English 11 Final Exam: Reading Skills
Questions 1 and 2 refer to the following passage:
Many gardeners find growing rare flowers or planning an elegant garden a stimulating challenge. Others enjoy topiary as an outlet for their creativity. Each shrub is a potential diamond, club, spade, or heart; each tree is a possible pyramid, cube, or sphere. The gardener with shears in hand is like a sculptor with a chisel, each bush like a block of marble.
(A) trimming trees and shrubs into shapes
(B) raising special varieties of trees and shrubs
(C) planning formal gardens
(D) stimulating the growth of shrubs and bushes
2. According to the passage, some gardeners enjoy topiary because it
(A) is easier than raising flowers
(B) is a relief from boredom
(C) permits self-expression
(D) is easy for beginners to learn
Questions 3 and 4 refer to the following passage:
Anyone who is prejudiced against one group is nearly always prejudiced against other groups as well. Prejudice is a disorder of thinking: prejudiced people make faulty generalizations by applying to a whole group what they have observed or heard about a few of its members. Then they behave toward the whole group as if there were no individual differences among its members. Few people would throw out a whole box of strawberries because they found one or two moldy berries at the top, yet this is the way prejudiced people think and act.
(A) experience with individuals of different types
(B) tendency to make illogical generalizations about people
(C) inability to distinguish the characteristics of one group from those of another
(D) dependence on hearsay rather than observation
4. In the strawberry analogy, the author uses the "one or two moldy berries" to represent the people
(A) who try to create prejudicial feelings within their group
(B) who deserve to be examined more closely by prejudiced people
(C) whose lives have been destroyed by prejudice
(D) whose behavior influences the opinions of prejudiced people
Questions 5 through 7 refer to the following passage:
The invention that had the most revolutionary impact on the old West was barbed wire. After John W. Gates demonstrated to skeptical Texas cattlemen in 1876 that barbed wire would hold back the longhorns, the old way of life was doomed. Within a dozen years, the wandering cowboy of the open range and his mustang cow pony no longer had a place in a land of privately owned and securely fenced pastures.
(A) career of John W. Gates
(B) changing attitudes of cattlemen
(C) effect of an invention
(D) disappearance of the open range
6. What is the effect of the opening sentence?
(A) It expresses a yearning for the days of the old West.
(B) It emphasizes the drastic nature of the change in the old West.
(C) It indicates that there was some resistance to Gates's invention.
(D) It explains why the role of the cowboy became obsolete.
7. According to the passage, which of the following was an outcome of the use of barbed wire?
(A) The cowboy of the open range eventually disappeared.
(B) The popular image of the cowboy changed.
(C) It became easier to get longhorn cattle to market.
(D) Cattle ranchers increased in importance in the community.
Questions 8 and 9 refer to the following passage:
Parents should resist the desire to be liked by their children every minute of the day. Some parents who are afraid of losing the love of their children dare not deny them anything, including control of the home. Children may exploit their parents' hunger for love and become tyrants ruling over anxious servants. But such children often encounter difficulties in the world outside the home when they find that others are not so eager to obey.
(A) discourage the reader
(B) categorize children
(C) refute current theories of child development
(D) offer advice to parents
9. The passage argues that
(A) children like to tyrannize their parents
(B) children do not trust their parents
(C) parents should not let their children control them
(D) some children should be seen and not heard
Questions 10 and 11 refer to the following passage:
Originating in India, the tactical use of elephants was brought forcibly to the Western military mind at the battle of Hydaspes, where both the potentialities and the limitations of the war elephant were demonstrated. The horses of Alexander the Great refused to face the beasts, yet his disciplined infantry, despite initial surprise and dismay, eventually turned the elephants back and dispersed them in panic-stricken flight.
(A) proved upsetting to the enemies' horses
(B) possessed great strength and immense bulk
(C) showed steadfast courage against disciplined troops
(D) could force their way through major obstacles
11. The passage indicates that elephants were first used as an instrument of war
(A) against horses
(B) against Alexander the Great
(C) at Hydaspes
(D) in India
Questions 12 and 13 refer to the following passage:
There are immense gains to be made from the exchange of information with civilizations in other star systems. Another civilization is almost certain to have developed technologies that we have not, and vice versa. Exchange of scientific information would also be worthwhile, and surely each culture would be enriched by acquaintance with the other's artistic masterpieces.
(A) emphasize the urgency of exchanging information with civilizations in other star systems
(B) compare the advantages and disadvantages of interstellar exchanges of material goods
(C) indicate the advantages of exchanging information with civilizations in other star systems
(D) express doubt about the likelihood of exchanging information with civilizations in other star systems
13. The passage suggests which of the following about a civilization in another star system?
(A) It is not likely to be as technologically advanced as our civilization is.
(B) It is not likely to benefit from exposure to our artistic heritage.
(C) It is likely to be hostile toward any offer to exchange information.
(D) It is likely to profit from our scientific knowledge
Questions 14 and 15 refer to the following passage:
Many who live in or visit California are aware of names such as Pico Boulevard, Pico Park, or Pico Rivera. The list of names that serve as reminders of Don Pico Rivera, California's last Mexican governor, goes on and on--an understandable circumstance, since at one point he supposedly held land from San Diego to Santa Barbara. Yet few are aware of the man's ambitious striving to rise from poverty to high estate. At a time when political leaders advanced through revolutions and counterrevolutions, Don Pico was no exception. He gained his first governorship in 1831 when his rebels defeated General Victoria. A victory at the Battle of Cahuenga Pass in 1845 established him for a second term, which was ended by the Mexican War.
