Style & Tone | The Complete SAT Course - Class 10 PDF Download

Tone

When writing, we may use phrases that are too informal for an essay, which we would use with our friends. Conversely, we may use overly formal and vocabulary-heavy phrases in an attempt to impress the reader. Tone questions focus on finding the appropriate level of formality. SAT writing passages are always written in a professional style, similar to an article in a magazine or a newspaper, such as the Wall Street Journal. Therefore, the tone is never too casual or excessively stiff and formal.

Extremely Casual

• The events that occurred during the Olympics were interesting.
• My job is unique and exceptional.
• Learning about the presidents is more engaging than I anticipated.

Overly Formal

• The Olympics have brought about a multitude of exceptional occurrences.
• My occupation allows for a significant amount of independence.
• Learning about the former presidents turned out to be more interesting than I expected.

What the SAT Likes

• The Olympics held this year were unforgettable, as many world records were broken.
• I have the freedom to work from home and set my own schedule thanks to my job.
• Discovering facts about former U.S. presidents was much more interesting than I had expected it to be.

It's worth noting that both excessively informal and excessively formal writing styles tend to be lacking in specificity, while the appropriate level of formality in writing is both clear and specific, while still avoiding unnecessary verbosity (for example, "learning" is a more concise and effective word choice compared to the verbose "imbibing knowledge").

Style

At times, the SAT assesses your ability to identify a particular writing style employed by an author, which can be challenging to gauge without explicitly inquiring about it. Therefore, the test makers concentrate primarily on the structure of sentences. The test will typically feature an unusual arrangement of one or more sentences that it expects you to notice. You may be curious about how to recognize this infrequent type of query. However, the test will likely inform you in the question prompt.

Which of the following answer choices is most consistent with the style used by the writer of the passage?
Standing in front of an audience of thousands was the greatest moment of the young singer’s life. Faces glowed with adulation. Eyes fixated on her with wonder. People could not wait to hear her.
(a) NO CHANGE
(b) People were anticipating her singing.
(c) Ears perked up in anticipation.
(d) She was going to sing in the crowd’s ears.

Notice how C) parallels the structure used by the previous two sentences: body part + verb + preposition.

Syntax: the arrangement of phrases, clauses and sentences.

Regarding the exam, this implies understanding how to effectively "combine sentences." That is the critical term to remember; there is no need to focus on the term syntax. You can think of this section as "Sentence Combination." The test will not require you to determine whether to combine sentences (you will not have to assess whether something is excessively abrupt), but rather only to determine the optimal way to merge two or more sentences.

Short Underline

Miles Davis was an innovative jazz trumpeter. He developed a style known as “cool jazz..”

This sentence is slightly choppy, so the test wants you to make it less so.

Which choice most effectively combines the sentences at the underlined portion?
(a) NO CHANGE
(b) jazz trumpeter who developed
(c) jazz trumpeter; and in his music, he developed
(d) jazz trumpeter, but developed

Answer and Explanation
A) is choppy, meaning that it doesn’t provide a transition word or phrase showing the connection between what comes before the period and what comes after it. Notice how the first part talks about how Miles Davis was innovative. The second part gives us an example: he developed a new style of jazz. D) is wrong because it indicates a contrast between the two sentences. C) is wrong for punctuation reasons. The ‘and’ directly after the semicolon is unnecessary. B) is correct because it avoids the choppiness in A) by connecting the two sentences. ‘Who’ avoids the unwanted contrasted suggested in D).

Entire Sentence Underline

Let’s take the same sentence and show you what else the test can do.

Miles Davis was an innovative jazz trumpeter. He developed a style known as “cool jazz.”
Which choice most effectively combines the sentences?
(a) Developing a style known as “cool jazz” is why Miles Davis was an innovative jazz trumpeter.
(b) Miles Davis was an innovative jazz trumpeter, and he also developed a style known as “cool jazz.”
(c) A style known as “cool jazz” was developed by Miles Davis, an innovative jazz trumpeter.
(d) An innovative jazz trumpeter, Miles Davis developed a style known as “cool jazz.”

Answer and Explanation
In sentence combination questions, it is essential to maintain a logical "balance" between the two sentences. For instance, Miles Davis' creation of a new jazz style is attributed to his innovative abilities. The logical connection is that INNOVATIVE resulted in the CREATION OF NEW STYLE.
(a) I have previously discussed how concision applies to many question types. In this instance, the phrase "is why" leads to a sentence that is not concise. Moreover, the original sentence does not state that Davis created a new style of jazz because he was an innovative trumpeter ("he developed a new style"); instead, it states that he was an innovative trumpeter who invented this new style of jazz.
(b) The use of "and also" does not convey this logical connection. This sentence implies that Davis was two distinct things: an innovative trumpeter who, by the way, also created a new style.
(c) The sentence is in passive voice, which is often deemed incorrect on the SAT. Passive voice is akin to the "by tense," such as "The ball was hit by him." There is almost always a valid answer that is not in passive voice.
(d) The sentence correctly emphasizes the two parts' significance. "An innovative trumpeter" is less important than "he created a new style." Thus, we make it a subordinate clause (meaning it is of lesser importance). This approach highlights the main clause's content.