PSAT/NMSQT Prep 2022 - Eggert M.D., Strelka A. 2022

How to do PSAT writing and language
The method for PSAT writing and language questions
PSAT Reading

LEARNING OBJECTIVE

After completing this chapter, you will be able to:

· Efficiently apply the PSAT Writing and Language Method

How to do PSAT writing and language

The Writing and Language section of the PSAT tests a limited number of grammar, style, and logic issues. You should feel empowered in knowing that you can familiarize yourself with these recurring issues and learn to spot them and address them quickly and efficiently. We’ll describe the issues that you’re likely to see on test day and how to deal with them in the other chapters of this unit. In this chapter, we’ll present a simple series of steps for tackling Writing and Language questions.

Take a look at the passage and questions that follow and think about how you would approach them on test day. Then, compare your approach to the recommendations presented.

Questions 1 and 2 refer to the following passage.

Design Museums

City museums are places where visitors can learn about various cultures by 1 glancing at objects of particular historical or artistic value. The increasingly popular “design museums” that are opening today perform quite a different function. 2 Design museums display and assess objects that are readily available to the general public, unlike most city museums. These museums place everyday household items under the spotlight, breaking down the barriers between commerce and creative invention. London’s Design Museum, for instance, displays a collection of mass-produced objects ranging from electric typewriters to Norwegian sardine-tin labels.

1.

A. NO CHANGE

B.studying

C.disregarding

D. organizing

2.

A. NO CHANGE

B.Design museums display and assess objects that are readily available to the general public, unlike the common practice at most city museums.

C.Unlike most city museums, design museums display and assess objects that are readily available to the general public.

D. Unlike the common practice at most city museums, design museums display and assess objects that are readily available to the general public.

There is no need to read the entire passage before you start to answer questions. Instead, answer them as you read. When you see a number, finish the sentence you are reading and then look at the corresponding question. If you can answer the question based on what you’ve read so far, do so—this will likely be the case if the question is testing grammar. If you need more information—which may happen if the question is testing organization or relevance—keep reading until you have enough context to answer the question.

Sometimes the issue being tested will be obvious to you when you look at the underlined segment. If it isn’t, glance at the answer choices to help you determine what the test maker is after. For instance, in question 1 from the previous page, a verb with -ing and a preposition are underlined. Is the question testing the verb, the preposition, or something else? A quick glance at the answer choices makes it obvious that this question is testing precise word choice, given that the choices are various -ing words. Identifying the issue, using the choices if necessary, is step 1 of the Writing and Language method.

To find the correct word choice, use the surrounding text. The sentence states that visitors can “learn about various cultures” by doing something to the museum’s objects. Thus, the underlined word must be something you could do to objects that would result in learning about them. As written, merely “glancing at” the objects would not be enough to result in actual learning, so eliminate (A). You can also eliminate (C) because “disregarding” the objects would result in the opposite of learning about them. Finally, eliminate (D), “organizing.” Although the museum staff might organize objects in the collection, the visiting public would not. Since none of the other choices correct the error, this leaves only (B), “studying,” which indeed matches the context of learning. So choose (B) as the correct answer to question 1. Eliminating answer choices that do not address the issue is step 2 of the Writing and Language method.

Sometimes there will be more than one choice that addresses the issue. When that happens, you’ll need to base your final response on three considerations: conciseness, relevance, and the potential of a given choice to introduce a new error. Question 2 from the previous page is an example of a question in which more than one choice addresses the issue. This question features an entire sentence that is underlined. The answer choices include various placements for the descriptive phrase “unlike most city museums”—a signal to check whether this modifying phrase is correctly placed. Indeed, it is design museums that should be contrasted with city museums, not the “general public,” so the phrase “design museums” should be right next to the phrase “unlike most city museums.” That eliminates (A) and (B), but you still have to decide between (C) and (D), both of which fix the misplaced modifier. Both these choices are grammatically correct and relevant to the surrounding context. However, (C) is more concise and is therefore the correct answer for question 2. Choosing the most concise and relevant response from those that are grammatically correct is step 3 of the Writing and Language method.

