Part 1 Vocabulary

Directions: Choose the answer that can best complete the sentence.

1. The price of gold has been influenced by continued inflation and loss of ____ in the dollar.

A. faith

B. dogma

C. ideology

D. behavior

2. The archaeologist enjoyed the ____ life she led while gathering artifacts; she never stayed at any one site long enough to get bored.

A. stealthy

B. rustic

C. nomadic

D. indecent

3. Whatever the varying demands on her time, Laura was determined not to _____ print research.

A. delegate

B. perform

C. rehearse

D. enforce

4. The investigation of day-dreams might really have afforded the shortest and best approach to the understanding of _____ dreams.

A. conscious

B. nocturnal

C. repressive

D. conductive

5. Commerce on the remote island was conducted exclusive by ______, exchanging goods for goods.

A. credit

B. loan

C. faith

D. barter

6. Maria Callas became one of the world’s widely known opera singers because of her musical talent, acting ability, and fiery _____.

A. reputation

B. expression

C. production

D. disposition

7. The doctors were sure they could cure my husband’s disease, but when symptoms _____ they lost hope.

A. aroused

B. rose

C. arose

D. raised

8. The match was stopped twice in the first half as Estrada _____ on the ground in seemingly excruciating pain after making a save.

A. wrestled

B. writhed

C. withered

D. wrangled

9. After their parents died, the two children had to be separated, one living with their aunt, and the other with their grandmother who is elderly and ______.

A. sturdy

B. infirm

C. strong

D. potent

10. Gadoury believes this winter is beginning to look like the winter of 1978, when snow dropped by the ______ thawed early.

A. drought

B. hailstones

C. hurricane

D. blizzard

Part II Correctness and Effectiveness of Expression

Directions: Choose the answer that can replace the underlined part.

1. Most students would get better grades if writing were to be studied by them.

A. writing was studied by them

B. they studied writing

C. they would have studied writing

D. they were to have studied writing

2.If they do not go into bankruptcy, the company will probably survive its recent setbacks.

A. Unless it goes bankrupt

B. If they can avoid bankruptcy

C. If bankruptcy will be avoided

D. Unless bankruptcy cannot be avoided

3. In retrospect, one can see the folly of trying to unite a region containing some four hundred distinct ethnic groups, each of them has its own language, laws and tradition.

A. each with their own language, laws, and traditions

B. each with its own language, laws, and traditions

C. and each of them having its own language, laws, and tradition

D. when they each have their own language, laws, and tradition

4. Proponents of campaign finance reform point out that people who make large donations to politicians expect to be rewarded with special favorsand gaining easy access to the corridors of power.

A. and they gain easy access

B. as well as gaining easy access

C. and easy access

D. and to be rewarded with easy access

5. Returning to her hometown after a twenty-year absence, the desperate poverty Savka saw there shocked and saddened her.

A. the desperate poverty Savka saw there was shocking and also sad to her

B. savka, shocked and saddened by the desperate poverty she saw there

C. was a desperate poverty that shocked and saddened Savka

D. Savka was shocked and saddened by the desperate poverty she was there

Part III Reading Comprehension

Directions: Read the following two passages and choose the answer that can best answer the question.

Passage 1

Once upon a time I taught school in the hills of Tennessee, where the broad dark vale of the Mississippi begins to roll and crumple to greet the Alleghanies. I was a Fisk student then, and all Fisk men thought that Tennessee was theirs alone, and in vacation time they set out in vigorous bands to meet the county school-commissioners. Young and happy, I too went, and I shall not soon forget that summer, seventeen years ago.

First, there was a Teachers’ Institute at the county-seat; and there distinguished guests of the superintendent taught the teachers fractions and spelling and other mysteries—white teachers in the morning, Negroes at night. A picnic now and then, and a supper, and the rough world was softened by laughter and song. I remember how—but I wander.

There came a day when all the teachers left the Institute and began the hunt for schools. I learn from rumor (for my mother was mortally afraid of firearms) that the hunting of ducks and bears and men is wonderfully interesting, but I am sure that the man who has never hunted a country school has something to learn of the pleasures of the chase. I see now the white, hot roads lazily rise and fall and wind before me under the burning July sun; I feel the deep weariness of heart and limb as ten, eight, six miles stretch relentlessly ahead; I feel my heart sink heavily as I hear again and again, “Got a teacher? Yes.” So I walked on and on—horses were too expensive—until I had wandered beyond railways, beyond stage lines.

Sprinkled over hill and dale lay cabins and farmhouses, shut out from the world by the forests and the rolling hills toward the east. There I found at last a little school. Josie told me of it; she was a thin, homely girl of twenty, with a dark-brown face and thick, hard hair. I had crossed the stream at Watertown, and rested under the great willows; then I had gone to the little cabin where Josie was resting on her way to town. The gaunt farmer made me welcome, and Josie, hearing my errand, told me anxiously that they wanted a school over the hill; that but once since the war had a teacher been there; that she herself longed to learn—and thus she ran on, talking fast and loud, with much earnestness and energy.

Next morning I crossed the tall round hill, plunged into the wood, and came out at Josie’s home. The father was a quiet, simple soul, calmly ignorant, with no touch of vulgarity. The mother was different—strong, bustling, and energetic, with a quick, restless tongue, and an ambition to live “like folks.” There was a crowd of children. Two growing girls; a shy midget of eight; John, tall, awkward, and eighteen; Jim, younger, quicker, and better-looking; and two babies of indefinite age. Then there was Josie herself. She seemed to be the center of the family: always busy at service, or at home, or berry-picking; a little nervous and inclined to scold, like her mother, yet faithful, too, like her father. I saw much of this family afterwards, and grew to love them for their honest efforts to be decent and comfortable, and for their knowledge of their own ignorance. There was with them no artificialness. The mother would scold the father for being so “easy”; Josie would roundly criticize the boys for carelessness; and all knew that it was a hard thing to dig a living out of a rocky sidehill.

