Reading Comprehension Questions and Answers

Answer: B

The underlined word 'majestic' is an Adjective.

In 'His courtroom was surrounded by majestic gardens', 'majestic' describes the noun 'gardens', telling what kind of gardens they were. A word that qualifies a noun is an adjective. Its noun form is majesty, and the adverb form would be majestically.

It is not a noun because it does not name anything here, not an adverb because it modifies a noun rather than a verb, and not a conjunction because it joins nothing.

Answer: C

The error is in part (c), 'are certain of'.

The passage tells the story in the past tense: 'The gods in the guise of the dove and the eagle were assured of Shibi's righteousness.' The sentence in the question puts the same event in the present tense with 'are', which does not match the narration, so the verb phrase in (c) is the part that is wrong. 'Were certain of' would match.

The other parts are acceptable for this item: (a) and (d) read correctly, and (b) leaves out the articles before 'dove' and 'eagle', which the passage supplies, but the question looks for the clear error, which the key places in the tense of (c). I could not rule out that (b) was meant to be flagged, so this follows the key.

Answer: D

The activities are both (a) playing video games and (b) watching TV.

The second paragraph says: 'Once back home, they sit glued to the idiot box for several hours or keep playing computer games.' The idiot box is television and computer games are video games, so (a) and (b) take up the children's time at home.

Walking and swimming, (c), appear only in the writer's advice ('a regular swim and walk down to the swimming pool'), not as what children do. So the options that include (c), or only one of (a) and (b), are wrong.

Answer: B

The keenness of girls to stay slim makes them fail to take essential nourishment because of dieting.

The passage says: 'Girls, usually keen to remain slim, keep dieting unnecessarily and deprive their bodies of vital nourishment.'

The inclination to fast food is said about children in general, as part of the diet that is deficient in nutrients, not about girls who diet. Undeveloped muscles and not going for walks and swims are never linked to dieting by the passage.

Answer: C

The author finds that convenience foods lack vital nutrients.

The passage says of fast foods, fried foods, chocolates and the like: 'These foods may be delicious and, therefore, tempting, but they are highly deficient in vital nutrients.' The fault is the missing nutrients.

'Delicious and tempting' is conceded as a quality of the foods, not a fault. Being readily available is not discussed, and helping muscle development is the reverse of the advice that children eat nutrient-rich food so that their muscles develop.

Answer: B

The underlined word 'highly' is an Adverb.

In 'They are highly deficient in vital nutrients', 'highly' modifies the adjective 'deficient', telling to what degree the foods are deficient. Words that modify verbs, adjectives or other adverbs are adverbs; 'highly' here is an adverb of degree, like 'very' or 'extremely'.

It is not an adjective, since it does not qualify a noun ('high' would be the adjective). It names nothing, so it is not a noun, and it shows no action or state, so it is not a verb.

Answer: B

The phrase means love that is harmful, as the key reads it.

The passage says: 'Parents are often aware of this, but out of misplaced love for children, they hardly ever discipline their eating habits.' Misplaced love is affection directed in the wrong way: parents who know the food is poor but still let the children eat it do them harm in the name of love.

'Love that does not exist' and 'love that is blind' say the love is absent or unseeing, but the passage presents it as real and aware ('often aware of this'). 'Love that lacks discipline' describes the result, that parents do not discipline eating habits, more than the love itself, and it is the nearest rival; I could not confirm from a dictionary which of the two the Board meant, so this follows the key.

Answer: D

The function that is not expressed in the passage is keeping knights' best horses.

The passage names four functions: bases for offensive attacks and defence in military operations, offices from which the lord administered his fiefdom, important social centres in medieval England, and symbols of power. Options A, B and C restate these, in the same words as the passage.

Horses and knights are never mentioned, so option D is the one that is not a function as expressed in the passage, whatever may be true of castles in general.

Answer: B

Paragraph 2 explains why castles were first built in England and the military purposes they served.

The paragraph opens with the Norman invaders of 1066, says William the Conqueror fortified key positions to secure the land he had taken, and then says castles were bases for offensive attacks and also served defensive roles. That is the reason for the first castles plus their military uses, which is option B.

Option A is too narrow, because the paragraph is about what castles did, not how William took control. Nothing is said about Norman lords being scared or retreating (C). The full list of purposes, including administration and social life, comes in paragraph 3, so D is wrong for paragraph 2.

Answer: A

The key gives it takes a lot more time and energy to build a stone castle.

The passage says only that the first castles were made of earth and timber and were later replaced by stone, which strengthened them. It gives no reason for the first choice of material, so the question has to be answered by inference. Of the four options, only A is a plausible practical reason that the passage does not contradict: a Norman army securing newly taken land needs quick fortifications, and wood and earth take less time and labour than stone.

Option B and C describe what people did or did not realise, which the passage does not say, and D is about looks, which is not mentioned. The passage does say wooden castles were highly susceptible to fire, but that is given as their weakness, not as a thing people failed to see.