Here are the steps we just illustrated:

Correct, concise, and relevant means that the answer choice you select:

· Has no grammatical errors

· Is as short as possible while retaining the writer’s intended meaning

· Is relevant to the paragraph and the passage as a whole

Correct answers do not change the intended meaning of the original sentence, paragraph, or passage, or introduce new grammatical errors.

Try on Your Own

Directions: Take as much time as you need on these questions. Work carefully and methodically. Practice using the steps that you just learned.

Questions 1—4 refer to the following passage.

Design Museums

One advantage that design museums have over other civic museums is that design museums are places where people feel familiar with the exhibits. Unlike average art gallery patrons, a design 1 museums visitors rarely feel intimidated or disoriented. This is partly because design museums clearly illustrate how and why mass-produced consumer objects work and look as they do and show how design contributes to the quality of our lives. 2 For example, an exhibit showcasing a collection of chair designs 3 do not simply explain how the chairs function. The display also demonstrates how such chairs’ various features combine to produce an artistic effect or redefine our manner of performing the basic act of being seated. Thus, the purpose of such an exhibit is to present these concepts in novel ways and to challenge, stimulate, and inform the viewer. An art gallery chair 4 exhibit, on the other hand would provide very little information about the chairs themselves and would expect the visitor to appreciate the exhibit on some abstract level.

1.

A. NO CHANGE

B.museums visitors’

C.museum’s visitors’

D. museum’s visitors

2.

A. NO CHANGE

B.In contrast,

C.Additionally,

D. Next,

3.

A. NO CHANGE

B.does not

C.will not

D. did not

4.

A. NO CHANGE

B.exhibit, on the other hand,

C.exhibit on the other hand

D. exhibit on the other hand:

Answers and Explanations

1. D

Difficulty: Medium

Category: Agreement: Modifiers

Getting to the Answer: When you encounter two nouns in a row, check to see whether the possessive form is needed. Who or what has “visitors”? The “museum.” Any answer choices that do not include the apostrophe to make “museum’s” possessive are incorrect: eliminate (A) and (B). The “visitors,” however, are not in possession of anything in this sentence, so you do not need a possessive form. Thus, eliminate (C) and choose (D) as the correct answer.

2. A

Difficulty: Medium

Category: Organization: Transitions

Getting to the Answer: To determine which type of transition is correct, analyze the relationship between the ideas it connects. The previous sentence explains that design museums do two things when displaying objects: 1) show how the objects work/look and 2) show how design impacts people’s lives. The sentence with the transition describes an exhibit of chair designs and states that the exhibit would not just explain “how chairs function.” The next sentence describes what the display would “also” demonstrate. Thus, the chair exhibit must be an example of the two things that design museums do, so (A) is correct. (B) is incorrect because it introduces an illogical contrast transition. (C) is incorrect because the sentence with the transition does not provide an “additional” detail about design museums, but rather it provides a specific example of design museums’ functions. (D) is incorrect because this transition is not a part of a chronological sequence of events.

3. B

Difficulty: Medium

Category: Agreement: Verbs

Getting to the Answer: When a verb is underlined, locate its subject to make sure they are in agreement. Although the noun “chair designs” is closest to the verb, the singular “exhibit” is what “does not simply explain how chairs function.” Eliminate (A) since it contains a plural verb. To decide among the remaining choices, determine which verb tense matches the surrounding context. The action is happening in the present, as confirmed by the present tense “demonstrates” in the next sentence, so (B) is correct. The future tense in (C) and the past tense of (D) are incorrect because they result in an unnecessary verb tense shift.

4. B

Difficulty: Medium

Category: Sentence Structure: Commas, Dashes, and Colons

Getting to the Answer: The phrase “on the other hand” is parenthetical information—if you were to remove the phrase, the sentence would retain the same meaning. Parenthetical information should be set off by a set of commas or dashes, so eliminate (A) because it uses only one comma, (C) because it uses no punctuation, and (D) because it uses a colon. (B) is correct because it sets off the parenthetical information with a pair of commas.