Nice work!
Review your answers above to learn from any mistakes.
About This Drill
SAT Reading & Writing: Hard Words in Context (Drill 12) is a Reading & Writing practice drill covering Hard Words in Context. It contains 5 original questions created by Brian Stewart, a Barron's test prep author with over 20 years of tutoring experience.
Hard SAT Words in Context questions ask you to choose the word or phrase that most precisely completes the sentence. The answer is rarely an obscure word; difficulty comes from three plausible distractors that all nearly fit, with one signal in the sentence pinning the correct choice.
Questions in This Drill
- The lexicographer warned that dictionaries are ______ rather than prescriptive: they record how speakers actually use words, not how an academy decrees they should.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word?
- The new flood model was praised for being ______: rather than assuming rainfall spreads evenly, it tracks how water actually pools in low ground and races down channels.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word?
- Once dismissed as a builder's afterthought, the medieval city wall is now read by historians as a ______ statement, its very height and gateways meant to broadcast the town's wealth and independence.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word?
- The following text is adapted from Charles Dickens's 1861 novel Great Expectations.
He took my watch from my pocket and turned the ring on my finger, while I recoiled from his touch as if he had been a snake. He was a stranger to me, and the warmth of his welcome only deepened my dread.
As used in the text, what does the word "recoiled" most nearly mean?
- Skeptics called the conservation plan ______, but its authors had priced out every stage and secured funding before a single acre was purchased.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word?