Reading Comprehension Questions and Answers

Answer: B

The pair that cannot be selected in the afternoon is yoga and public speaking.

The afternoon activities to choose from are dancing, yoga, basketball and song writing. Public speaking is a morning workshop, so a pair that includes it is not available in the afternoon.

Each of the other three pairs is made of afternoon activities from that list.

Answer: A

The camps are justifiably named 'Reach Out!' because members are encouraged to collaborate with neighbourhood organizations.

On Action Day small groups go out with an adult group leader to work with organisations in the neighbourhood, and the aim of the camp is to encourage the young people to go out and make the world a better place. Reaching out to the community is what the name stands for.

Reaching the camp site, being action packed all day and working under group leaders do not express the idea of reaching out to others.

Answer: D

All the seven days at the camp are not the same routine-wise.

The camps are week-long, and the passage says that there is no average day at the camp and that the timetable is changed daily to make room for exciting events. So no two days follow the same routine.

Only one day, Action Day, is spent working with local organisations, so options 1 and 2 are wrong, and since there is no average day, 'tiring and average' cannot describe them.

Answer: A

The underlined words are an adverb and a noun.

Also modifies the verb 'meet', adding that they do this as well as their other activities, so it is an adverb. Interests is the plural noun, the object of 'have', meaning things a person enjoys or cares about.

'Also' is not a conjunction (it does not join clauses) or a preposition (it has no object). 'Interests' is not a verb here, because 'have' is the verb of the clause, and it is not an adjective, since it names something rather than describing it.

Answer: A

Four boys had missed school: four.

Glen is the first, and the passage says that three other faces broke into a smile when they heard him, and that all were heading for the canal and not for school. Glen with the three others makes four.

Three counts only the other boys and leaves out Glen, who is the leader of the pack. Five and two are not given anywhere in the passage.

Answer: D

The key gives that their hearts grew braver because they could no longer see the school building.

The passage says that the cold imposing white building became smaller and smaller, and that their little hearts grew braver by the minute. As the school shrank behind them their fear of it shrank too, and the passage makes this link by putting the two sentences side by side. The text says the building grew smaller, not that it was out of sight, so this reading is an approximation, but it is the option closest to the passage.

The passage does not say they were afraid of their teachers finding them, and 'they knew exactly where they were headed' describes their plan, not the growth of courage. Their excitement is true, but the passage does not give it as the reason for the courage.

Answer: B

The boys should have been at school.

The passage says that they were clearly not heading towards where they should be, and names it: school. Glen has his schoolbag on his back, and they cut class to go to the canal.

The canal is where they went, so it cannot be where they should have been. Nothing says they should have been at home or playing with friends.

Answer: A

The order is C, A, B, D.

The passage tells that Glen, the leader, hoisted himself over the railings (C) and climbed down the huge monsoon drain (A). Then, in a fraction of a second, the other boys joined him (B), and after that came the thrill of catching the small fish (D).

Any order that puts A before C reverses climbing the railings and going down the drain, and any order that puts D before B has the fishing begin before the friends arrive.

Answer: C

The underlined words are a verb and an adjective.

Spied is the past tense of the verb 'spy', meaning caught sight of; it is the main verb of the sentence, telling what Glen did. Murky describes the noun 'water', meaning dark and muddy, so it is an adjective.

Options calling 'spied' an adverb or 'murky' a noun misread their roles: an adverb modifies a verb, adjective or adverb, and a noun names a thing, whereas here 'water' is the noun that 'murky' describes.

Answer: B

A and B are incorrect and C is correct: option 2.

A is incorrect: the passage says that a determined person will always succeed, not occasionally. B is incorrect: the passage opens by saying that a majority think the dream job is a matter of luck, so few is wrong. C is correct: the same majority think the job is too competitive.

Option 1 reverses A, and options 3 and 4 call B correct, so none of them can stand.