If you are reading this in an email you received from me, do not click the link to sat.collegeboard.org below. Use the link to my website that is farther down on the email. If you are seeing this in my blog, do the SAT Question of the Day by clicking on this link:
http://sat.collegeboard.org/practice/sat-question-of-the-day?src=R&questionId=20130523 (This link takes you to today’s question. If you use my archive, you will see the question related to my SAT explanation for that date.)
The answer is C. Start with the topic of the sentence: “drug-resistant strains have done something to the hopes of researchers.” Now predict words for the blanks: words like arrival, existence, growth, expansion, and increase work well for the first blank and words like hurt, dampened, dashed, and reduced all work for the second blank. Looking at the answers, we can see that B, D, and E can easily be dismissed based on our first prediction which leaves us with A and C. We can throw out A based on the second prediction because corroborated means supported (not hurt); so, we are all done. Only C is left. Be sure as a final step to read the sentence using your answer to make sure it sounds right.
If you had trouble with any of these words, put them in your vocabulary notebook. Make up your own sentences using the words instead of simply writing a definition. For example, “The SAT webpage corroborated the answer that I chose; once again proving the Wizard’s Sentence Completion strategy works well!”
Let’s see what we can do to crush the ACT trickery this morning.
http://www.act.org/qotd/ (The ACT staff does not put a date on their questions so if you click on an archived blog, you’ll get today’s question and the old explanation. Sorry. The SAT staff has dated their questions; so, the archive is helpful. The ACT folks simply don’t do that.)
The answer is J. Simply follow my “Insertable” strategy. Plugging in (substituting) the different answers for cumbrous (never heard the word before seeing it in this passage), only burdensome makes sense. The context tells us the proceedings had to follow “very exact form…without a mistake.” None of the other answers fit when you insert them into this context. Be sure to circle your answer in the test booklet and then bubble it on you answer sheet. That way if you get off line on your bubble sheet and discover it later, you’ll be able to fix the problem quickly since you’ll have a record of your answers in the test booklet!
I hope your finals are going well and/or you are reviewing for them. Be sure to eat my recommended breakfast: granola cereal with fruit and nuts, Greek yogurt, banana, fruit juice (no high fructose corn syrup) and some high protein food like ham, unbreaded chicken, etc. (Sun dried tomatoes and soybean sprouts are vegetables with high percentages of protein.) Avoid caffeine, eggs, cheese, breads, and greasy meats. They are hard to digest and your body will divert blood flow to your stomach and away from your brain.
Have a great day.
Wizard
