Module I: Reading and Writing

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The adult io moth appears black, orange, and yellow with large eyespots as a result of pigmented scales that cover its wings and body. Although scales are widely known as the source of a moth’s color and pattern, the______blank of these scales goes beyond visual display: they also detach when moths are caught in a spiderweb.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?
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Mark for Review
attractiveness
utility
tendency
frailty
Amaranth grain was domesticated in Mexico. Its physical structure is no longer identical to the structure of the wild plant it is descended from. Summer squash also______blank its wild ancestor. That ancestor plant had a hard rind and bitter flesh. Indigenous people in eastern North America carefully bred the crop until it had a soft rind and mild-tasting flesh.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?
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Mark for Review
reacts to
Helps with
Varies from
argues with
Despite a growing view among young people and others in South Africa that celebrated anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela should have taken greater strides as president to effect more substantive structural changes in the country’s stratified society, years after his death in 2013 Mandela continues to be _________ blank by many worldwide.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?
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Mark for Review
evaluated
reinterpreted
lauded
criticized
The dinosaur displays at museums such as the Naturmuseum Senckenberg in Frankfurt (which has a life-sized Diplodocus longus statue among its holdings) are notable for the _________ blank of the research behind them—the museum staff consulted numerous sources to ensure the accuracy of the displays.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?
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Mark for Review
novelty
rigor
obscurity
shallowness
The following text is adapted from Eugene O’Neill’s 1920 play Beyond the Horizon. Andrew and Robert Mayo are brothers who grew up on their family’s farm.
ANDREW: Farming ain’t your nature. There’s all the difference shown in just the way us two feel about the farm. You—well, you like the home part of it, I expect; but as a place to work and grow things, you hate it. Ain’t that right?
ROBERT: Yes, I suppose it is. For you it’s different. You’re a Mayo through and through. You’re wedded to the soil. You’re as much a product of it as an ear of corn is, or a tree. Father is the same. This farm is his life-work
Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?
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Mark for Review
It illustrates that two characters share a goal.
It shows how two characters solved a mystery.
It describes a place two characters visited on vacation.
It emphasizes a difference between two characters.
In the past, historians who wanted to examine Frederick Douglass’s diary and other personal papers had to visit the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, to view them on microfilm (film containing scaled-down reproductions of documents). But traveling to the library often added time and costs to research projects. Now, by going to the library’s website, researchers can access digitized versions of Douglass’s papers without physically going anywhere.
Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?
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Mark for Review
It gives information about a famous person.
It describes a debate among historians.
It summarizes an unexpected finding.
It explains the meaning of a word.
Built in the 1970s, Raccoon Mountain is a pumped-storage hydropower facility (a “water-battery”) located in the United States along the Tennessee River. When energy demand is low, excess power from the regional electric utility’s nuclear plants is used to pump water (from a lower reservoir filled from the Tennessee River) up a shaft to the summit lake, where the water is stored as gravitational potential energy. When energy demand peaks, the water drains down from the summit lake, spinning turbines and generating upward of 1,700 megawatts of power—enough to power one million homes for twenty hours.
Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?
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Mark for Review
To discuss the benefits of a new energy technology
To point out the differences between two methods of energy generation
To explain the basics of how a specific energy technology works
To encourage regional electric utilities to build energy storage facilities
Text 1
The Roadmender, The Life of Martin R. Delany, and twenty-three other works of the late 1800s and early 1900s were rereleased in 2020 as publicity for a prestigious prize for women writers of fiction. Recognizing that women long had to use male pseudonyms for their works to be granted serious consideration (by publishers and readers alike), the campaign restored the authors’ given female names in place of such pseudonyms and brought visibility to identities that should not have been hidden.
Text 2
The belief that women historically were barred from publishing under names perceived as female is persistent. That it is also an overgeneralization becomes obvious when considering writers such as Elizabeth Barrett Browning, who published Poems and many other works under her own name in the 1800s, and Mary Mackay, who elected to use the female pseudonym Marie Corelli for her novels and stories in the late 1800s.
Based on the texts, how would the author of Text 2 most likely respond to the overall characterization in Text 1 of the publicity campaign?
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Mark for Review
By suggesting that Barrett Browning and Mackay are among the historical examples that challenge the assumption about the historical use of pseudonyms by female writers that is presented in Text 1
By agreeing that the authors of The Roadmender, The Life of Martin R. Delany, and the other works referred to in Text 1 were not afforded the same opportunities as Barrett Browning and Mackay to shape their own representations when publishing
By acknowledging that the circumstances of publication for Barrett Browning and Mackay differed from those for the authors whose works are the focus of Text 1, given that Barrett Browning and Mackay each published multiple works
By asserting that while it is clearly inappropriate to conclude that Barrett Browning was motivated by the same set of factors as the authors of the works discussed in Text 1 to publish under the names they did, it is appropriate to conclude that Mackay was
When people think of dinosaurs with feathers, they typically think of winged dinosaurs, such as the four-winged Microraptor. However, many dinosaurs that didn’t have wings also had feathers on their bodies. For instance, research indicates that the wingless, speedy Ornithomimus likely had feathers.
Which choice best states the main topic of the text?
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Mark for Review
Dinosaurs with feathers
The most valuable fossil
Animals without feathers
Bird species
The following text is from María Amparo Ruiz de Burton’s 1885 novel The Squatter and the Don. Don Mariano Alamar was silently walking up and down the front piazza of his house at the rancho; his hands listlessly clasped behind and his head slightly bent forward in deep thought. He had pushed away to one side the many arm-chairs and wicker rockers with which the piazza was furnished. He wanted a long space to walk. That his meditations were far from agreeable, could easily be seen by the compressed lips, slight frown, and sad gaze of his mild and beautiful blue eyes.
Based on the text, why does Don Mariano push aside the furniture on the piazza?
10
Mark for Review
He wishes to create the impression that he often receives important guests at his home.
He is making his home more comfortable for his family.
He wants to make space so that he can engage in vigorous exercise.
He feels that walking an uninterrupted path will help him think through a difficult issue.
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