SAT Reading & Writing: Hard Words in Context (Drill 19)

Question 1. The new pieces of equipment were not just incremental improvements over the old machines; they were ______: the assembly line could now produce in a single shift what had previously taken a full week.

Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word?

• A) transformative ✓
• B) marginal
• C) superficial
• D) customary

Explanation: (A) The colon explains a leap from a week's output to a single shift, so the change remade the process rather than nudging it, which is what transformative names. (B) marginal points the wrong way, describing the small gains the sentence explicitly sets aside. (C) superficial means affecting only the surface, but the sentence describes a deep change in output, not a shallow one. (D) customary means usual or habitual, but the passage stresses how unprecedented the gain was.

Question 2. Linguists studying the remote valley dialect found its vowel system surprisingly ______: speakers from communities barely twenty miles apart produced the same handful of sounds in almost identical ways.

Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word?

• A) variable
• B) nasal
• C) homogeneous ✓
• D) fragmented

Explanation: (C) The detail that distant speakers produce sounds in nearly identical ways pins a system uniform throughout, which homogeneous captures. (A) variable inverts the evidence, which shows little variation rather than much. (B) nasal names a possible feature of particular vowels, not the system-wide sameness the sentence is describing. (D) fragmented suggests a system broken into disconnected parts, the opposite of the cohesion the speakers display.

Question 3. The following text is adapted from Herman Melville's 1853 story Bartleby, the Scrivener.

But not without sundry twinges of impotent rebellion against the mild effrontery of this unaccountable scrivener.

As used in the text, what does the word "effrontery" most nearly mean?

• A) cowardice
• B) audacity ✓
• C) courtesy
• D) carelessness

Explanation: (B) The narrator feels a powerless anger at the clerk's boldness in dictating terms to his own employer, so effrontery is shameless audacity. (A) cowardice contradicts the picture of a clerk who calmly holds his ground. (C) courtesy reverses the sense, since the narrator is provoked, not gratified. (D) carelessness misses the mark, because the clerk's manner is deliberate and self-possessed, not negligent.

Question 4. Curators noted that the photographer's late prints were anything but ______: each frame was composed with such care that nothing entered it by chance.

Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word?

• A) somber
• B) sentimental
• C) ornate
• D) haphazard ✓

Explanation: (D) The clause that nothing entered a frame by chance contrasts with the blank, so the rejected quality is randomness, which is what haphazard means. (A) somber concerns mood, not the order or chance the sentence is weighing. (B) sentimental would fault the prints for sappy feeling, a charge the sentence never raises. (C) ornate describes elaborate decoration, not the presence or absence of chance in the composition.

Question 5. Although the foundation's early grants were scattered across dozens of unrelated causes, its recent giving has grown far more ______: nearly all of it now flows to a single field where the board believes it can have measurable impact.

Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word?

• A) focused ✓
• B) generous
• C) cautious
• D) transparent

Explanation: (A) The contrast with scattered grants and the detail that nearly all giving now goes to one field point to concentration, which focused names. (B) generous concerns the size of the gifts, not whether they are concentrated. (C) cautious would describe risk appetite, which the sentence does not address. (D) transparent speaks to openness about the giving, again not the narrowing the sentence describes.