English Language and Usage

Which of the following sentences contains a homophone?

A. Each evening, the young woman walked alone on the canal path.

B. As water is heated up, it slowly begins to expand.

C. By Sunday, they were ready to raze the old building, and everyone gathered to watch.

D. The previous tenant had been a chemistry teacher.

C

Which of the following is written correctly in its plural form?

A. halves

B. prooves

C. razores

D. chieves

Which of the following is a correctly punctuated compound sentence?

A. The moonlight glowed white on the roof next door, and the sky was a gentle summer blue.

B. The raspberries we just picked from the garden are ripe, and sweet.

C. She spent all afternoon studying for the biology test; but she neglected to work on her psychology paper.

D. The man often drew sketches in his room but he never liked to show his art to anyone.

A

Which of the following demonstrates correct punctuation of a quotation?

A. "You should have never invited Neda to the party," said Angelica, "if you didn't want her to run into Alex."

B. "You should have never invited Neda to the party," said Angelica. "If you didn't want her to run into Alex."

C. "You should have never invited Neda to the party," said Angelica "if you didn't want her to run into Alex."

D. "You should have never invited Neda to the party," said Angelica, "If you didn't want her to run into Alex."

A

Which of the following punctuation marks is used incorrectly in the sentence below?

She put down her glasses, and her book; the train was starting to enter the long, dark tunnel.

A. The semicolon after "book"

B. The comma after "long"

C. The comma after "glasses"

D. The period at the end of the sentence

C

Which of the following is an example of a simple sentence?

A. Viruses are made up of a core of malignant nucleic acid.

B. Malignant nucleic acid that is covered by protein.

C. Viruses are made up of a core of malignant acid, though, covered by protein.

D. Viruses made up of a core of malignant nucleic acid.

A

Which of the following is the simple subject in the sentence below?

Every morning, the to friends walked a half mile together to school.

A. Every morning

B. Half mile

C. Friends

D. School

C

Please don't take what I said too personally.

Which of the following parts of speech is the word "personally" as used in the sentence above?

A. Article

B. Adjective

C. Verb

D. Adverb

D

Which of the following should include citations?

A. A comparison of language used in two different Shakespeare plays

B. A news article describing a burglary

C. A description of your favorite play

D. A personal essay about your interest in marine biology

A

Which of the following statements is correct about the outline below?

I. Causes of Obesity

A. Diet

1. Fast food

2. Processed food

3. Large portions

B. Lifestyle

1. Sedentary jobs

2. No incentive to exercise

3. Not cooking at home

A. Sedentary jobs are a more important cause of obesity than not cooking at home.

B. Not cooking at home falls into the category of diet causes of obesity.

C. The causes of obesity can be divided into diet and lifestyle.

D. Large portions are part of the lifestyle causes of obesity.

C

Which of the following is an incomplete sentence?

A. Watch out.

B. In the rose garden out back.

C. I guess that's true.

D. It would take about three weeks.

B

Which of the following is an example of a compound-complex sentence?

A. Even though Darren prefers to eat with a fork, he will use chopsticks to eat Chinese food, but it is often a struggle.

B. Darren uses chopsticks to eat Chinese food, but, in general, h prefers to use a fork.

C. Darren, who prefers to eat with a fork, uses chopsticks to eat Chinese food, but it is often a struggle.

D. Darren often finds it a struggle to eat Chinese food with chopsticks.

A

Which of the following correctly describes the error in the sentence below?

The currant number of students in their basic anatomy class seems much too large for the room.

A. "Currant" should be "current"

B. "Too" should be "to"

C. "Seems" should be "seams"

D. "Their" should be "there"

A

Which of the following sentences has the correct pronoun-antecedent agreement?

A. All passengers must show his passport before getting on the plane.

B. Each of the cats has its own special hiding place.

C. If the students need my help for this project, he or she can email me with questions.

D. When the clothes come out of the dryer, it should be folded right away.

B

Based on the evidence found, electrical stimulation may be a potential therapy of OSAS, warranting further clinical trials.

A. Motivational speech

B. Business memo

C. Scientific journal

D. Personal Blog

C

Wow, I can't believe that beret I was planning to buy is 100 bucks.

Which of the following from the sentence above is slang.

A. Wow

B. bucks

C. can't

D. beret

B

Donna is an excellent nurse, but her patients find her bedside manner to be somewhat churlish and unpleasant.

Which of the following is the meaning of the word "churlish" as used in the sentence?

A. weak

B. incompetent

C. tricky

D. rude

D

Constantly talking about your problems at work will only exacerbate them, which I'm sure you don't want.

Which of the following is a synonym for "exacerbate" as used in the sentence above?

A. diminish

B. worsen

C. rectify

D. settle

B

In which of the following word pairs does the suffix is added?

A. Biology, Biologist

B. Apology, Apologize

C. Happy, Happily

D. Mineral, Mineralogy

B

Based on an examination of word parts, which of the following words means "above the kidney"?

A. interrenal

B. subrenal

C. intrarenal

D. suprarenal

D

Based on an examination of word parts, which of the following words means "abnormality of movement"?

A. dyskinesia

B. hyperkinesia

C. akinesia

D. hypokinesia

A

In which of the following words does the suffix make the root word an adjective?

A. Created

B. Pointing

C. Childlike

C. Suburbanite

C