led to her eventual success, it does not demonstrate how this affected American attitudes toward overcoming failures.
Question analysis
This reading question asks how Gertrude Ederle's record-setting English Channel swim mainly influenced American attitudes, according to the final paragraph of the passage. Students must stick to what the passage actually reports about Americans' reactions, since several choices sound plausible for such a famous swim.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how a person influenced others is typical grade 7 reading. The evidence sits in one paragraph near the end, and the main demand is matching each choice to what that paragraph actually says.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- The right answer is reworded minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 790 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 55 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
The answer is reported plainly in the last paragraph, but the passage's opening primes a different expectation. Because the editor dismissed women and Ederle then beat the men's record, many students expect her swim to have changed how Americans saw women, an effect the passage never reports. The question rewards sticking to what the text says Americans actually did afterward.
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The right choice and the one about encouraging other swimmers both say Ederle moved people to take up swimming, and differ only in scale: earning swimming certificates or chasing “challenging feats”. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
The right answer is reworded minor Choosing the answer
The answer recasts paragraph 9's “inspired them to be more active” and “swimming certificates” in new words, while one wrong choice echoes the closing word “determination”. (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Strategy: Go to the paragraph about her return to New York and note exactly what it says Americans did or felt afterward, then match that report to a choice.
Traps
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
The wrong answers, classified
B Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Stretches the 60,000 people she motivated to earn swimming certificates into swimmers chasing “challenging feats”, a bigger claim than the passage makes about anyone.
C Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Combines the editor's “weaker sex” remark with her beating the men's record and concludes Americans changed their views of women, an effect the passage never describes.
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Echoes the closing line about determination but changes “it was possible” to “necessary” and adds overcoming failure, a lesson the passage gives the world, not American habits.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how Ederle’s swim changed the way Americans thought or acted. You need the effect the passage actually reports. So look at what happened after she came home.
Find the effect in paragraph 9
Paragraph 9 says: “Not only were everyday American citizens proud of Ederle, but she also inspired them to be more active.” It goes on: “Over the next few years, more than 60,000 people credited her with motivating them to earn their American Red Cross swimming certificates.”
Put it in plain words
To credit someone means to say they were the reason for something. A swimming certificate is a paper that shows you passed a swimming course. So Americans got more active. Many worked to earn swimming certificates because of her.
Check each choice
- A: “sparking interest in physical activity and in seeking swimming certification.” This matches both parts of paragraph 9.
- B says swimmers went after “challenging feats.” The passage talks about certificates, not big feats.
- C: Ederle did beat the men’s record. But the passage never says this changed what Americans thought about women.
- D echoes the last sentence about determination. But that sentence is about what she proved “to the world,” and it says “possible,” not “necessary.”
Watch out: C feels right because of the editor in paragraph 1. But the passage never reports a change in how Americans saw women.
Pick the answer
Paragraph 9 reports that Americans became more active and earned swimming certificates. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is close because it also says people were moved to swim. But it says they chased “challenging feats,” like crossing the channel. The passage only says people got more active and earned swimming certificates. A matches that exactly.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 79 of 92
2018 Test A English, question 35Passage Excerpt from A Tramp Abroad
Excerpt from A Tramp Abroad
by Mark Twain
Now and then, while we rested, we watched the laborious ant at his work. I found nothing new in him—certainly nothing to change my opinion of him. It seems to me that in the matter of intellect the ant must be a strangely overrated bird. During many summers now I have watched him, when I ought to have been in better business, and I have not yet come across a living ant that seemed to have any more sense than a dead one. I refer to the ordinary ant, of course; I have had no experience of those wonderful Swiss and African ones which vote, keep drilled armies, . . . and dispute about religion. Those particular ants may be all that the naturalist paints them, but I am persuaded that the average ant is a sham.
I admit his industry, of course; he is the hardest working creature in the world—when anybody is looking—but his leather-headedness is the point I make against him. He goes out foraging, he makes a capture, and then what does he do? Go home? No; he goes anywhere but home. He doesn’t know where home is. His home may be only three feet away; no matter, he can’t find it. He makes his capture, as I have said; it is generally something which can be of no sort of use to himself or anybody else; it is usually seven times bigger than it ought to be; he hunts out the awkwardest place to take hold of it; he lifts it bodily up in the air by main force, and starts—not toward home, but in the opposite direction; not calmly and wisely, but with a frantic haste which is wasteful of his strength; he fetches up against a pebble, and, instead of going around it, he climbs over it backwards, dragging his booty after him, tumbles down on the other side, jumps up in a passion, kicks the dust off his clothes, moistens his hands, grabs his property viciously, yanks it this way, then that, shoves it ahead of him a moment, turns tail and lugs it after him another moment, gets madder and madder, then presently hoists it into the air and goes tearing away in an entirely new direction; comes to a weed; it never occurs to him to go around it. No; he must climb it, and he does climb it, dragging his worthless property to the top—which is as bright a thing to do as it would be for me to carry a sack of flour from Heidelberg to Paris by way of Strasburg steeple; when he gets up there he finds that that is not the place; takes a cursory glance at the scenery, and either climbs down again or tumbles down, and starts off once more—as usual, in a new direction. At the end of half an hour he fetches up within six inches of the place he started from, and lays his burden down. Meantime, he has been over all the ground for two yards around, and climbed all the weeds and pebbles he came across. Now he wipes the sweat from his brow, strokes his limbs, and then marches aimlessly off, in as violent a hurry as ever. He traverses a good deal of zig-zag country, and by and by stumbles on his same booty again. He does not remember to have ever seen it before; he looks around to see which is not the way home, grabs his bundle, and starts. He goes through the same adventures he had before; finally stops to rest, and a friend comes along.
Evidently the friend remarks that a last year’s grasshopper leg is a very noble acquisition, and inquires where he got it. Evidently the proprietor does not remember exactly where he did get it, but thinks he got it “around here somewhere.” Evidently the friend contracts to help him freight it home. Then, with a judgment peculiarly antic (pun not intentional), they take hold of opposite ends of that grasshopper leg and begin to tug with all their might in opposite directions. Presently they take a rest, and confer together. They decide that something is wrong, they can’t make out what. Then they go at it again, just as before. Same result. Mutual recriminations follow. Evidently each accuses the other of being an obstructionist. They warm up, and the dispute ends in a fight. They lock themselves together and chew each other’s jaws for a while; then they roll and tumble on the ground till one loses a horn or a leg and has to haul off for repairs. They make up and go to work again in the same old insane way, but the crippled ant is at a disadvantage; tug as he may, the other one drags off the booty and him at the end of it. Instead of giving up, he hangs on, and gets his shins bruised against every obstruction that comes in the way. By and by, when that grasshopper leg has been dragged all over the same old ground once more, it is finally dumped at about the spot where it originally lay. The two perspiring ants inspect it thoughtfully and decide that dried grasshopper legs are a poor sort of property after all, and then each starts off in a different direction to see if he can’t find an old nail or something else that is heavy enough to afford entertainment and at the same time valueless enough to make an ant want to own it. . . .
Science has recently discovered that the ant does not lay up anything for winter use. . . . He does not work, except when people are looking, and only then when the observer has a green, naturalistic look, and seems to be taking notes. This amounts to deception, and will injure him for the Sunday schools. He has not judgment enough to know what is good to eat from what isn’t. This amounts to ignorance, and will impair the world’s respect for him. . . . He cannot stroll around a stump and find his way home again. This amounts to idiocy, and once the damaging fact is established, thoughtful people will cease to look up to him. It is strange beyond comprehension that so manifest a humbug as the ant has been able to fool so many nations and keep it up so many ages without being found out.
we: the author and his fictional travel companion
From A TRAMP ABROAD by Mark Twain—Public Domain
Question
How does the presence of the friend in paragraph 3 influence the first ant’s behavior?
- AThe friend distracts the ant from finding the correct path home.
- BThe friend inspires the ant to consider a new approach to the situation.
- CThe friend encourages the ant to continue his worthless efforts.
- DThe friend tries to prevent the ant from finishing his task.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The answer is (C)
The question asks how the second ant, a friend, influences the first ant.
Option C is correct because the friend’s complimentary remark about the grasshopper leg serves to encourage the first ant to continue his efforts to drag the useless object home (paragraph 3: “Evidently the friend remarks that a last year’s grasshopper leg is a very noble acquisition”).
Option A is incorrect because the first ant does not know where his home is (paragraph 2: “He doesn’t know where home is. His home may be only three feet away; no matter, he can’t find it”).
Option B is incorrect because, while the friend offers to help the first ant (paragraph 3: “Evidently the friend contracts to help him freight it home”), he does not inspire a new approach to resolving the situation.
Option D is incorrect because, while the friend does make it difficult for the first ant to transport the grasshopper leg, the friend is not intentionally trying to prevent the first ant from reaching home (paragraph 3: “Then, with a judgment peculiarly antic [pun not intentional], they take hold of opposite ends of that grasshopper leg and begin to tug with all their might in opposite directions”).
Question analysis
This question asks how a second ant, the “friend” who arrives in paragraph 3 of Mark Twain's excerpt, affects the first ant's behavior. Students must follow cause and effect through a tug-of-war in which the two ants pull a grasshopper leg in opposite directions.
- NYS standards
- 7R3 plot elements and ideas
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how one character affects another is everyday grade 7 work, and the interaction here unfolds within a single paragraph. Reading the friend's remark about the grasshopper leg in context is the only subtle step.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 1099 words; question and choices: about grade 6, 59 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A wrong paragraph number in the explanation was corrected.
- 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
The paragraph is chaotic, with tugging, a fight and a lost leg, and that chaos makes the friend look like an obstacle. What the question rewards is seeing that every move the friend makes, praising the leg and offering to help carry it, keeps the first ant hauling a worthless object. Students who judge the friend by the results of the tug-of-war, rather than by what he says and intends, are drawn away from the key.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The effect is never stated: students must infer from the friend calling the leg “a very noble acquisition” and offering to “freight it home” that he spurs the first ant on. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
Mock-formal words such as “proprietor,” “contracts,” “recriminations” and “obstructionist” narrate the ants' exchange, and a student who stumbles on them loses track of who helps whom. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Trace what the first ant does before the friend arrives and what he does after; then ask how the friend's remark and offer change, or fail to change, that pattern.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
A Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Assumes the familiar idea that a chatty friend distracts you from your route, but paragraph 2 says the ant never knew “where home is” to begin with.
B Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Takes the friend's offer to help as a fresh strategy, though the two ants go back to work “in the same old insane way.”
D Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Turns the accidental tug in opposite directions, and the charge of being “an obstructionist,” into deliberate sabotage, though the friend set out to help carry the leg home.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The handbook places “Evidently the friend remarks that a last year’s grasshopper leg is a very noble acquisition” in paragraph 2. The sentence opens paragraph 3, the paragraph the question asks about, so the explanation now reads “(paragraph 3: …)”.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This question asks how one character affects another. You need to see how the friend changes, or doesn’t change, what the first ant does.
See what the ant does first
At the end of paragraph 2, the first ant has dragged the grasshopper leg around for a long time. He has gotten nowhere. He “finally stops to rest, and a friend comes along.” This rest is the moment he might have quit.
See what the friend says and does
In paragraph 3, the friend says the leg “is a very noble acquisition.” An acquisition is something you got. Noble means fine and grand. So the friend praises a worthless leg.
Then he “contracts to help him freight it home.” Contracts means agrees, and freight means carry. With this praise and help, the first ant goes right back to hauling the leg.
Check each choice
- A The ant was never on the right path, so the friend can’t pull him off it: “He doesn’t know where home is.”
