Sentence Correction (SC) Practice Questions - 3 | Mock Test series for GMAT Classic Edition PDF Download

The correct response is (A). The sentence is correct as written. The verb “is” agrees with its noun “political machine.” The verb form “becoming” is used appropriately as well.

If you chose (B), the infinitive form, although sometimes preferred on the GMAT, is not used correctly in this sentence. The participle is required.

If you chose (C), this choice may sound correct on its own, but placed back in the original sentence it reads “is becoming in danger a mere extension….” This answer choice does not make sense when placed in the underlined part of the sentence.

If you chose (D), the present perfect tense “has become” is not the correct verb form here. We use the present perfect to indicate that an action happened at an unspecified time before now. The simple present tense is all we need.

If you chose (E), the wording in this choice gives us a very unclear meaning, particularly when compared with choice (A). Since “has been” (i.e. ended at some point in the past) and “in danger of becoming a mere extension” (i.e. in the future) connote different time frames, the meaning of this choice is unclear. With (B), it’s clear that the machine is currently in danger of becoming (over time) an extension of big corporate agendas, as indicated by the reformer.

Compare to is used to point out or imply resemblances between objects regarded as essentially of a different order;

Compare with is used mainly to point out differences between objects regarded as essentially of the same order.

Since we wish to point out the differences between the Cluny Museum’s collection of medieval art and the Metropolitan Museum’s collection, we should use “compared with”.

The correct response is (D). This is a Comparison question, and the correct choice must compare the Cluny’s collection to the Metropolitan’s collection. “That” is used here as a pronoun referring to the Metropolitan Museum’s collection. The singular verb “is” correctly agrees with the subject “collection” and the use of “the former” avoids pronoun ambiguity by referring back to the Metropolitan Museum’s collection. The past tense verb “required” is appropriate since the meaning of the sentence is offering an explanation for a present-day situation by explaining what happened in the past.

If you chose (A), the verb “were” is plural and does not agree with the subject of the sentence “collection.” Always start a long-winded sentence correction by identifying the subject and its predicate verb.

If you chose (B), the final clause beginning with “requiring…” is somewhat ambiguous. It could be referring to the Cluny’s collection, which is NOT the correct meaning of the sentence.

If you chose (C), this choice makes a correct comparison, but alters the meaning of the sentence. The pronoun “it” can only refer back to the Cluny Museum’s collection, but it is not the Cluny that required more money, but rather the Metropolitan.

If you chose (E), “were” is a plural verb and does not agree with its subject “collection.” Additionally, the phrase “that, by and large, since it…” is not grammatically correct. We would need to have a verb after the word “that.” The pronoun “it” is ambiguous here. It must clearly refer to the Metropolitan for the sentence to make sense.

The correct response is (B). This choice avoids redundancy, and the problems in meaning contained in the other options. This answer choice does not repeat “world” twice as answer choice (A) does.

If you chose (A), “whom” is used incorrectly here. You use "who" when you are referring to the subject and "whom" when you are referring to the object. Since “Yo-yo Ma” is clearly the subject, “who” would be correct. Additionally “ever-changing” and “versatile” are redundant.

If you chose (C), we have some issues with meaning. The “classical world” is somewhat unclear, and since we know Yo-yo Ma plays in a variety of genres, including “modern minimalism,” it is clear that is not the intended meaning of the sentence. In addition, the word “yet” implies a contrast, but the Yo-Yo Ma’s versatility is exemplified by the list of genres in which he plays. The two ideas are not meant to disagree.

If you chose (D), this is a sentence fragment. Each of the three dependent clauses describe the subject, “Yo-yo Ma,” but we are never given a predicate verb to make the sentence a complete thought. There’s no need to repeat the word “world” twice as this answer choice does.

If you chose (E), “every-changing” and “versatile” are redundant. “Plays” and “employing” are not parallel. We should use the verbs “plays” and “employs” to maintain parallelism.

The correct response is (D). The meaning of the sentence is that the “oldest ocean crust” was “formed” in the past during the Jurassic period and has been around for 200 million years. We need to use the correct tenses. The past tense (formed) indicates the formation ended in the past while the present progressive (lasting) indicates the oldest ocean crust is still around.

If you chose (A), the ocean crust was “formed” in the past” but if “lasted” is past tense then the oldest ocean crust is no longer around, which would mean it couldn’t be the “oldest.”

If you chose (B) or (C), “forming” implies the crust is still being formed. While it’s true the Earth’s crust is constantly in flux, we’re concerned with the “oldest ocean crust” – that part that is no longer continuing to form, but was formed at some point during the Jurassic period.

If you chose (E), you correctly used “formed,” however “has been lasting” is incorrect. The present perfect form of a verb is formed by combining have/has + the past tense form of the verb. For example, has lasted or have lasted will be correct present perfect constructions. To indicate that something is expected to continue into the future, we need the progressive form of the verb (lasting).