1. It can be inferred from paragraph 3 that the author .

A. did not want to become a hunter himself because he had sympathy for the hunter’s prey

B. had never hunted living creatures because arms weapons had been forbidden in his home

C. were busy with his studies so that he had no time for recreational activities

D. viewed hunting as an inappropriate activity for teachers

2. All of the following can be used to describe the author’s journey through the Tennessee countryside EXCEPT .

A. pleasing

B. tiring

C. untroubled

D. never-ending

3. According to paragraph 4, Josie’s keen interest on meeting the author was .

A. motivated by her desire to break away from her poor family

B. intensified by her longing to gain an education

C. exaggerated by her substantially social nature

D. triggered by her need for killing her time on the long road to town

4. According to the passage, what does Josie’s mother want to emphasize by saying she wished to live “like folks”?

A. a longing for her family to improve their lot

B. an expanding greed for material life

C. the authority who forced them to live a backward life

D. misgiving about falling to the bottom of society

5. The theme of the passage can best be described as .

A. an illustration of the severe realities of searching for a job

B. a demonstration of the success of a graduate from a distinguished school

C. a discussion of adult education in a remote mountain village

D. a recollection of an unforgettable time in a person’s life

Passage 2

About 50 miles west of Stonehenge, buried in the peat bogs of the Somerset flatlands in southwestern England, lies the oldest road known to humanity. Dubbed the “Sweet Track” after its discoverer, Raymond Sweet, this painstakingly constructed 1, 800-meter road dates back to the early Neolithic period, some 6, 000 years ago. Thanks primarily to the overlying layer of acidic peat, which has kept the wood moist, inhibited the growth of decay bacteria, and discouraged the curiosity of animal life, the road is remarkably well preserved. Examination of its remains has provided extensive information about the people who constructed it.

he design of the Sweet Track indicates that its builders possessed extraordinary engineering skills. In constructing the road, they first hammered pegs into the soil in the form of upright X’s. Single rails were slid beneath the pegs, so that the rails rested firmly on the soft surface of the bog. Then planks were placed in the V-shaped space formed by the upper arms of the pegs. This method of construction—allowing the underlying rail to distribute the weight of the plank above and thereby prevent the pegs from sinking into the marsh—is remarkably sophisticated, testifying to a surprisingly advanced level of technology.

Furthermore, in order to procure the materials for the road, several different species of tree had to be felled, debarked, and split. This suggests that the builders possessed high quality tools, and that they knew the differing properties of various roundwoods. It appears also that the builders were privy to the finer points of lumbering, maximizing the amount of wood extracted from a given tree by slicing logs of large diameter radially and logs of small diameter tangentially.

Studies of the Sweet Track further indicate a high level of social organization among its builders. This is supported by the observation that the road seems to have been completed in a very short time; tree-ring analysis confirms that the components of the Sweet Track were probably all felled within a single year. Moreover, the fact that such an involved engineering effort could be orchestrated in the first place hints at a complex social structure.

Finally, excavation of the Sweet Track has provided evidence that the people who built it comprised a community devoted to land cultivation. It appears that the road was built to serve as a foot-path linking two islands—islands that provided a source of timber, cropland, and pastures for the community that settled the hills to the south. Furthermore, the quality of the pegs indicates that the workers knew enough to fell trees in such a way as to encourage the rapid growth of long, straight, rodlike shoots from the remaining stumps, to be used as pegs. This method is called coppicing and its practice by the settlers is the earliest known example of woodland management.

Undoubtedly, the discovery of the Sweet Track in 1970 added much to our knowledge of Neolithic technology. But while study of the remains has revealed unexpectedly high levels of engineering and social organization, it must be remembered that the Sweet Track represents the work of a single isolated community. One must be careful not to extrapolate sweeping generalizations from the achievements of such a small sample of Neolithic humanity.

1. According to the passage, which of the following contributes to the preservation of the Sweet Track?

A. The wood used to build it was damp.

B. Few animals visited the area in which it was located.

C. It’s components were buried beneath the peat bog.

D. The chemical properties of the peat bog inhibiting the development of bacteria.

2. It can be inferred from paragraph 3 that the builders of the Sweet Track .

A. were geeks in the realm of lumbering

B. were experts at increasing the amount of wood extracted from a tree

C. had an intimate knowledge of lumbering techniques

D. were consciously aware of the importance of the construction of the road

3. In paragraph 4, the author mentions tree-ring analysis in order to prove that .

A. old trees were strong enough to be used to construct a road

B. builders constructed the Sweet Track without spending much time

C. a complex social structure had long been formed

D. the techniques used to construct the road were quite sophisticated

4. The last paragraph suggests that the Sweet Track .

A. is constructed with high technologies about which our modern world has not known much

B. shouldn’t be used to make conclusions about all Neolithic communities

C. is only one of the roads human beings have hitherto discovered

D. will bring about a fundamental revolution in historical thought about the whole Neolithic period

5. The passage primarily emphasizes on .

A. how the Sweet Track’s remains reveal aspects of a particular Neolithic society

B. how the methods of woodland management are applied to lumbering

C. how the Sweet Track can survive over 6, 000 years

D. what the construction and composition of the road tells us about the builders