- B No new plan appears. They work “in the same old insane way.”
- C fits. The friend’s praise and help keep the ant going at his useless task.
- D The tug in opposite directions is an accident. The friend meant to help, not to stop him.
Choose the answer
The friend cheers the ant on and helps him keep hauling junk. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
D is the closest trap, because the friend does get in the way. Each ant even calls the other an obstructionist (someone who blocks things). But that happens by accident. What the friend chooses to do is praise the leg and help carry it. That pushes the ant to keep going, so C fits better.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from A Tramp Abroad” as printed (pages 62–63)
Question 80 of 92
2018 Test A English, question 37Passage Ruins of a Fabled City
Ruins of a Fabled City
The African country of Zimbabwe took its name from the Shona word meaning “stone enclosures” or “venerated houses.” In fact, today dozens of stone ruins are scattered throughout Zimbabwe and other areas in southeastern Africa. One of these ruins, known as Great Zimbabwe, was once a fabled city that inspired tales that circulated throughout Europe. Where was this remarkable city, and who had built it? For centuries the mystery occupied the minds of explorers and treasure seekers.
The first reports to Europeans of Great Zimbabwe were spread a thousand years ago by Arab traders sailing between the Middle East and the east coast of Africa. The traders told of the fabulous wealth of a mysterious stone city in the African interior. In the trader’s tales, that city became associated with the Europeans’ understanding of Middle Eastern history—the Queen of Sheba, King Solomon and his legendary gold mines, long since lost to the world. By the sixteenth century, Portuguese explorers regularly visited East Africa, searching for King Solomon’s gold, but they never found Great Zimbabwe. In 1552, a Portuguese historian, João de Barros, recorded a story told by Arabs about a city with a “square fortress of masonry within and without, built of stones of marvelous size, and there appears to be no mortar joining them.”
In fact, Great Zimbabwe was a marvel. In one area a massive wall more than thirty feet high and twenty feet thick created a great enclosure. Another area contained a fortress-like series of walls, corridors, and steps built into the bluff that overlooks the ruins. Throughout the city, each stone was precisely fitted to the others without the use of mortar.
In the 1870s Karl Mauch, a German geologist, was the first European to see Great Zimbabwe, by then in ruins. Mauch realized that he had “rediscovered” the fabled city from de Barros’s story. He jumped to the conclusion that Great Zimbabwe had been built by the Queen of Sheba. British authorities sent a British journalist, Richard Hall, to Great Zimbabwe to investigate Mauch’s report. Archaeology was still in its infancy, and Hall, convinced that the structures had been built by ancient people from the Middle East, dug up and discarded archaeological deposits that would have revealed much about the true history of Great Zimbabwe. Later European excavations destroyed even more valuable evidence.
In the twentieth century, after excavating areas that had not been disturbed, David Randall-MacIver, a Scottish Egyptologist, and Gertrude Caton-Thompson, an English archaeologist, concluded that the ruins were unmistakably African in origin. Great Zimbabwe was most likely built during the fourteenth or fifteenth century by the ancestors of the present-day Shona people. Recent carbon-14 dating supports their conclusion. Great Zimbabwe was once home to an estimated 20,000 people, the center of a great Shona kingdom. Wealthy Shona kings traded their ivory and gold in coastal towns for other goods, thus accounting for the discovery of beads and other foreign wares in the ruins.
One mystery of Great Zimbabwe had been solved. Another mystery remains: why was the settlement at Great Zimbabwe abandoned, leaving the magnificent stone architecture to fall into ruins?
Question
What was the main way that Karl Mauch’s conclusions about Great Zimbabwe in paragraph 4 affected later archaeological investigations?
- AArchaeologists from all over Europe became interested in excavating the area.
- BArchaeologists made assumptions about the history of the ruins before excavating.
- CArchaeologists started to believe that many of the past accounts recorded about the ruins were true.
- DArchaeologists realized it was unlikely that an ancient culture could build such grand structures.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The answer is (B)
The question asks for an explanation of how Mauch’s conclusions influenced later investigations.
Option B is the best option because Mauch’s conclusion that Great Zimbabwe “had been built by the Queen of Sheba” (paragraph 4) affected later investigations of the ruins by causing archaeologists to destroy evidence without examining it, as they assumed that Mauch’s conclusions were accurate (paragraph 4).
Option A is incorrect because, while archaeologists were interested in the area, this was not the main effect of Mauch’s conclusions, as described in the passage.
Option C is incorrect because people searched for Great Zimbabwe because they already believed the stories told by Arab traders and historians like de Barros (paragraph 2), not because of Mauch’s conclusions.
Option D is incorrect because, although the city was considered impressive (paragraph 3), Mauch’s conclusions did not influence whether people believed an ancient culture could have built the city.
Question analysis
This cause-and-effect question asks how Karl Mauch's 1870s conclusions about Great Zimbabwe shaped the investigations that came after him. Students must trace the effect through paragraph 4, where later visitors dug at the site, while keeping the older traders' tales and Portuguese searches in their proper order.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Grade 7 informational reading asks how events and ideas influence one another, which is exactly this task. The effect is implied rather than stated, but it sits in one paragraph, keeping the demand typical for grade 7.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Much to keep track of minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 524 words; question and choices: about grade 11, 70 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
The cause and effect is implied across two sentences of paragraph 4, so students must connect Mauch's leap to the Queen of Sheba with Hall's conviction and the evidence he threw away. The passage's long run of legends makes the older accounts feel like a consequence of Mauch, when they came first. The key rewards reading for what investigators did differently because of him, not what anyone believed at some point.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The passage never says Mauch's conclusion caused anything; the link comes from Hall being sent “to investigate Mauch's report” and arriving “convinced” of Middle Eastern builders. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
B and C both say later investigators took beliefs about the ruins' history for granted; C differs in one detail, since trust in the old accounts began centuries before Mauch rather than because of him. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Much to keep track of minor Working it out
Students must keep the order of believers straight: Arab traders, Portuguese explorers, de Barros in 1552, Mauch in the 1870s, then Hall and later European diggers. (Sweller, 1988; Carpenter, Just & Shell, 1990)
Strategy: Find what Mauch concluded, then read the sentences about the next people to dig at the site and ask how his conclusion shows up in what they did.
Traps
- Reversed relationship: Cause and effect, or the order of events, turned around.
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Outside knowledge: A choice is plausible in the real world but not supported by this text.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Inflates the British inquiry and the “later European excavations” into archaeologists from all over Europe, and treats their interest as Mauch's main effect.
C Reversed relationship (King et al., 2004)
Flips the order: trust in the traders' tales and de Barros's account came long before Mauch and shaped his conclusion, not the other way round.
D Outside knowledge (King et al., 2004; Recht & Leslie, 1988)
Echoes the real colonial-era doubt that Africans built the city, but in the passage Hall credits ancient Middle Eastern builders, so investigators did think an ancient culture built it.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This is a cause-and-effect question. It asks how Karl Mauch’s ideas changed what later people did at the ruins.
Find the evidence in paragraph 4
Mauch “jumped to the conclusion that Great Zimbabwe had been built by the Queen of Sheba.” Then Richard Hall was sent “to investigate Mauch’s report.”
Hall arrived “convinced that the structures had been built by ancient people from the Middle East.” So he “dug up and discarded archaeological deposits.” Later digs “destroyed even more valuable evidence.”
Work out the effect
To jump to a conclusion is to decide something before you have proof. Mauch did that. Hall came to check Mauch’s report, already sure of a story like Mauch’s. He decided the answer before he dug. So he threw away clues. “Deposits” here means layers of old things in the ground. They could have shown the true history.
Check each choice
- A The passage never says people from all over Europe became interested.
- B fits. The diggers made assumptions (beliefs taken as true without proof) before they dug.
- C People trusted the old tales centuries before Mauch, so he did not cause that.
- D Hall still thought an ancient people built the city, just not Africans.
Choose the answer
Mauch’s guess led later diggers to decide the city’s history before they dug. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest trap. It also says people trusted ideas about the ruins. But trust in the old tales began with Arab traders, and de Barros wrote his story down in 1552. Mauch came in the 1870s. C gets the order backward. B names what changed after Mauch.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Ruins of a Fabled City” as printed (page 68)
Question 81 of 92
2018 Test A English, question 41Uses the passage above: “Ruins of a Fabled City”.
Question
The conclusions of David Randall-MacIver and Gertrude Caton-Thompson were significant because they
- Aproved that Great Zimbabwe was much older than previously thought.
- Bquestioned why the Shona people left Great Zimbabwe.
- Csupported the idea that the ancient Shona had a robust society at Great Zimbabwe.
- Drevealed that Great Zimbabwe was African in origin.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The answer is (D)
The question asks for the impact of Randall-MacIver and Caton-Thompson’s discovery. David Randall-MacIver and Gertrude Caton-Thompson’s conclusions were significant because their excavation of the ruins revealed that Great Zimbabwe was most certainly built by the ancestors of modern-day Africans (paragraph 5), discrediting the long-standing idea that the structure was Middle Eastern in origin. This conclusion is stated in Option D.
Option A is incorrect because paragraph 5 states that Randall-MacIver and Caton-Thompson determined that the city was likely built in the fourteenth or fifteenth century, which was later than earlier explorers had assumed.
Option B is incorrect because the question of why the great city was abandoned was not part of Randall-MacIver and Caton-Thompson’s discovery.
Option C is incorrect because, while paragraph 5 also indicates that the Shona society was strong and healthy, this idea was not the main focus of Randall-MacIver and Caton-Thompson’s discovery.
Question analysis
This question asks why the conclusions of David Randall-MacIver and Gertrude Caton-Thompson about Great Zimbabwe mattered. Students must judge significance, not just recall facts, by weighing several details from paragraph 5 and deciding which one the passage treats as most important.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Weighing why a finding matters is typical grade 7 informational reading. The researchers' conclusion is easy to find, but students must use the earlier theories to see why it mattered, which keeps the task at grade 7.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 524 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 52 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
The finding itself is stated almost word for word, so the work is judging significance. Paragraph 5 piles several facts after the conclusion, a date, a population and trading kings, and one of them invites the reading that the researchers' point was a thriving society. Students who remember what Mauch and Hall believed see that overturning the Middle Eastern theory is what the passage treats as the turning point.
Reading between the lines minor Working it out
“Significant” is never explained; students must set “unmistakably African in origin” against the Queen of Sheba and Middle Eastern theories of paragraph 4 to see why it mattered. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Strategy: Read paragraph 5 alongside paragraph 4, note what earlier investigators believed, and judge each choice by how much it changes or confirms that earlier picture.
Traps
- True but not the answer: A choice says something accurate about the text that does not answer this question.
- Reversed relationship: Cause and effect, or the order of events, turned around.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reversed relationship (King et al., 2004)
Gets the time relation backward: a fourteenth- or fifteenth-century date makes the city far younger than the King Solomon and Queen of Sheba legends implied.
B Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Borrows the open question of why the settlement was abandoned, which the author raises in the last paragraph, not something these researchers addressed.
C True but not the answer (King et al., 2004; Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
Picks the true picture of a large, wealthy Shona kingdom from the same paragraph, but that detail follows the conclusion and is not what made it significant.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks why the two scientists’ conclusion was significant, or important. To see why it mattered, compare it with what people believed before.
Recall the earlier beliefs
Paragraph 4 tells what people believed. Mauch thought the city “had been built by the Queen of Sheba.” Hall was sure it was built “by ancient people from the Middle East.” For centuries, who built the city was a mystery.