(A) It was typically obtained through family influence.
(B) It was available only to those who had ambition.
(C) It was easier to achieve in some regions than in others.
(D) It was often gained through rebellion.
15. What does the writer indicate about the period of California history described in the passage?
(A) It provided a stable economic environment in which those with ambition would prosper.
(B) It was unsettled and turbulent because of military power struggles.
(C) The economy of California was developed through the efforts of a few wealthy individuals.
(D) The Mexican War was a divisive episode for the citizens of California.
Questions 16 through 18 refer to the following passage:
People can be involuntarily committed to psychiatric hospitals only if they are dangerous to themselves or others, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled several years ago. Recently a California federal court has gone further, ruling that a "mental disability hearing" must be held before every involuntary commitment. Involuntarily committed patients have also won the right to refuse treatment, and psychiatric hospitals must obtain the patient's consent for treatment. Although some applaud these newly won rights, others are less optimistic. Professor William Curran of Harvard warns that the refusal-of-treatment rules "could cause chaos in the wards."
(A) They are increasingly subject to involuntary commitment.
(B) They do not endanger themselves or others.
(C) They have recently gained greater control over their own treatment.
(D) They refuse treatment more often than not.
17. The passage suggests that a person would NOT be involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital for doing which of the following?
(A) Insisting that the Civil War has just ended
(B) Running across busy streets during frequent periods of hallucination
(C) Repeatedly trying to set fire to buildings
(D) Taking excessive doses of barbiturates
18. The attitude of Professor Curran toward the effects of the new refusal-of-treatment rules can best be described as
(A) indecisive
(B) supportive
(C) neutral
(D) skeptical
Questions 19 through 21 refer to the following passage:
Architects tend to be born remodelers. One of the earliest of these is the Roman emperor Hadrian, who is given credit for designing the Pantheon and the Temple of Venus in Rome and who continued to recreate, in the green hills near Tivoli, an estate that has remained a model for elegant country living ever since. As he crisscrossed the length and breadth of the Roman Empire, from England in the north (where he built the great wall named for him) to Palestine in the east, Hadrian would write back to the small army of architects employed at his Tivoli estate, urging them to carry out whatever expansions and refinements might have occurred to him in the course of his travels: baths, belvederes, fountains, and temples, many of them so complexly wrought and daring in style that they anticipated the Italian Baroque architecture of some fourteen centuries later.
(A) Hadrian designed enduring monuments such as the Pantheon and the Temple of Venus.
(B) Hadrian was willing to be influenced by the styles of various cultures.
(C) Hadrian continued making additions and refinements to his estate near Tivoli.
(D) Hadrian created buildings with original and complex designs.
20. The passage indicates that in the course of his travels, Hadrian did which of the following?
(A) Fought a large number of wars.
(B) Frequently returned to Tivoli.
(C) Discovered architectural features that he could incorporate in his estate.
(D) Encountered people with greater taste and refinement than could be found in Rome.
21. The passage implies that Italian Baroque architecture was
(A) simple and dignified
(B) elaborate and detailed
(C) a reflection of country life rather than city life
(D) more influential than early Roman architecture
Questions 22 through 24 refer to the following passage:
The modern big city is the creation of the nineteenth century's ability to move people. In 1850, everyone in London--as in most major cities--walked to work except the owners, who lived over their shops or their counting houses. But soon came the railroad, the bus, the streetcar, the subway, the bicycle, and of course the automobile. By the early twentieth century, the means to move people into an office-centered large city--and to enable the office workers to live outside it--had been developed. By the late twentieth century, this trend had reached extremes. In Los Angeles, for example, traffic at 6:00 every weekday morning is bumper to bumper in all directions--people trying to get to their desks by 8:30 or 9:00 A.M. Yet none of this is necessary anymore. It is now infinitely easier, cheaper, and faster to do what the nineteenth century could not do: move information, and with it office work, to people. Using faxes, e-mail, and cellular phones, tomorrow's office workers will flee to sites far remote from urban centers, but closer to home.
(A) evoke nostalgia for the simpler days and closer communities of the past
(B) show that modern technology continues to create more problems than it solves
(C) demonstrate the impact of the automobile on twentieth-century business practices
(D) examine how technological developments affect where people live in relation to their work
23. London is used as an example because it
(A) typifies the circumstances of workers in a large nineteenth-century city
(B) is where modern means of transportation were first used on a large scale
(C) reveals a European form of social organization as opposed to an American form
(D) is less technologically advanced but also less congested than Los Angeles
24. The passage argues that
(A) the number of people living in large cities will decrease
(B) large cities will no longer be the preferred sites for conducting office work
(C) commuting by car will continue into the foreseeable future
(D) new inventions and new technologies will make current modes of transportation obsolete
Questions 25 through 27 refer to the following passage:
Mark Twain has sometimes been compared with his contemporary, Anatole France. Both writers had an ironical, skeptical view of life and a native pessimism overlaid by gaiety. Both believed that the existing social order was a swindle and its cherished beliefs mostly delusions. Both were atheists, convinced of the unbearable cruelty of the universe. But there the resemblance ends. Not only was France more learned and more civilized, but he was also more courageous. He attacked the things he did not believe in; he did not, like Twain, always take refuge behind the friendly mask of the "public figure" or place unpopular views in the mouths of his fictional characters. France was always ready to take the unpopular side in a controversy--the Dreyfus case, for example. Twain, except in one short essay--"What is Man?"--never attacked established beliefs in a way that was likely to get him into trouble.