PARCC - Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers Advanced Grammar Practice Questions 1

Question 1

Which sentence correctly uses the conditional perfect tense?

Accepted Answer

If she had studied harder, she would have passed the exam.

Answer

The conditional perfect requires 'had + past participle' in the if-clause and 'would have + past participle' in the result clause. 'If she had studied harder, she would have passed' follows this pattern correctly.

Question 2

Which sentence contains a misplaced modifier?

Accepted Answer

She almost drove her children to school every day.

Answer

'Almost' is misplaced — it modifies 'drove' rather than 'every day,' implying she nearly drove but didn't. The intended meaning is that she drove them on almost every day, so 'almost' should precede 'every day.'

Question 3

Which sentence correctly uses a semicolon?

Accepted Answer

He finished his report; then he submitted it to his manager.

Answer

A semicolon correctly joins two independent clauses without a coordinating conjunction. 'He finished his report' and 'then he submitted it to his manager' are both independent clauses, making the semicolon appropriate here.

Question 4

Which sentence contains faulty parallelism?

Accepted Answer

He likes to swim, running, and to cycle on weekends.

Answer

The series mixes infinitives ('to swim,' 'to cycle') with a gerund ('running'), breaking parallel structure. All items in a series must use the same grammatical form.

Question 5

Which sentence correctly punctuates a non-restrictive clause?

Accepted Answer

Mount Everest, which is the world's tallest peak, attracts thousands of climbers.

Answer

A non-restrictive clause adds extra information that is not essential to identifying the noun. 'Which is the world's tallest peak' is non-essential information about Mount Everest and must be set off by commas. Restrictive clauses (using 'that' or 'who') do not take commas.

PARCC Practice Test

PARCC Practice Test

PARCC - Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers Advanced Grammar Practice Questions 1