Find what they concluded
Paragraph 5 says Randall-MacIver and Caton-Thompson dug in places no one had disturbed. They “concluded that the ruins were unmistakably African in origin.”
Unmistakably means with no doubt. Origin means where something comes from. Their finding proved the old Middle East ideas wrong. That is why it was so important.
Check each choice
- A The passage dates the city to the 1300s or 1400s. That makes it much younger than the King Solomon legends, not older.
- B Why the Shona left is the open question in paragraph 6. These two did not study it.
- C Paragraph 5 does describe a rich kingdom. But that detail is not what made their finding important.
- D fits. They showed the city was African in origin.
Choose the answer
Their work was significant because it revealed that Great Zimbabwe was African in origin. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest trap, because paragraph 5 does show a strong Shona kingdom of “an estimated 20,000 people.” But that detail comes after their conclusion. What mattered most was proving the city African, which overturned the Middle East theories. That is D.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 82 of 92
2018 Test A English, question 53Passage The Year without a Summer
The Year without a Summer
The eruption of the Philippine volcano Mount Pinatubo in June 1991 sent a huge cloud of gas and dust encircling the globe. The dust and ash from Mount Pinatubo was blamed for a two-year decrease in global temperature, changes in weather patterns, and damage to the ozone layer. The situation brings to mind a time now remembered as “The Year without a Summer,” a meteorological event that occurred 175 years earlier. At that time, harsh weather conditions plagued much of eastern North America and, to a lesser extent, northern Europe.
April 1816 brought typical spring weather to upstate New York and New England; trees budded, and farmers prepared to plow and plant. In May, however, the expected warm temperatures failed to arrive. Most people remained optimistic, waiting for the summer that was “just around the corner.” They waited in vain. During the first week of June, ten inches of snow fell on New England. Throughout the month, temperatures rarely rose above the 30s. Many farmers replanted crops several times, only to see them stunted or destroyed by sleet, hail, and icy winds. July and August brought little improvement. During most days the temperature stayed in the 40s. Farmers’ diaries document the farmers’ daily struggles with near-freezing temperatures, failing crops, and dying farm animals. The few crops that managed to survive were killed by frost in mid-September. Winter came early in New England and was unusually severe. Even the South was affected; on July 4, the high temperature for Savannah, Georgia, was only 46 degrees Fahrenheit!
Some religious leaders warned their congregations that the unusual weather meant that the end of the world was drawing near. Other leaders attributed the cool weather to unusual sunspot activity. The proliferation of the newly invented lightning rod was also blamed as some people believed that lightning rods had interrupted the natural temperature balance of Earth, causing the cooler temperatures.
It was not until October that the first plausible explanation for “The Year without a Summer” was suggested. Friedrich Bessel, a German astronomer, reported seeing thick clouds of dust in the upper atmosphere. He theorized that these dust particles screened portions of Earth from the warming rays of the sun. It was discovered that in April 1815, Mount Tambora, an Indonesian volcano, had erupted with such force that it had sent an estimated 100 cubic miles of fine dust into the atmosphere. Witnesses to the eruption reported that the sky remained dark for two days. The dust then rose high into the stratosphere, where it encircled the world for several years to come.
Skeptics in 1816 doubted that a faraway volcano could steal their summer. However, most present-day researchers believe Bessel’s explanation to be generally correct, demonstrating the global nature of weather. The dust in the atmosphere eventually settled, and the spring of 1817 was back to normal.
Question
In the winter that followed the summer of 1816, New Englanders most likely experienced
- Anew weather events that they had not encountered before.
- Btemperatures that were warmer than usual for that time of year.
- Cshortages of fruits, vegetables, and other essential crops.
- Ddifficulty adjusting to a different timeline for planting crops.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The answer is (C)
The question asks for the outcome that is best implied by the situation the New Englanders faced in 1816.
Option C is the correct answer because, with many crops “stunted or destroyed” (paragraph 2) in the summer of 1816, one would expect food shortages the following winter.
Option A is incorrect because cold weather was familiar to the population in New England, just not for such an extended period of time.
Option B is incorrect because there is no evidence in the passage that people experienced warmer temperatures.
Option D is incorrect because, although some farmers did replant their crops, there is no evidence in the passage that they struggled to adjust to a different timeline for farming.
Question analysis
Students must predict what New Englanders most likely faced in the winter after the cold summer of 1816, an inference question on an informational passage about a historic cold spell. The passage says little about daily life that winter, so students must reason one step beyond the text from what it reports about the summer.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Drawing a likely consequence from stated facts is typical grade 7 inference work. The needed step goes just beyond what the passage reports, and the text is short and clear, so the demand matches grade 7.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Something you must already know minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 469 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 50 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A spelling error in the explanation was corrected.
- 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
This inference goes one step past the text, from destroyed crops to a hungry winter, and the passage never makes that step for the reader. Meanwhile the one sentence about the winter, early and unusually severe, tempts students toward an answer about unheard-of weather. Students who ask what the summer's losses would mean for daily life months later find the key; those who look only for the word “winter” do not.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The passage says nothing about food that winter; students must reason from “The few crops that managed to survive were killed by frost in mid-September” to empty stores months later. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Something you must already know minor Working it out
The inference needs the everyday fact that a farm family's winter food comes from the autumn harvest, which the passage leaves unsaid. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Strategy: List the consequences of the cold summer that paragraph 2 reports, then ask which would still affect people months later, in winter.
Traps
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Stretches “unusually severe” into weather never encountered before, but New Englanders knew cold winters well; this one was harsher, not new.
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Reverses the passage's statement that winter “came early” and “was unusually severe,” which rules out warmer temperatures.
D Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Carries the summer's repeated replanting into winter, though planting is not a winter task and the passage never mentions a changed planting timeline.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The handbook’s “some famers did replant their crops” now reads “some farmers”.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This is an inference question. The passage never says what life was like that winter. You must reason from what it does say.
Find what happened to the crops
Paragraph 2 tells the story. Crops were “stunted or destroyed by sleet, hail, and icy winds.” Then: “The few crops that managed to survive were killed by frost in mid-September.” Finally, “Winter came early in New England and was unusually severe.”
Work out the result
Stunted means stopped from growing to full size. In 1816, families ate food they grew in summer and saved for winter. But almost all the crops died. So there was very little food to save. That means the winter would bring shortages: not enough food to go around.
Check each choice
- A New Englanders knew cold winters well. This one was harsher, not a new kind of weather.
- B The passage says the winter was severe, so it was not warmer.
- C fits. With the crops gone, food would run short.
- D Nobody plants crops in winter. The passage says nothing about a new planting schedule.
Choose the answer
With the crops destroyed, people likely ran short of food that winter. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest trap, because the winter was “unusually severe.” But severe means harsh, not new. Cold winters were normal in New England. C follows from the clearest facts in paragraph 2: the crops died, so there would be little food.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “The Year without a Summer” as printed (page 76)
Question 83 of 92
2018 Test A English, question 55Uses the passage above: “The Year without a Summer”.
Question
The author includes the details in paragraph 4 about the eruption of Mount Tambora in order to
- Asuggest that the aftermath of the eruption still affects the environment today.
- Bhighlight the severe impact that the eruption had on the atmosphere.
- Cprovide a description of what happens during a volcanic eruption.
- Demphasize how differently people perceive natural events in various parts of the world.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The answer is (B)
The question asks why the details about the eruption of Mount Tambora are included in the passage. The details in paragraph 4 about the eruption highlight the severity of the eruption and how it clouded the atmosphere and eventually encircled the world, making Option B the correct answer.
Option A is incorrect because the passage does not support the idea that the effects are still present today.
Option C is incorrect because the details may include information about what happens during an eruption, but the author is specifically describing the event at Mount Tambora as the inception of weather issues all over the world.
Option D is incorrect because, while it is possible that people perceive natural events in various parts of the world differently, the specific details about the force and magnitude of the eruption do not emphasize this idea.
Question analysis
This author's purpose question asks why “The Year without a Summer” includes details about the 1815 eruption of Mount Tambora in Indonesia. Students must work out the job those details do in the passage's larger explanation, which takes more than noticing what they describe.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining why an author includes certain details is core grade 7 work. The paragraph is short and factual, and its purpose follows from its place in the passage, so the demand is typical for grade 7.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 469 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 62 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
The details are vivid, a blast, 100 cubic miles of dust, two days of darkness, and a student can easily answer what they show rather than why they are there. Their job is to make Bessel's dust theory believable by showing how much material reached the atmosphere and how far it spread. The passage's own ending, with the dust settling and spring of 1817 back to normal, rules out any lasting effect.
How, not what moderate Working it out
The stem asks why the author includes the eruption details, so students must tie the force, the 100 cubic miles of dust and the darkened sky to the cold summer they explain. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Strategy: Reread paragraph 4 and ask how the eruption details connect to the cold summer the passage is explaining; the purpose must serve that connection.
Traps
- Wrong purpose or structure: Names a purpose, structure or effect that the part does not serve, or describes what a part says when the question asks what it does.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Stretches dust that “encircled the world for several years” into effects still felt today, though the passage says the dust settled and spring of 1817 was normal.
C Wrong purpose or structure (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Notes what the details are, a description of an eruption, rather than why they are there, to show how the dust could chill summers worldwide.
D Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Draws on the skeptics in paragraph 5, but the eruption details stress the event's force and reach, not how people in different places perceived it.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks about the author’s purpose: why the author put certain details in. Don’t just say what the details are. Ask what job they do.
Find the details in paragraph 4
Mount Tambora “had erupted with such force that it had sent an estimated 100 cubic miles of fine dust into the atmosphere.” Witnesses said “the sky remained dark for two days.” The dust “encircled the world for several years to come.”
Work out their job
The atmosphere is the layer of air around Earth. These details show how huge the eruption was. A hundred cubic miles of dust is enough to block sunlight around the whole world.
That makes Bessel’s idea easy to believe. Dust from far away really could steal a summer in New England.
Check each choice
- A The dust settled, and “the spring of 1817 was back to normal.” So the effects did not last until today.
- B fits. The details show how hard the eruption hit the atmosphere.
- C They describe one eruption to explain the cold. They don’t teach how all eruptions work.
- D The details are about the eruption’s force, not how people see events.
Choose the answer
The details show the eruption’s severe impact on the atmosphere. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest trap. The details do describe an eruption. But C tells what the details are, not why they are there. The author is not teaching how volcanoes work. The details show how much dust reached the sky, which explains the cold summer. That is B.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 84 of 92
2018 Test B English, question 18Passage Excerpt from A Voice in the Wilderness
Excerpt from A Voice in the Wilderness
by Grace Livingston Hill
With a lurch the train came to a dead stop and Margaret Earle, hastily gathering up her belongings, hurried down the aisle and got out into the night.
It occurred to her, as she swung her heavy suit-case down the rather long step to the ground, and then carefully swung herself after it, that it was strange that neither conductor, brakeman, nor porter had come to help her off the train, when all three had taken the trouble to tell her that hers was the next station; but she could hear voices up ahead. Perhaps something was the matter with the engine that detained them and they had forgotten her for the moment.
The ground was rough where she stood, and there seemed no sign of a platform. Did they not have platforms in this wild Western land, or was the train so long that her car had stopped before reaching it?
She strained her eyes into the darkness, and tried to make out things from the two or three specks of light that danced about like fireflies in the distance. She could dimly see moving figures away up near the engine, and each one evidently carried a lantern. The train was tremendously long. A sudden feeling of isolation took possession of her. Perhaps she ought not to have got out until some one came to help her. Perhaps the train had not pulled into the station yet and she ought to get back on it and wait. Yet if the train started before she found the conductor she might be carried on somewhere and he justly blame her for a fool.
