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About The ACT Reading Test

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“Nuts & Bolts” of the ACT Reading Test

The Reading Test has 40 questions that must be answered in 35 minutes; that time includes reading the four passages.

Each passage is approximately 750 words long. Students have about 8 - 9 minutes to read each passage and answer the questions that follow.

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What types of questions are on the Reading Test?

All questions fall into one of two basic categories:

Referring questions ask students to find or use information that is clearly stated in the passage.

Reasoning questions ask students to take information that’s either stated or implied in the passage and use it to answer more complex questions.

Content of the ACT Reading TestOne passage from each of the following categories:

• Prose Fiction: intact short stories or excerpts from short stories or novels

• Social Science: anthropology, archaeology, business, economics, education, geography, history,

political science, psychology, sociology

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• Humanities: architecture, art, dance, ethics, film, language, literary criticism, music, philosophy, radio, television, theater

• Natural Science: anatomy, astronomy, biology, botany, chemistry, ecology, geology, medicine, meteorology, microbiology, natural history,physiology, physics, technology, zoology

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Prose Fiction Passages and Questions

The questions on Prose Fiction passages ask about the kinds of things you pay attention to when you read a short story or novel--plot, characters, and mood, among other things.

As you read, you should be aware of the mood or tone of the passage, the relationship of the characters, and the emotion implied by what the characters say as well as how they say it.

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Social Science Passages and Questions

Social studies (or social science) passages typically present information gathered by research.

Students will find names, dates and concepts in these passages, and they should pay close attention to what name goes with what concept and keep track of who said what in a passage discussing different views of a constitutional amendment.

Students should look for cause-effect relationships, comparisons, and sequence of events.

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Humanities Passages and Questions

Humanities passages tend to describe or analyze ideas or works of art. These passages are typically informative pieces, although at times the writer’s presence and point of view are obvious.

A question might ask you to project the writer’s likely response to a hypothetical argument or situation. In these passages, the kinds of relationships students will be asked to infer or identify are those between events, ideas, people, trends, or modes of thought.

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Natural Science Passages and Questions

This kind of passage usually presents a scientific topic and an explanation of the topic’s significance

In a natural sciences passage the author is typically concerned with the relationships between natural phenomena, not characters.

A Natural Science passage may contain specialized or technical language. However, the passage will contain clues to the meaning.

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• There is no order of difficulty. However, individual students may find one type of passage easier than the other types.

• If find that you don’t do so well on a particular type of question such as cause-effect, don’t waste valuable time on the test struggling with this type.

• By practicing, you can learn your ideal reading speed.

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• Scribble, Doodle, Underline.

• You can use your underlines and notes as a map through the passage. But don’t spend lots of time marking.

• Underlining the topic sentence of each paragraph (NOT always the first sentence) will help you keep on top of the argument’s direction.

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• When you encounter a sentence or a section that looks like it will enumerate examples to support a point, quickly scribble “ex” in the margin to let you know that this is an example.

• Underlining key phrases that help relate parts of the passage, such as “subsequently,” “on the other hand,” and “in contrast” will also help you map your way through the passage.

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Prose Fiction passage:

• Identify specific details and facts• Draw inferences (usually have “suggest,” “infer,” “imply,” and “indicate”)• Understand character (reducing a lot of information about acharacter into a simple, digestible statement)• Point of view (the narrator’s point of view)

• Cause-effect cue words include “resulted in,” “ledto,” “caused by” and “because.”

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Social Science passage

• Specific detail• Inference• Main idea and argument (some deal with whole passage and some with sections…look for line references) The author’s purpose questions fall under this category also.• Cause-effect (more likely on nonfiction than prose fiction)• Point of view (how the writer views his or her subject) The writer’s tone is important here.• Comparison—mostly on social and natural science (cue words are “compares” and “analogy.”

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Humanities passage

• Specific detail

• Inference

• Vocabulary (words with multiple meanings will include a line number)

• Main idea

• Comparison

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Natural Science passage (heavy on scientific facts, argument, cause-effect logic, and details):

• Specific detail• Inference• Cause-effect• Comparison• Main idea• Vocabulary • Point of view

• The questions are not necessarily in order.

• There is no particular order of difficulty.

• After practicing, decide on the order in which you will do the passages.

• When it comes to paragraphs, small and many is better than big and few.

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Reading Test

• Process of elimination (POE) is vital for the Reading section

• Read the blurb before the passage.

• Preview the questions before reading.

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WRITE ON THE TEST as you read!!Use different marks to mean different things.

• Circle names of people

• Underline critical phrases, terms, main ideas

• Number (“1,” “2,” “3,” etc.) ideas in a sequence

Underline or circle hinge words

• Words or phrases that are used to alert you to shifts in thought

• Words or phrases that are used to drive a point home

• Answers are often located near hinge words!

Common Hinge Words

but, although, yet, however, as a result, nevertheless, on the other hand, despite, while, in spite of, consequently, therefore, thus, alternatively

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Practice Test Question 1. The passage indicates that women’s demand for property rights was agreed to primarily because men realized that:A. Women were indeed individuals

deserving of their own rights.B. If they gave in on the property rights

issue, they’d be able to hold firm on suffrage.

C. Conceding the right would provide men with a way to protect themselves from creditors.

D. Women had unique interests and were needed as students in universities and teachers in schools.

“Men gradually agreed to extend property rights to women, because property in a wife’s name could save a man from his creditors. They accepted coeducation, because universities needed students and society needed trained teachers”

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The FOUR Types of Distracters

The WeaselThe ShiftThe EnticerThe Extreme