The correct response is (E). As written, this is a run-on sentence with dubious clarity. The correct answer will separate the two independent clauses with a semicolon or make one clause dependent, as choice (E) does by using the word “as.”

If you chose (A), the verb “are” does not agree with the singular noun “reason.” Additionally, the word “these” begins an independent clause (a stand-alone thought that can act as a complete sentence). It should be separated from the rest of the sentence by a semicolon or turned into a dependent clause.

The correct response is (C). This corrects the original sentence by using the plural pronoun “they” to refer back to “sales,” rather than the ambiguous “it.” Additionally, it is more idiomatic to say that sales were expected to decline than to say “it could have been assumed they would decline”. If we assume something, we take for granted other possibilities that could materialize. If a city sees a decline in tourism, we might EXPECT sales of biographies to decline as well.

If you chose (A), this has an awkward double-conditional with “could” and “would.” Only one conditional is needed for the meaning to be clear. Additionally, “it” is ambiguous and has no antecedent. Look for a more concise choice.

If you chose (B), we have an awkward double-conditional with “might” and “should.” We do not need to introduce a relative clause with the word “that.”

If you chose (D), this choice is written in passive voice. The “decline” is the object of the verb, so in an active construction, it should come at the end of the sentence. The subject, the noun or pronoun doing the action, should come first in a GMAT clause.

If you chose (E), this choice retains the errors from the original sentence and increases the wordiness, additionally muddling the meaning. We don’t need the double-conditional of “might” and “would.”

It is more idiomatic to say that the judges dissented in a case, or that the judges dissented from an opinion or interpretation than to say the judges dissented with a case.

The correct response is (E), “those” is the correct pronoun to refer back to “justices,” while “later dissented in another landmark case” correctly uses a past-tense verb.

If you chose (A), “half as many as later dissented” is not correct. This answer choice appears to be saying “two is half as many as later dissented” A better way of expressing this comparison is to say “two is half the number that later dissented”. Additionally, it is more idiomatic to say “the judges dissented in a landmark case” than to say “the judges dissented with a landmark case”. You can disagree with the verdict reached in a case, but you don’t disagree with the case itself.

If you chose (B), since “those” refers to people, the “justices,” we cannot use the pronoun “that.” Only “who” and “whom” can refer to people.

If you chose (C), the phrase “judgment of the defendant” here implies that the defendant was the one making the judgment, which is clearly false. In addition, the phrase “half the number as dissented later on” is needlessly wordy. Look for a more concise choice.

If you chose (D), “the ones” is an awkward choice of pronoun. Additionally, since the pronoun “which” refers to the immediately preceding noun (judgment), this answer choice appears to be saying “the judgment was half the ones who later dissented in…”

The correct response is (E). On the GMAT, sometimes sentences unnecessarily written in passive voice can be corrected with an active construction. (E) replaces the passive form by starting the sentence with its true subject, “SteelCo.” It’s considerably clearer and more concise than the other choices.

If you chose (A), this sentence is written in passive voice and is wordy (“that information that was provided”). Look for a more active construction in the other choices, since that is usually a less wordy and clearer way of conveying a sentence’s meaning.

If you chose (B), the verb “is” does not match the past-tense “was” later in the sentence. Additionally, this simply rephrases the original sentence but remains passively constructed. Look for a more active construction that is free from grammar errors.

If you chose (C), this choice incorrectly changes the singular verb “was” to “were.” The verb “were” does not agree with the noun it references, “information.”

If you chose (D), this is simply a rewording of the original sentence. However, it does not fix the original wordiness and passive construction. Additionally, it is unclear what “that information” is referring to.

The correct response is (C). Answer choice (C) is preferable because it employs a semicolon to connect two independent clauses.

If you chose (A), the use of the coordinating conjunction “and” suggests that there are two separate and equally important ideas in the sentence, when in fact, the second half of the sentence just provides additional information about Ralph Waldo Emerson’s professed ideal of transcendentalism. When we want to connect two related independent clauses, we use a semicolon as answer choice (C) does.

If you chose (B), the lack of a pronoun before “outlined” implies that it was the American environmental movement which “outlined his beliefs” when in fact it was Emerson himself.

If you chose (D), the American environmental movement did not launch Rachel Carson’s book. Rather, the book helped to launch the movement.

If you chose (E), the pronoun “it” seems to refer to Silent Spring, but that is not Emerson’s work.

The correct response is (D). This choice correctly uses the singular pronoun “it” to replace the noun “computer.” The construction is passive, but it avoids the grammatical and meaning issues in the other choices. This question hinges on meaning. The verb “program” tells us that it is the computer not the financial reports that are generating the balance sheet. A balance sheet cannot logically “program” something on its own.

Answer choice (A) is incorrect because “named the way it is named” is unnecessarily wordy. “So named” as used in answer choice (D) is concise and clearly conveys the author’s intended meaning. In addition, it is not clear what the second “it” in answer choice A refers to.