There did not seem to be any building on that side of the track. It was probably on the other, but she was standing too near the cars to see over. She tried to move back to look, but the ground sloped and she slipped and fell in the cinders, bruising her knee and cutting her wrist.
In sudden panic she arose. She would get back into the train, no matter what the consequences. They had no right to put her out here, away off from the station, at night, in a strange country. If the train started before she could find the conductor she would tell him that he must back it up again and let her off. He certainly could not expect her to get out like this.
She lifted the heavy suit-case up the high step that was even farther from the ground than it had been when she came down, because her fall had loosened some of the earth and caused it to slide away from the track. Then, reaching to the rail of the step, she tried to pull herself up, but as she did so the engine gave a long snort and the whole train, as if it were in league against her, lurched forward crazily, shaking off her hold. She slipped to her knees again, the suit-case, toppled from the lower step, descending upon her, and together they slid and rolled down the short bank, while the train . . . ran giddily off into the night.
The horror of being deserted helped the girl to rise in spite of bruises and shock. She lifted imploring hands to the unresponsive cars as they hurried by her—one, two, three, with bright windows, each showing a passenger, comfortable and safe inside, unconscious of her need.
A moment of useless screaming, running, trying to attract some one’s attention, a sickening sense of terror and failure, and the last car slatted itself past with a mocking clatter, as if it enjoyed her discomfort.
Margaret stood dazed, reaching out helpless hands, then dropped them at her sides and gazed after the fast-retreating train, the light on its last car swinging tauntingly, blinking now and then with a leer in its eye, rapidly vanishing from her sight into the depth of the night.
She gasped and looked about her for the station that but a short moment before had been so real to her mind; and, lo! on this side and on that there was none!
The night was wide like a great floor shut in by a low, vast dome of curving blue set with the largest, most wonderful stars she had ever seen. Heavy shadows of purple-green, smoke-like, hovered over earth darker and more intense than the unfathomable blue of the night sky. It seemed like the secret nesting-place of mysteries wherein no human foot might dare intrude. It was incredible that such could be but common sage-brush, sand, and greasewood wrapped about with the beauty of the lonely night.
No building broke the inky outlines of the plain, nor friendly light streamed out to cheer her heart. Not even a tree was in sight, except on the far horizon, where a heavy line of deeper darkness might mean a forest. Nothing, absolutely nothing, in the blue, deep, starry dome above and the bluer darkness of the earth below save one sharp shaft ahead like a black mast throwing out a dark arm across the track.
As soon as she sighted it she picked up her baggage and made her painful way toward it, for her knees and wrist were bruised and her baggage was heavy.
A soft drip, drip greeted her as she drew nearer; something plashing down among the cinders by the track. Then she saw the tall column with its arm outstretched, and looming darker among the sage-brush the outlines of a water-tank. It was so she recognized the engine’s drinking-tank, and knew that she had mistaken a pause to water the engine for a regular stop at a station.
cinders: track bed made from the residue of burnt coal
From A VOICE IN THE WILDERNESS by Grace Livingston Hill—Public Domain
Question
Read this sentence from paragraph 4.
Yet if the train started before she found the conductor she might be carried on somewhere and he justly blame her for a fool.
How does the sentence contribute to the development of the plot?
- AIt shows how Margaret’s reliance on the guidance of others leads to the external conflict she faces.
- BIt reveals how Margaret’s concern about the opinions of others causes the external conflict she faces.
- CIt highlights how Margaret’s indecision results in the external conflict being prolonged.
- DIt illustrates how Margaret’s confusion makes it difficult for her to fully understand the external conflict.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks which sentence correctly explains the connection between the sentence from paragraph 4 and the overall plot of the excerpt. The train’s need to stop for water is not evident to Margaret, which causes the external conflict. The sentence from paragraph 4 reveals how Margaret’s confusion over her best course of action prevents her from recognizing the nature of the external conflict; therefore, Option D is correct.
Option A is incorrect because Margaret’s reliance on others is not demonstrated in the sentence, and her reliance on others does not contribute to the external conflict.
Option B is incorrect because her concern for the opinion of others is not the main cause for her external conflict.
Option C is incorrect because Margaret’s indecision has no effect on the cause of the conflict.
Question analysis
This plot-development question quotes one sentence from A Voice in the Wilderness in which Margaret worries the train will carry her off and the conductor will think her a fool. Students explain how that sentence connects her state of mind to the story’s external conflict. Every choice links a believable trait to the conflict, which makes this one of the trickier questions on the excerpt.
- NYS standards
- 7R3 plot elements and ideas
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 plot questions usually link one event to its result. This one asks how a single sentence of Margaret’s private worry bears on the external conflict, which students must first pin down using the whole excerpt.
- Estimated difficulty
- Among the hardest on the SHSAT: a non-obvious approach, heavy reading, or a well-hidden trap.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Every choice must be checked major
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Complex sentences moderate
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 981 words; question and choices: about grade 9, 101 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
This is one of the hardest questions on the excerpt because every choice is half plausible: Margaret does want the conductor, does fear being called a fool, and does waver. The decisive half is the second one, what the trait does to the conflict, and judging it requires knowing the conflict is a water stop she mistook for a station. Students who check only the first half will usually choose the worry about others’ opinions.
Every choice must be checked major Choosing the answer
Every choice pairs a trait, reliance, worry about opinion, indecision or confusion, with an effect on the conflict, so each must be tested twice: is the trait in the sentence, and does it do that? (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The indecision choice is nearly the right one: “indecision” and “confusion” name almost the same state in paragraph 4, so only the effect, prolonging the conflict versus making it hard to understand, separates them. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Complex sentences moderate Understanding the question
The sentence is old-fashioned and elliptical: “he justly blame her for a fool” silently shares the “might” of “she might be carried on,” which makes its meaning hard to parse. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The nature of the external conflict, a stop to water the engine rather than a station, is revealed only in the excerpt’s last paragraph, far from paragraph 4. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
The choices rely on the literary term “external conflict,” and students unsure what it means cannot judge how a thought in Margaret’s head relates to it. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Check each choice in two halves: is the trait really shown in this sentence, and does that trait truly cause or change the trouble Margaret ends up in?
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
The wrong answers, classified
A Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads her wish to find the conductor as dependence on others, but the sentence shows her weighing a risk, and nothing makes reliance the cause of her being stranded.
B Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Gets the first half right, since she fears the conductor will think her “a fool,” but that worry does not cause the conflict; the train leaves after a water stop.
C Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Spots her wavering in paragraph 4, with its two “Perhaps” sentences and a “Yet,” but the indecision does not stretch out the conflict, which arrives when the train pulls away.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how one sentence helps build the plot, the events of the story. The choices use the term external conflict: a problem between a character and something outside her. Margaret’s problem is that she got off where there is no station, and the train leaves her behind.
Read the sentence in plain words
The sentence is: “Yet if the train started before she found the conductor she might be carried on somewhere and he justly blame her for a fool.” In plain words: If the train leaves with me still on it, I might miss my stop. Then the conductor could rightly call me foolish.
See where it fits in paragraph 4
Just before, she thinks “Perhaps she ought not to have got out” and “Perhaps the train had not pulled into the station yet.” Her thoughts go back and forth. She cannot tell whether she is at her station or not. She is confused.
Learn what is really happening
At the end of the excerpt, she learns the truth. She “had mistaken a pause to water the engine for a regular stop at a station.” Because she is confused, she worries about the wrong danger. She fears being carried too far. The real danger is being left behind.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. The sentence doesn’t show her depending on others, and that is not what strands her.
- B is wrong. She does worry about being called a fool. But that worry doesn’t cause her problem. The water stop does.
- C is wrong. Her back-and-forth doesn’t make the problem last longer. The trouble comes when the train pulls away.
- D is right. Her confusion keeps her from seeing what is really going on.
Watch out: B is half right, since she fears looking foolish. But the question asks what that does to the conflict, and her worry does not cause it.
Choose the answer
The sentence shows Margaret’s mixed-up thinking about a problem she does not understand yet. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong answer. Its first half is true: Margaret worries the conductor will think she is a fool. But B says this worry causes her problem. It doesn’t. The train stopped for water, and she got off. D fits better, because the sentence shows how confused she is.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from A Voice in the Wilderness” as printed (pages 128–129)
Question 85 of 92
2018 Test B English, question 21Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from A Voice in the Wilderness”.
Question
How does Margaret’s experience in paragraph 9 emphasize a theme of the excerpt?
- AIt confirms Margaret’s understanding that she cannot rely on help from anyone else.
- BIt leads Margaret to realize that her efforts to change her situation are ineffective.
- CIt causes Margaret to believe that her own actions led to an unfavorable outcome.
- DIt reinforces Margaret’s frustration about her lack of control over her surroundings.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks about the relationship between the theme and paragraph 9, where Margaret desperately tries to get someone on the train to notice her. One important theme of this excerpt concerns Margaret’s willingness to take action to ensure that she reaches her destination. This determination, described in Option A, is why she gathers her belongings together without help, gets off the train without being assisted by employees, and then attempts to climb back on while the train employees are busy examining the engine.
Option B is incorrect because, while the narrator describes her screaming as useless, she does not feel that her efforts overall are useless, and she does not give up until paragraph 10.
Option C is incorrect because, while Margaret is feeling a sense of “failure” in paragraph 9, she does not condemn herself as the train moves away.
Option D is incorrect because Margaret has expressed “terror” in paragraph 9 over being unable to catch someone’s attention, not frustration over her lack of control over her surroundings.
Question analysis
This theme question focuses on paragraph 9 of the Grace Livingston Hill excerpt, where Margaret screams and runs as the train pulls away without her. Students decide which larger idea of the excerpt that desperate moment reinforces. All four choices describe feelings she could plausibly have, so students must tie the moment to what the whole story keeps showing.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 theme questions ask how a theme develops; this one asks students to decide which theme a single desperate moment reinforces, with four answers that all fit the scene. Weighing them takes the whole excerpt and fine judgment.
- Estimated difficulty
- Among the hardest on the SHSAT: a non-obvious approach, heavy reading, or a well-hidden trap.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines major
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from the whole text
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 981 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 65 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
This is among the hardest questions in the set because every choice describes a feeling Margaret could reasonably have, and two of them borrow the paragraph’s own words, “useless” and “failure.” The answer depends on seeing paragraph 9 as the end of a pattern rather than a single moment of panic. Students who reason from that one paragraph usually conclude she has given up, which the rest of the excerpt contradicts.
Reading between the lines major Working it out
The theme is never stated; it has to be inferred from paragraph 9’s unanswered cries for attention and what they show about whether anyone will come to her aid. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The same pattern starts in paragraph 2, where no trainman comes to help, and returns in paragraph 8’s passengers “unconscious of her need,” so the theme rests on evidence across the excerpt. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Strategy: Decide what idea the excerpt keeps returning to from its first paragraph to its last, then ask which choice that moment in paragraph 9 most directly strengthens.
Traps
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Wrong tone or attitude: Misjudges the tone, attitude or point of view, such as reading admiration as criticism, or taking a character's or subject's feelings for the author's.
The wrong answers, classified
B Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Generalizes the “useless screaming” of one moment into a realization that all her efforts fail, though she soon picks up her baggage and heads for the dark shaft ahead.
C Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Turns the paragraph’s “sense of terror and failure” into self-blame, though Margaret never says her own choice to leave the train caused her trouble.
D Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Names frustration over things she cannot control, which fits the indifferent train, but paragraph 9 stresses terror at going unnoticed rather than frustration.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks about a theme: a big idea the story keeps coming back to. How does what happens in paragraph 9 support a theme?
Look at paragraph 9
In paragraph 9, Margaret is “screaming, running, trying to attract some one’s attention.” But no one notices her, and the train goes on without her. Her calls for help get no answer.
Find the same idea earlier
This has happened before. In paragraph 2, none of the three train workers “had come to help her off the train.” In paragraph 8, the passengers are “comfortable and safe inside, unconscious of her need.” Here, “unconscious of her need” means they don’t know she needs help. Again and again, no one comes to help her.
Check each choice
- A is right. Paragraph 9 shows once more that she cannot count on anyone else.
- B is wrong. One moment of useless screaming doesn’t mean she gives up. Later she picks up her bags and walks on.
- C is wrong. She never blames herself for her trouble.
- D is wrong. The paragraph shows terror at not being noticed, not frustration about control.
Watch out: B takes one failed moment and makes it about all her efforts. The rest of the excerpt doesn’t support that.
Choose the answer
Paragraph 9 adds one more time that nobody helps Margaret. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong answer, because her screaming is called “useless.” But a theme must fit the whole excerpt. Margaret keeps acting: in paragraph 14 she “picked up her baggage” and walked on. What stays true from paragraph 2 to paragraph 9 is that no one helps her. That is A.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 86 of 92
2018 Test B English, question 23Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from A Voice in the Wilderness”.
Question
How does paragraph 11 contribute to the plot of the excerpt?
- AIt reveals that the reality of the situation is different from Margaret’s assumptions.
- BIt illustrates that Margaret’s main problem is her own imagination.
- CIt shows that Margaret is surprised by the unexpected adventure she is about to undertake.
- DIt provides additional insight into how Margaret reacts to stressful situations.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks how paragraph 11 helps shape the overall plot of the excerpt. In paragraph 5, Margaret assumes there is a station, “It was probably on the other [side], but she was standing too near the cars to see,” but in paragraph 11, the station that had been “so real” in Margaret’s mind actually does not exist, supporting Option A as the correct response.
Option B is incorrect because Margaret’s main problem is not that she has imagined the station on the other side of the train but that it actually isn’t there.
Option C is incorrect because, while Margaret seems somewhat in awe of her surroundings in paragraph 12 and she “gasped” in paragraph 11, her exclamation is one of shock at the discovery, not surprise over an unexpected adventure.
Option D is incorrect because the paragraph mainly describes what Margaret does in the particular situation she is currently in but does not explain or provide details that give insight to Margaret’s personality in general.
Question analysis
This plot question asks what paragraph 11 of the Grace Livingston Hill story, a single exclaiming sentence, adds after the train has gone. Students explain the paragraph’s role in the plot, linking it to earlier moments in the excerpt. Its old-fashioned phrasing, including the word “lo,” can make the meaning hard to pin down.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how one short paragraph moves a plot forward appears in the grade 6 structure standard and carries into grade 7 plot analysis. It is typical work, but students must connect this one-sentence moment to what came before and after it.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 981 words; question and choices: about grade 10, 59 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
Paragraph 11 is one short exclaiming sentence, and its job is to overturn what Margaret, and the reader, had assumed since paragraph 3. Students who connect it to those earlier guesses see the reversal at once; students who read it alone fasten on her gasp or on “so real to her mind.” The question rewards reading the paragraph as a turning point in the plot rather than a window into her character.
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The imagination choice and the right one both describe a gap between what Margaret pictured and what is there; the separating detail is where the trouble lies, in her mind or in the missing station. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The assumption the paragraph overturns was set up earlier: in paragraph 3 she looked for a platform, and in paragraph 5 she decided the building “was probably on the other” side. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
The archaic “lo!” and “on this side and on that there was none” are how the paragraph announces its reversal, and students unused to such phrasing may miss it. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Reread paragraph 11 with the paragraphs just before it, ask what new fact it gives Margaret, and judge each choice by whether the paragraph itself shows it.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
The wrong answers, classified
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Twists “so real to her mind” into a claim that her imagination is the problem, when the station she pictured is simply not there and the danger is real.
C Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Rightly hears surprise in her gasp and “lo!” but reads it as excitement about an adventure ahead, when it is shock at finding no station at all.
D Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Offers a general claim about how she handles stress, which could fit almost any paragraph, though this one reports a single discovery that moves the plot.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how paragraph 11 moves the plot forward. What new thing does Margaret learn there?
Read paragraph 11
Paragraph 11 says: “She gasped and looked about her for the station that but a short moment before had been so real to her mind; and, lo! on this side and on that there was none!”
Put it in plain words
“Lo!” is an old word that means Look! The words “on this side and on that there was none” mean there was no station on either side of the track. Earlier, in paragraph 5, she guessed the station “was probably on the other” side. She was sure it was there. Now she sees that it does not exist.
Check each choice
- A is right. What she believed (a station) is different from what is real (no station).
- B is wrong. Her imagination is not the problem. The missing station is a real problem.
- C is wrong. Her gasp is shock, not excitement about an adventure.
- D is wrong. The paragraph shows one discovery. It says nothing about how she handles stress in general.
Watch out: B uses the idea that the station was “so real to her mind.” But her trouble is real, not imagined: she truly is stranded.
Choose the answer
Paragraph 11 shows that the station she counted on is not there. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong answer, because both A and B notice a gap between what Margaret pictured and what is there. But B blames her imagination. The real problem is outside her head: there is no station, and the train is gone. A says this correctly.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 87 of 92
2018 Test B English, question 24Uses the passage above: “Excerpt from A Voice in the Wilderness”.
Question
How do the details in paragraphs 12–13 about the setting help support the theme of the excerpt?
- AThey show that Margaret is overwhelmed by the darkness that surrounds her.
- BThey suggest that the situation is frustrating but that Margaret is hopeful.
- CThey reveal that the landscape is beautiful and that Margaret is alone.
- DThey demonstrate that Margaret is easily discouraged and frightened.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks how the details about the setting support the theme of the excerpt. In paragraph 12, phrases such as “vast dome of curving blue” and “the beauty of the lonely night” describe the beauty of the place. However, in paragraph 13, the author writes, “no building broke the inky outlines of the plain, nor friendly light streamed out to cheer her heart” to express how alone Margaret really is. These phrases demonstrate that Option C is correct.
Option A is incorrect because positive phrases such as “largest, most wonderful stars” show that Margaret is not overwhelmed by the darkness.
Option B is incorrect because, while Margaret is feeling helpless and alone at the recent realization that there is no station (paragraph 11), the descriptions of the landscape, which focus on the beauty and mysteriousness of the place, do not signify hope but rather how quiet and isolated the location is.
Option D is incorrect because, while Margaret has expressed fear in paragraphs 9–11, the details in paragraphs 12–13 do not show that she is discouraged but rather that she is aware of her situation because she sees no buildings or light.
Question analysis
This theme question asks how the description of the night landscape in paragraphs 12 and 13 of A Voice in the Wilderness supports the excerpt’s theme. Students interpret details of sky, stars and plain and decide what they show about Margaret’s situation after the train leaves. Several choices sound reasonable for a stranded traveler, so students must stick to what the paragraphs actually show.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Linking setting details to a theme is typical grade 7 literary analysis. What raises the load is the language: two paragraphs of dense, old-fashioned description with words like unfathomable and greasewood.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Figurative or literary language moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 8, 981 words; question and choices: about grade 8, 61 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
These two paragraphs pull in opposite directions, wonder at the starry sky and emptiness on the plain, and the right answer is the one that keeps both. Students who notice only the dark imagery overstate her fear, and those who notice only that her situation is hard may add a hope the text denies when no “friendly light” comes to cheer her. Checking each half of a two-part choice separately is the safest way through.
Figurative or literary language moderate Understanding the question
Paragraph 12 calls the sky “a low, vast dome of curving blue” and the land a “secret nesting-place of mysteries,” beauty and menace mixed, so students must hold both feelings at once. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
Words such as “unfathomable,” “greasewood” and “sage-brush” slow the reading of two descriptive paragraphs where every detail matters to the theme. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: List the main details in paragraphs 12 and 13, decide what they suggest about Margaret’s situation, then test every part of each choice against that list.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Fixes on the inky outlines and heavy shadows and overlooks the “largest, most wonderful stars she had ever seen,” so it reports only the darker half of the description.
B Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Accepts that her situation is hard but adds hope, which paragraph 13 denies when no “friendly light streamed out to cheer her heart.”
D Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Judges her character as easily discouraged, though these paragraphs describe the setting she sees, and in paragraph 14 she sets off at once toward the dark shaft.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how the setting in paragraphs 12 and 13 supports the theme. The setting is where and when a story happens. You need a choice that fits all the details, not just some.
List the details in paragraph 12
Paragraph 12 describes the sky and the land. It has “the largest, most wonderful stars she had ever seen.” It ends with “the beauty of the lonely night.” These details are beautiful. But notice the word “lonely,” too.
List the details in paragraph 13
Paragraph 13 says: “No building broke the inky outlines of the plain, nor friendly light streamed out to cheer her heart.” It adds, “Not even a tree was in sight.” There are no houses, no lights and no people. She is completely alone.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. There is darkness, but the wonderful stars show she also sees beauty. A leaves that half out.
- B is wrong. No friendly light comes to cheer her, so nothing here shows hope.
- C is right. The land is beautiful, and she is alone in it.
- D is wrong. These paragraphs describe the place, not her character. Right after them, she sets off on her own.
Watch out: A notices only the dark half of the description.
Choose the answer
The setting is lovely and empty at the same time. So the answer is C.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest wrong answer, because the paragraphs do mention dark shadows and “inky outlines.” But A leaves out the beauty: the wonderful stars and the blue sky. The phrase “the beauty of the lonely night” holds both halves together, and so does C.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 88 of 92
2018 Test B English, question 29Passage Excerpt from “Niagara Falls”
Excerpt from “Niagara Falls”
by Rupert Brooke
The real secret of the beauty and terror of the Falls is not their height or width, but the feeling of colossal power and of unintelligible disaster caused by the plunge of that vast body of water. If that were taken away, there would be little visible change, but the heart would be gone.
The American Falls do not inspire this feeling in the same way as the Canadian. It is because they are less in volume, and because the water does not fall so much into one place. By comparison their beauty is almost delicate and fragile. They are extraordinarily level, one long curtain of lacework and woven foam. Seen from opposite, when the sun is on them, they are blindingly white, and the clouds of spray show dark against them. With both Falls the colour of the water is the ever-altering wonder. Greens and blues, purples and whites, melt into one another, fade, and come again, and change with the changing sun. Sometimes they are as richly diaphanous as a precious stone, and glow from within with a deep, inexplicable light. Sometimes the white intricacies of dropping foam become opaque and creamy. And always there are the rainbows. If you come suddenly upon the Falls from above, a great double rainbow, very vivid, spanning the extent of spray from top to bottom, is the first thing you see. If you wander along the cliff opposite, a bow springs into being in the American Falls, accompanies you courteously on your walk, dwindles and dies as the mist ends, and awakens again as you reach the Canadian tumult. And the bold traveller who attempts the trip under the American Falls sees, when he dare open his eyes to anything, tiny baby rainbows, some four or five yards in span, leaping from rock to rock among the foam, and gambolling beside him, barely out of hand’s reach, as he goes. One I saw in that place was a complete circle, such as I have never seen before, and so near that I could put my foot on it. It is a terrifying journey, beneath and behind the Falls. The senses are battered and bewildered by the thunder of the water and the assault of wind and spray; or rather, the sound is not of falling water, but merely of falling; a noise of unspecified ruin. So, if you are close behind the endless clamour, the sight cannot recognise liquid in the masses that hurl past. You are dimly and pitifully aware that sheets of light and darkness are falling in great curves in front of you. Dull omnipresent foam washes the face. Farther away, in the roar and hissing, clouds of spray seem literally to slide down some invisible plane of air.
Beyond the foot of the Falls the river is like a slipping floor of marble, green with veins of dirty white, made by the scum that was foam. It slides very quietly and slowly down for a mile or two, sullenly exhausted. Then it turns to a dull sage green, and hurries more swiftly, smooth and ominous. As the walls of the ravine close in, trouble stirs, and the waters boil and eddy. These are the lower rapids, a sight more terrifying than the Falls, because less intelligible. Close in its bands of rock the river surges tumultuously forward, writhing and leaping as if inspired by a demon. It is pressed by the straits into a visibly convex form. Great planes of water slide past. Sometimes it is thrown up into a pinnacle of foam higher than a house, or leaps with incredible speed from the crest of one vast wave to another, along the shining curve between, like the spring of a wild beast. Its motion continually suggests muscular action. The power manifest in these rapids moves one with a different sense of awe and terror from that of the Falls. Here the inhuman life and strength are spontaneous, active, almost resolute. . . . A place of fear.
One is drawn back, strangely, to a contemplation of the Falls, at every hour, and especially by night, when the cloud of spray becomes an immense visible ghost, straining and wavering high above the river, white and pathetic and translucent. The Victorian lies very close below the surface in every man. There one can sit and let great cloudy thoughts of destiny and the passage of empires drift through the mind; for such dreams are at home by Niagara. I could not get out of my mind the thought of a friend, who said that the rainbows over the Falls were like the arts and beauty and goodness, with regard to the stream of life—caused by it, thrown upon its spray, but unable to stay or direct or affect it, and ceasing when it ceased. In all comparisons that rise in the heart, the river, with its multitudinous waves and its single current, likens itself to a life, whether of an individual or of a community. A man’s life is of many flashing moments, and yet one stream; a nation’s flows through all its citizens, and yet is more than they. In such places, one is aware, with an almost insupportable and yet comforting certitude, that both men and nations are hurried onwards to their ruin or ending as inevitably as this dark flood. Some go down to it unreluctant, and meet it, like the river, not without nobility. And as incessant, as inevitable, and as unavailing as the spray that hangs over the Falls, is the white cloud of human crying. . . . With some such thoughts does the platitudinous heart win from the confusion and thunder of a Niagara peace that the quietest plains or most stable hills can never give.
From LETTERS FROM AMERICA by Rupert Brooke—Public Domain
diaphanous: sheer, translucent
platitudinous: clichéd, common
Question
Read this sentence from paragraph 4.
There one can sit and let great cloudy thoughts of destiny and the passage of empires drift through the mind; for such dreams are at home by Niagara.
The sentence most contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt by
- Asuggesting that viewing the Falls can be a life-changing experience.
- Bshowing that the cliffs of the Falls are a good place for self-examination.
- Cemphasizing that the grandeur of the Falls seems impossible to grasp.
- Dhighlighting the type of reflection that is inspired by a visit to the Falls.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks how the sentence from paragraph 4 contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt.
The description of “cloudy thoughts of destiny and the passage of empires” in the sentence refers to the types of thoughts a person might have while observing the Falls, as stated in Option D.
Option A is incorrect because the sentence focuses on the idea that the Falls are a place of great contemplation but does not clarify that these thoughts are life-changing.
Option B is incorrect because the sentence does not describe focused thoughts of a personal nature; the grand, sweeping nature of the Falls inspires thoughts of the same caliber as “the passage of empires.”
Option C is incorrect because the sentence is about how the Falls inspire great thoughts but is not about how difficult it is to grasp the grandeur of the Falls.
Question analysis
This question asks how a sentence near the end of Rupert Brooke’s “Niagara Falls” contributes to the development of ideas in the excerpt. Students must make sense of abstract phrases such as “cloudy thoughts of destiny” and “the passage of empires” and then decide exactly what the sentence adds, since several choices sound close.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Explaining how a sentence develops ideas is a grade 7 skill, and this sentence is quoted in full. The challenge is its abstract, old-fashioned wording, which a grade 7 reader must translate before comparing the choices.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Figurative or literary language moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 9, 987 words; question and choices: about grade 7, 94 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A grammar slip in the explanation was corrected.
- 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
The sentence is about thinking, and most of the choices describe thinking too, so the difference lies in what kind of thought and how much the sentence claims. Students lose the point by inflating daydreams into a life-changing experience or by turning thoughts about empires into self-examination. Paraphrasing the sentence before reading the choices, people sit by the Falls and think about destiny and history, keeps the right one in view.
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The self-examination choice and the right one both say the Falls prompt reflection; they differ in one detail, what the thoughts are about, and the sentence’s “destiny and the passage of empires” is not the self. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Figurative or literary language moderate Understanding the question
“Great cloudy thoughts” drifting through the mind borrow the image of the Falls’ spray, and “such dreams are at home by Niagara” treats the Falls as the natural home of this kind of daydream. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
“The passage of empires” and “destiny” are abstract, and students who cannot pin them down may not see that the thoughts concern history, not the thinker. (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Paraphrase the sentence in plain words first, then test each choice against your paraphrase, rejecting any that adds a claim the sentence does not make.
Traps
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Inflates the sentence’s daydreaming into a life-changing experience, though the author says only that great thoughts drift through the mind, not that they change anyone.
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Turns the reflection inward, but the thoughts named are of “destiny and the passage of empires,” history on a grand scale, and the sentence says nothing about cliffs.
C Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Borrows the earlier idea that the Falls and rapids are hard to understand, from paragraphs 1 and 3, but this sentence is about the thoughts they inspire.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The handbook writes “the grand, sweeping nature of the falls inspire thoughts.” The subject “nature” takes “inspires,” and the passage always capitalizes “the Falls,” so the site now reads “the grand, sweeping nature of the Falls inspires thoughts.”
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what one sentence adds to the essay’s ideas. Put the sentence in plain words first, then test each choice against it.
Read the sentence closely
The sentence says: “There one can sit and let great cloudy thoughts of destiny and the passage of empires drift through the mind; for such dreams are at home by Niagara.”
Put it in plain words
“Destiny” means what is meant to happen in the future. “The passage of empires” means great nations rising and falling over time. “At home by Niagara” means these dreams fit naturally at the Falls. So sitting by the Falls makes you think big thoughts about fate and history. The sentence names the kind of reflection, or deep thinking, the Falls bring on.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. Thoughts drift by, but nothing says they change a person’s life.
- B is wrong. The thoughts are about history and fate, not about yourself. The sentence doesn’t mention cliffs.
- C is wrong. This sentence is about the thoughts the Falls inspire, not about how hard they are to grasp.
- D is right. It names the type of thinking a visit to the Falls brings on.
Watch out: B is close, since both B and D are about reflection. Check what the thoughts are about: empires, not yourself.
Choose the answer
The sentence shows what kind of thoughts the Falls inspire. So the answer is D.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest wrong answer, because both B and D say the Falls make people reflect. The difference is the topic. Self-examination means thinking about yourself. The sentence names “thoughts of destiny and the passage of empires.” Those are big ideas about history, not about the self.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Excerpt from “Niagara Falls”” as printed (pages 134–135)
Question 89 of 92
2018 Test B English, question 48Passage Invention of the Telegraph
Samuel Morse, an American inventor, is credited with creating the electronic telegraph, a communication device that allows users to send messages using a system of short and long pulses that represent letters, numbers, and punctuation. In 1843 the United States Congress passed the Telegraph Bill, which provided Morse with the funds to build an electric telegraph system.
Invention of the Telegraph
Earlier Signal Systems
Long before Samuel F. B. Morse electrically transmitted his famous message “What hath God wrought?” from Washington to Baltimore on May 24, 1844, there were signaling systems that enabled people to communicate over distances. Most were visual or “semaphore” systems using flags or lights. In the eighteenth century, such systems used an observer who would decipher a signal from a high tower on a distant hill and then send it on to the next station. The young American republic wanted just such a system along its entire Atlantic coast and offered a prize of $30,000 for a workable proposal. The framers of this legislation had no way of knowing that when they used the word “telegraph” to refer to this visual semaphore system, they would be offered an entirely new and revolutionary means of communication—electricity.
The Growth of an Idea
The idea of using electricity to communicate over distance is said to have occurred to Morse during a conversation aboard ship when he was returning from Europe in 1832. Michael Faraday’s recently invented electromagnet was much discussed by the ship’s passengers, and when Morse came to understand how it worked, he speculated that it might be possible to send a coded message over a wire. While a student at Yale College years before, he had written his parents a letter about how interesting he found the lectures on electricity. Despite what he had learned at Yale, Morse found when he began to develop his idea that he had little real understanding of the nature of electricity, and after sporadic attempts to work with batteries, magnets, and wires, he finally turned for help to a colleague at the University of the City of New York, Leonard D. Gale.
Gale was a professor of chemistry and familiar with the electrical work of Princeton’s Joseph Henry, a true pioneer in the new field. Well before Morse had his shipboard idea about a telegraph, Henry rang a bell at a distance by opening and closing an electric circuit. In 1831, he had published an article, of which Morse was unaware, that contained details suggesting the idea of an electric telegraph. Gale’s help and his knowledge of this article proved crucial to Morse’s telegraph system because Gale not only pointed out flaws in the system but showed Morse how he could regularly boost the strength of a signal and overcome the distance problems he had encountered by using a relay system Henry had invented. Henry’s experiments, Gale’s assistance, and, soon after, hiring the young technician Alfred Vail were keys to Morse’s success.
Obstacles and Opportunities
By December 1837, Morse had enough confidence in his new system to apply for the federal government’s appropriation, and during the next year he conducted demonstrations of his telegraph both in New York and Washington.
However, when the economic disaster known as the Panic of 1837 took hold of the nation and caused a long depression, Morse was forced to wait for better times. It was during this period that Morse visited Europe again and tried not only to secure patent protection overseas but to examine competing telegraph systems in England. . . .
By 1843, the country was beginning to recover economically, and Morse again asked Congress for the $30,000 that would allow him to build a telegraph line from Washington to Baltimore, forty miles away. The House of Representatives eventually passed the bill containing the Morse appropriation, and the Senate approved it in the final hours of that Congress’s last session. With President Tyler’s signature, Morse received the cash he needed and began to carry out plans for an underground telegraph line.
Realizing a Great Invention
Morse had hired the ingenious construction engineer Ezra Cornell to lay the pipe carrying the wire, and although Cornell did his job superbly, one of Morse’s partners, Congressman F. O. J. Smith, had purchased wire with defective insulation. Too much time had been wasted laying bad wire, and with the project on a rigid deadline, something had to be done quickly. Cornell suggested that the fastest and cheapest way of connecting Washington and Baltimore was to string wires overhead on trees and poles. The desperate Morse gave the go-ahead, and the line was completed in time for the dramatic and spectacularly successful link between the Supreme Court chamber of the Capitol building and the railroad station in Baltimore.
Soon, as overhead wires connected cities up and down the Atlantic coast, the dots-and-dashes method that recorded messages on a long moving strip of paper was replaced by the operator’s ability to interpret the code in real time. . . . Telegraph lines soon extended westward, and within Morse’s own lifetime they connected the continents of Europe and America.
“Invention of the Telegraph”—Public Domain/Library of Congress
legislation: Telegraph Bill
dots-and-dashes method: the short and long pulses of Morse code that are sent and received by telegraph operators
The first transatlantic electric telegraph message was sent in 1858, and by 1902 the British All-Red Line connected most of the world.
Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census. Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970, Bicentennial Edition, Part 2. Washington, D.C., 1975.
Question
Which statement describes how the author’s use of problem-solution in paragraph 2 contributes to the development of ideas in the passage?
- AMorse’s discussion on a ship about Faraday’s electromagnet reminded him of the Yale College lectures on electricity, which he had enjoyed but had not fully understood, inspiring him to learn more about electricity from his colleague Gale.
- BMorse’s discouragement over his lack of knowledge of electricity prompted him to experiment with batteries, magnets, and wires, which led to the development of a new long-distance communication system.
- CMorse’s difficulty in understanding how Faraday’s electromagnet worked was frustrating, and it pushed him to create a system for sending signals over wires.
- DMorse’s longtime fascination was not enough to make up for his lack of knowledge about electricity, so he eventually sought help from Gale.
Show the answer
Correct answer: D
The question asks for the best explanation of how the use of problem-solution in paragraph 2 helps develop the ideas in the passage. Option D is correct because it explains that Morse realized his problem was that he was not knowledgeable enough to continue his experimentation without help, so the solution was to seek help from a colleague.
Option A is incorrect because, while the discussion on the ship fascinated Morse and reminded him of the lectures he had attended at Yale College, it was his failed attempts with electricity that caused him to reach out to Gale for help.
Option B is incorrect because, while “Morse found when he began to develop his idea that he had little real understanding of the nature of electricity” (paragraph 2), the paragraph does not state that he was discouraged; it was his failed experimentation that resulted in him first realizing that he needed help.
Option C is incorrect because the paragraph states that “Morse came to understand how [Faraday’s electromagnet] worked,” and that understanding is what caused him to think about sending messages over a wire. Also, Morse’s difficulty was in understanding the properties of electricity in general once he began his experimentation.
Question analysis
In this text structure question about “Invention of the Telegraph,” students explain how the problem-and-solution pattern in paragraph 2 develops ideas about Samuel Morse. All four choices are long sentences built from real details about the ship, Yale and Gale, so students must check each one’s account of what led to what.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Identifying problem and solution is familiar from earlier grades, but these choices are long, detail-packed chains in which a single misplaced cause makes an option wrong, which demands closer checking than typical grade 7 items.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Every choice must be checked major
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- The right answer is reworded moderate
- A lot to read moderate
- How, not what minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 910 words; question and choices: about grade 16, 132 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A wrong paragraph number in the explanation was corrected.
- A misspelled name in the explanation was corrected.
- A punctuation slip in the explanation was corrected.
- 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
Every choice is assembled from things the paragraph really mentions, so recognition is useless and only the order of causes decides. The most tempting wrong choice ends with Gale, the right solution, but invents a reminder of the Yale lectures to get there; others turn the failed experiments into the solution or reverse what Morse understood. The question rewards reading each long choice clause by clause, which costs time.
Every choice must be checked major Choosing the answer
Each choice is a chain of two or three causes built from real details, the ship, Faraday, Yale, the batteries and wires, Gale, so every link has to be checked against paragraph 2’s order of events. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The Yale-reminder choice and the key both join Morse’s enjoyment of electricity, his weak grasp of it and his turn to Gale; they part on one detail, the claim that the shipboard talk “reminded him” of Yale, which the paragraph never makes. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
The right answer is reworded moderate Choosing the answer
The key turns the Yale letter and the shipboard speculation into “longtime fascination,” a phrase the passage never uses, while the wrong choices repeat its names and phrases and so look better supported. (Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
A lot to read moderate Understanding the question
The four choices run to about 110 words, the longest 37, and paragraph 2 itself packs a voyage, a college letter, failed experiments and a colleague into four sentences. (Kintsch, 1998; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
How, not what minor Working it out
Students must name the paragraph’s problem, too little understanding of electricity, and its solution, Gale, before judging which account of the pattern is accurate. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Strategy: Name the problem and the solution in paragraph 2 in a few words each, then choose the option whose sequence of events matches the paragraph exactly.
Traps
- Reversed relationship: Cause and effect, or the order of events, turned around.
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
The wrong answers, classified
A Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Ends correctly with Morse learning from Gale, but invents its cause: the paragraph never says the shipboard talk reminded Morse of Yale, and it skips the failed experiments that sent him to Gale.
B Reversed relationship (King et al., 2004)
Reverses cause and effect: the “sporadic attempts” with batteries, magnets and wires exposed Morse’s weak grasp of electricity and sent him to Gale, rather than flowing from discouragement and producing the system.
C Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Says Morse struggled to understand Faraday’s electromagnet, but the paragraph states that he “came to understand how it worked,” and that understanding is what gave him the idea.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Explanation: The handbook places the sentence “Morse found when he began to develop his idea that he had little real understanding of the nature of electricity” in paragraph 3. It is in paragraph 2, the paragraph the question is about, so the site now says “(paragraph 2).”
- Explanation: The handbook spells Leonard Gale’s name “Gail.” The passage spells it “Gale,” and so does the site now.
- Explanation: The handbook capitalizes “Also” after a semicolon (“over a wire; Also, Morse’s difficulty…”). The site starts a new sentence instead: “over a wire. Also, Morse’s difficulty…”
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks about problem-solution in paragraph 2. Problem-solution is a way to organize writing. First you learn about a problem, then how someone solved it. Find the problem and the solution. Then pick the choice that tells them in the right order.
Find the problem in paragraph 2
Paragraph 2 starts with “The idea of using electricity to communicate over distance.” It says Morse had enjoyed the electricity lectures at Yale. But then comes the problem: “Morse found when he began to develop his idea that he had little real understanding of the nature of electricity.”
Find the solution
The same sentence goes on: “after sporadic attempts to work with batteries, magnets, and wires, he finally turned for help to a colleague.” “Sporadic” means now and then, not steady. A colleague is a coworker. So Morse was interested in the subject, tried on his own, and did not succeed. His interest was not enough. His solution was to ask Gale for help.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. It ends with Gale, but the paragraph never says the ship talk “reminded him” of Yale. It also skips the failed tries.
- B is wrong. It has the order backward. The experiments showed the problem. They did not build the system.
- C is wrong. The paragraph says Morse “came to understand how it worked,” meaning the electromagnet.
- D fits. Long interest was not enough, so he got help from Gale.
Choose the answer
The problem was Morse’s weak grasp of electricity, and the solution was Gale. So the answer is D, “Morse’s longtime fascination was not enough to make up for his lack of knowledge about electricity, so he eventually sought help from Gale.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest trap. Like D, it mentions Yale, Morse’s weak grasp of electricity and Gale. But it adds a link the paragraph never makes, that the ship talk reminded him of Yale. With long choices, check every part. One made-up link makes the whole choice wrong.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Invention of the Telegraph” as printed (pages 146–148)
Question 90 of 92
2018 Test B English, question 49Uses the passage above: “Invention of the Telegraph”.
Question
Which statement describes how the author’s use of sequencing in paragraph 3 contributes to the overall structure of the passage?
- AIt shows that several people were simultaneously attempting to create an electric telegraph.
- BIt shows how the invention of the electric telegraph depended on information and techniques discovered by others.
- CIt shows that multiple means of long-distance communication were being used at the same time.
- DIt shows how quickly long-distance communication changed from visual signals to electrical signals.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The question asks how the use of sequencing, or arranging in chronological order, in paragraph 3 contributes to the overall structure of the passage. Paragraph 3 outlines the information that Gale knew who Henry was (“Well before Morse had his shipboard idea about a telegraph, Henry rang a bell at a distance by opening and closing an electric circuit”) and that Gale told Morse. Gale’s input was “crucial to Morse’s telegraph system,” and hiring Vail was an additional and necessary help.
Therefore, Option B is correct because the creation of Morse’s telegraph involved a series of steps that each built upon earlier ideas and inventions from others, such as Henry, Gale, and Vail.
Option A is incorrect because, although the inventions and advancements of others assisted in the development of the telegraph, the passage does not suggest that the other men were attempting to create their own telegraph systems.
Option C is incorrect because the only other long-distance communication system mentioned in the passage is the outdated semaphore system discussed in paragraph 1.
Option D is incorrect because the telegraph system was in development for more than ten years because of the lack of funding and the need for further experimentation.
Question analysis
Students explain how the sequence of events in paragraph 3 of “Invention of the Telegraph” contributes to the passage’s overall structure. The paragraph names several people and their roles in a few long sentences, and the choices make claims about the invention’s history that must each be checked against it.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Sequencing is familiar grade 7 structure work. This paragraph packs several people and dates into long sentences, but once the order is clear the role of the sequence is fairly direct, so the demand is typical.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Complex sentences moderate
- How, not what moderate
- Much to keep track of minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 910 words; question and choices: about grade 12, 77 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
Paragraph 3 is dense, but its last sentence nearly states the answer: Henry’s experiments, Gale’s help and Vail were “keys to Morse’s success.” Students lose the point when Henry’s telegraph-like article makes them imagine a race, or when the stem’s “overall structure” sends them back to the semaphore towers of paragraph 1. The question rewards reading the time markers as a chain of borrowed knowledge.
Complex sentences moderate Understanding the question
The key facts sit in embedded sentences, such as “an article, of which Morse was unaware, that contained details suggesting the idea,” and a 53-word sentence on what Gale showed Morse. (Abedi & Lord, 2001; Freedle & Kostin, 1993; Messick, 1989)
How, not what moderate Working it out
The stem asks what the order of events contributes to the passage’s structure, so students must see the time words, “Well before,” “In 1831,” “soon after,” as showing Morse building on others’ work. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Much to keep track of minor Working it out
Four people, Henry, Gale, Vail and Morse, and two of Henry’s inventions have to be kept straight to see who supplied what to whom. (Sweller, 1988; Carpenter, Just & Shell, 1990)
Strategy: Put the events of paragraph 3 in order, noting who did what and when, then ask what that order shows about Morse’s invention.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Too broad or too strong: A choice overstates, generalizes, or uses absolute words the text does not support.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Reads Henry’s article “suggesting the idea of an electric telegraph” as a rival effort, but the paragraph places Henry’s work “well before” Morse’s and shows it helping him.
C Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Brings back the flag and light systems of paragraph 1, which came before the telegraph; paragraph 3 describes no other means of communication in use alongside it.
D Too broad or too strong (King et al., 2004)
Follows the passage’s overall move from semaphore to electricity but adds “how quickly,” though Morse’s idea of 1832 did not become a working line until 1844.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks about sequencing in paragraph 3. Sequencing means putting events in time order. You need to say what that order shows about Morse’s invention.
Put paragraph 3’s events in order
Paragraph 3 uses time words. “Well before Morse had his shipboard idea about a telegraph, Henry rang a bell at a distance.” It adds that “In 1831, he had published an article” that hinted at an electric telegraph. Then Gale showed Morse “a relay system Henry had invented.” Last, Morse hired Alfred Vail “soon after.”
See what the order shows
A relay is a device that boosts a signal so it can travel farther. Each event in the order is someone else’s work that helped Morse. Henry’s work came first. Gale passed it on. Vail added his skill. The last sentence sums it up: these were all “keys to Morse’s success.” So Morse built his telegraph on what others had found.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. Henry’s work came “well before” Morse’s and helped him. Nobody was racing at the same time.
- B fits. The order shows Morse depending on earlier work by Henry, Gale and Vail.
- C is wrong. Paragraph 3 talks only about electric work. Flags and lights are in paragraph 1.
- D is wrong. Nothing here shows speed. Morse’s idea came in 1832, and his line opened in 1844.
Choose the answer
The time order shows one person’s work feeding the next, all leading to Morse. So the answer is B, “It shows how the invention of the electric telegraph depended on information and techniques discovered by others.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the strongest trap, because Henry’s article had details “suggesting the idea of an electric telegraph.” That can sound like a rival. But the time words show Henry came first, and Gale used his work to help Morse. Earlier work that helps is what B describes.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 91 of 92
2018 Test B English, question 54Uses the passage above: “Invention of the Telegraph”.
Question
Which sentence is the best summary of how Morse obtained the funding necessary to build his telegraph system?
- AMorse applied for a federal grant that was delayed until 1843, so he spent time traveling in Europe, where he concentrated on obtaining a patent for his system.
- BMorse applied for a government grant that required both houses of Congress and the president to pass a bill awarding him $30,000 for his telegraph project.
- CMorse applied for a government appropriation and conducted telegraph demonstrations to show that his system could work, and after a delay caused by a financial depression, Congress approved the $30,000 appropriation in 1843.
- DWorking with Gale and Vail allowed Morse to find flaws in Henry’s work and to develop his own ideas before applying for the federal government appropriation.
Show the answer
Correct answer: C
The question asks for the best summary of Morse’s efforts to fund the construction of his telegraph system. Option C is correct because it details all the steps that resulted in Morse obtaining the appropriation, or $30,000 needed.
Option A is incorrect because it focuses on what Morse did while his application for the funding was delayed.
Option B is incorrect because, while it begins with Morse applying for the grant, it focuses on the process required for the government to approve the appropriation.
Option D is incorrect because it relates how Morse worked with others to develop his ideas about the telegraph before applying for funding for its construction.
Question analysis
Students choose the best summary of how Samuel Morse obtained the money to build his telegraph, an account spread across three paragraphs of “Invention of the Telegraph.” Each choice is a long sentence with accurate-sounding facts, so the task is to find the one that covers the main steps in order without drifting to side events.
- Grade level
- Grade 7 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- At grade 7 Summarizing a sequence is core grade 7 work. The facts are clearly stated, but the four long choices each mix accurate details with gaps or shifts in focus, so careful checking, not inference, is the main demand.
- Estimated difficulty
- Moderate: several steps, or a close reading with one strong distractor.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly understand
- What makes it hard
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Evidence in several places moderate
- A lot to read minor
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 910 words; question and choices: about grade 13, 127 words.
- Corrected from the DOE handbook
- A date in the passage introduction was corrected.
- 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
A good summary has to be complete as well as accurate, and two wrong choices are accurate but incomplete. Students who check only whether each statement is true find little to reject in the choice about Congress and the president, so they need to test coverage: application, demonstrations, delay, approval. The right choice is the longest and the only one that covers every stage.
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
The Congress-and-president choice and the key both start with Morse applying and end with the $30,000 approved; they part on one stretch of the story, the demonstrations and the depression’s delay, which only the key includes. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The funding story runs across paragraphs 4 to 6: the application in December 1837, demonstrations in New York and Washington, the Panic of 1837, the trip to Europe, and the 1843 request and vote. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
A lot to read minor Understanding the question
The four choices are each a long sentence of 26 to 33 words, packed with dates, institutions and places that must all be checked. (Kintsch, 1998; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: Before reading the choices, list the funding steps in paragraphs 4 to 6 in order, then pick the summary that includes the key steps and leaves out side details.
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.
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
The wrong answers, classified
A Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Builds the summary around Morse’s trip to Europe, a side event during the delay, and leaves out his demonstrations and Congress’s eventual approval of the money.
B Too narrow (King et al., 2004)
Gives only the last stage, the House, the Senate and the president’s signature in paragraph 6, and omits the demonstrations and the depression that delayed the money.
D Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Describes how Morse developed the telegraph in paragraph 3, not how he paid for it, and garbles it: Gale found flaws in Morse’s system, not in Henry’s work.
What was corrected from the DOE handbook, and why
- Passage: The handbook’s introduction says Congress passed the Telegraph Bill “In 1844.” Congress passed the $30,000 appropriation in March 1843; 1844 is the year of Morse’s first message. Paragraph 6 describes the 1843 approval, and Option C, the correct answer, says 1843, so the introduction now reads “In 1843.”
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks for the best summary of how Morse got the money to build his telegraph. A summary is a short retelling of the main steps. A good summary must be true and also complete. It should cover all the main steps, in order.
Find the funding steps
The story runs through paragraphs 4 to 6. In paragraph 4, Morse applied “for the federal government’s appropriation” in 1837. The next year he “conducted demonstrations of his telegraph both in New York and Washington.” In paragraph 5, the Panic of 1837 “caused a long depression,” so he had to wait. In paragraph 6, Congress passed the bill in 1843, and President Tyler signed it.
Explain the hard words
An appropriation is money the government sets aside for a certain use. A demonstration is a show of how something works. A depression is a long time when business is bad and money is short. So the steps are: apply, show that the system works, wait out the hard times, then win approval of the $30,000.
Check each choice
- A is wrong. It focuses on the trip to Europe, a side event. It leaves out the demonstrations and the final approval.
- B is wrong. It is true but tells only the last step, the vote and the signature. It skips the demonstrations and the delay.
- C fits. It covers the application, the demonstrations, the delay and the 1843 approval.
- D is wrong. It is about building the system, not paying for it. Also, Gale found flaws in Morse’s system, not in Henry’s work.
Choose the answer
Only one choice covers every main step, from the first application to the final approval. So the answer is C, the summary that ends with Congress approving “the $30,000 appropriation in 1843.”
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest trap, because everything in it is true. But a summary has to be complete, not just true. B leaves out the demonstrations and the long wait during the depression. C covers the whole story from start to finish, so it is the better summary.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
Question 92 of 92
2018 Test B English, question 56Uses the passage above: “Invention of the Telegraph”.
Question
The idea that, in the mid-nineteenth century, the United States was mostly unaware of the possibilities of electricity is illustrated in the passage mainly through the
- Adescription of the government’s initial desire to expand a semaphore signaling system that used either flags or lights along the Atlantic Coast.
- Bdelay by the House of Representatives to pass the bill funding Morse’s telegraph line six years after he first applied for the appropriation.
- Cdiscussions of the newly invented electromagnet that sparked the idea of sending codes through wires.
- Ddescription of how an electric circuit could be closed to ring a bell at a distance.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The question asks for information that conveys the idea that the United States was mostly unaware of the possibilities of electricity in the mid-nineteenth century. The passage states that most signaling systems at the time were “visual or ‘semaphore’ systems using flags or lights” (paragraph 1) and that the United States was looking for “just such a system along its entire Atlantic coast” (paragraph 1).
Option A is correct because waving lights and flags reveals how limiting and simple the system of the time was, and Option A states that the United States wanted to expand this system, not improve upon it.
Option B is incorrect because the delay in funding had to do with the Panic of 1837 and the “long depression” (paragraph 5), not because the House of Representatives was not aware or ready for innovation in the use of electricity.
Option C is incorrect because it focuses on what prompted Morse to consider an electronic wire-based communications system.
Option D is incorrect because it describes a basic aspect of an early electrical discovery that demonstrated the interest of scientists in the possibilities of electricity, not the United States as a whole.
Question analysis
Students identify how “Invention of the Telegraph” mainly illustrates the idea that, in the mid-1800s, the United States was largely unaware of what electricity could do. The idea is implied rather than stated, so students must decide which detail truly reveals the nation’s thinking at the time.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Grade 7 evidence questions often match a stated idea to a sentence. This idea is only implied, so students must infer what a historical detail reveals about a whole nation’s understanding, closer to grade 8 inference.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly evaluate
- What makes it hard
- Reading between the lines moderate
- Evidence in several places moderate
- Hard words minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: about grade 11, 910 words; question and choices: about grade 12, 102 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
The stem asks about a whole nation’s understanding, so details about individuals with electrical interests, the ship’s passengers and Henry, show the opposite of what is needed. The real trap is the funding delay, which looks like official indifference but has an economic cause the passage states. Students who remember that the semaphore plan came with a remark about not knowing electricity was coming find the answer.
Reading between the lines moderate Working it out
The idea is implied: wanting a semaphore system shows unawareness only alongside paragraph 1’s comment that its framers “had no way of knowing” they would be offered electricity. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Evidence in several places moderate Working it out
The choices point to four separate places, paragraph 1’s semaphore plan, the funding delay of paragraphs 4 to 6, the shipboard talk in paragraph 2 and Henry’s bell in paragraph 3, and each must be checked there. (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990; Gorin & Embretson, 2006)
Hard words minor Understanding the question
“Semaphore” and “appropriation” are uncommon words, and the passage defines “semaphore” only in passing, as systems “using flags or lights.” (Perfetti, 2007; Freedle & Kostin, 1993)
Strategy: For each choice, find the detail in the passage and ask whether the author uses it to show what the country did or did not understand about electricity.
Traps
- Twists what the text says: Uses the text's topic and ideas but changes what it says: who did it, how much, when, or why.
- Supports only part of the claim: In a question about evidence: a line that backs one half of the claim but not the other, or a related point rather than the claim itself.
The wrong answers, classified
B Twists what the text says (King et al., 2004)
Reads the long wait for funding as doubt about electricity, but the passage gives a different cause, the Panic of 1837 and the “long depression” that followed.
C Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
The ship’s passengers did discuss the new electromagnet, but that shows a few people interested in electricity, not a country unaware of what it could do.
D Supports only part of the claim (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Henry’s bell rung at a distance is a real detail, but it shows a scientist exploring electricity’s uses, the opposite of unawareness, and says nothing about the nation.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks which part of the passage best shows an idea. The idea is that in the mid-1800s, the United States mostly did not know what electricity could do. Look for a detail about the country as a whole, not about one scientist.
Find the detail in paragraph 1
Paragraph 1 says most early systems were visual, or semaphore, “systems using flags or lights.” Then it says, “The young American republic wanted just such a system along its entire Atlantic coast.” The next sentence explains that its lawmakers “had no way of knowing” they would be offered “an entirely new and revolutionary means of communication—electricity.”
Explain what the detail shows
A semaphore system sends signals people can see, like waving flags. The country asked for that old kind of system. It did not ask for an electric one, because it did not know one was possible. “Revolutionary” means bringing a huge change. So the government’s plan shows how unaware the nation was of what electricity could do.
Check each choice
- A fits. The government wanted to spread flags and lights, not electric signals.
- B is wrong. The delay had a money cause. The Panic of 1837 “caused a long depression.” It was not about electricity.
- C is wrong. Passengers talking about the electromagnet shows interest in electricity, the opposite of not knowing about it.
- D is wrong. Henry ringing a bell shows one scientist exploring electricity. It says nothing about the whole country.
Choose the answer
The country’s wish for a flags-and-lights system shows it did not yet see what electricity could do. So the answer is A, the description of the government’s plan for a semaphore system along the Atlantic Coast.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
B is the closest trap, because a long wait for money can look like doubt about electricity. But paragraph 5 gives the real cause, the Panic of 1837 and the hard times after it. A is backed by the passage’s own words: the lawmakers “had no way of knowing” electricity was coming.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
