SAT Standard English Conventions Practice Test
Punctuation, boundaries, agreement, verb forms. 26% of Reading and Writing. Here are 10 SAT standard english conventions questions, each with the answer and the reason.
Updated by the Tigertest team. Original questions written to the digital SAT specifications. Not affiliated with College Board. Score estimates are unofficial.
Coral reefs are among the most crowded habitats on Earth. They cover less than one percent of the ocean ______ they provide a home for roughly a quarter of all known marine species.
1.Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A.
floor, yet
- B.
floor yet
- C.
floor,
- D.
floor
Answer: A.Both "They cover less than one percent of the ocean floor" and "they provide a home for roughly a quarter of all known marine species" are independent clauses. Two independent clauses can be joined by a comma plus a coordinating conjunction such as "yet," as in choice A. Choice C uses a comma alone, which creates a comma splice, and choice D runs the clauses together with no punctuation at all.
- A.
Painters of the Italian Renaissance developed many techniques for making figures look lifelike. The soft, smoky blending of tones that allows the faces in Leonardo da Vinci's ______ to melt gently into the shadows around them is known as sfumato, from an Italian word for smoke.
2.Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A.
portraits
- B.
portraits,
- C.
portraits;
- D.
portraits:
Answer: A.The subject of the sentence is the long phrase "The soft, smoky blending of tones that allows the faces in Leonardo da Vinci's portraits to melt gently into the shadows around them," and its verb is "is known." No punctuation should separate a subject from its verb, and here "portraits" sits in the middle of a phrase inside the subject, so it takes no punctuation. Choice B is the trap because the subject is so long that a comma feels natural, but a pause in speech is not a reason for a comma.
- A.
Instrument makers had long known by experience that shorter and tighter strings sound higher. In 1636, the French scholar Marin Mersenne ______ precise laws describing how a string's pitch depends on its length, tension, and mass, and those laws are still taught in physics classes today.
3.Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A.
published
- B.
publishes
- C.
will publish
- D.
has been publishing
Answer: A.The date "In 1636" places the action in the completed past, so the simple past tense "published" is correct. Choice B is present tense and choice C is future tense, neither of which fits a past date, and choice D suggests an action that continues into the present. Use time markers like dates to choose the verb tense.
- A.
Streaming services pay artists a small fraction of a cent each time a song is ______ an artist may need several hundred plays to earn what a single album sale once provided.
4.Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A.
played;
- B.
played
- C.
played,
- D.
played, which
Answer: A."Streaming services pay artists a small fraction of a cent each time a song is played" and "an artist may need several hundred plays..." are both complete sentences, and a semicolon can join two complete sentences. Choice C is the most tempting, but a comma alone between two complete sentences is a comma splice, and choice B fuses them with no punctuation at all. To join two independent clauses, use a semicolon, a period, or a comma plus a word like "and" or "so."
- A.
Soil looks lifeless, but it is crowded with organisms. A single teaspoon of healthy garden soil ______ more living microorganisms than there are people on Earth, and many of them help break down dead plant material.
5.Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A.
contain
- B.
contains
- C.
have contained
- D.
are containing
Answer: B.The subject of the verb is "teaspoon," which is singular, so the verb must be the singular "contains." Choice A is the most tempting because the plural word "microorganisms" comes right after the blank, but the subject is "teaspoon"; "of healthy garden soil" is only a prepositional phrase describing the teaspoon. To check agreement, cross out the prepositional phrase and match the verb to the noun that remains.
- A.
In 1957, Swiss designers Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann released a clean, unadorned sans serif typeface for a type foundry near Basel. Renamed a few years later to sound more marketable, ______
6.Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A.
the typeface became known around the world as Helvetica.
- B.
the world came to know the typeface as Helvetica.
- C.
designers around the world came to use Helvetica.
- D.
Miedinger and Hoffmann saw their typeface become known as Helvetica.
Answer: A.The opening phrase "Renamed a few years later to sound more marketable" describes the typeface, so the words that come right after the comma must name the typeface. Choice C is the most tempting because it mentions Helvetica, but placing "designers" after the comma says the designers were renamed. Choices B and D put "the world" and "Miedinger and Hoffmann" first; an introductory modifier must be followed immediately by the noun it describes.
- A.
The proposal that cities replace dark asphalt with lighter-colored pavement to reflect more ______ has gained support from engineers, but critics note that sunlight bounced off bright surfaces can raise temperatures for pedestrians walking above them.
7.Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A.
sunlight
- B.
sunlight,
- C.
sunlight;
- D.
sunlight, which
Answer: A.The subject of the sentence is the long noun phrase "The proposal that cities replace dark asphalt with lighter-colored pavement to reflect more sunlight," and its verb is "has gained," so no punctuation should separate them. Choice B is the strongest distractor because the subject is long enough to feel like it needs a pause, but a single comma between a subject and its verb is an error, and choices C and D leave the sentence without a main verb for "The proposal."
- A.
Franz Boas, ______ insisted that cultures be studied on their own terms rather than ranked on a single scale of progress, a position that shaped American anthropology for most of the twentieth century.
8.Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A.
the German-born anthropologist who trained a generation of American researchers,
- B.
the German-born anthropologist who trained a generation of American researchers;
- C.
was the German-born anthropologist who trained a generation of American researchers,
- D.
the German-born anthropologist who trained a generation of American researchers
Answer: A.The phrase describing Boas is a nonessential appositive that interrupts the main clause, whose subject is 'Franz Boas' and whose verb is 'insisted,' so it must be set off by a comma on both sides. Choice A supplies the closing comma. Choice D omits it, leaving the appositive open, and choice B uses a semicolon, which can only separate independent clauses. Choice C turns the appositive into a verb phrase, so that 'insisted' is left with no subject.
- A.
By the time Clara Schumann gave her final public performance in 1891, she ______ more than 1,300 concerts across Europe over a career that had begun when she was a child prodigy of nine.
9.Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A.
had played
- B.
has played
- C.
plays
- D.
will have played
Answer: A.The clause 'By the time Clara Schumann gave her final public performance in 1891' sets a point in the past, and the concerts occurred before that point, so the past perfect 'had played' is required. Choice B, the present perfect, connects past action to the present and conflicts with the past-tense frame. Choice D describes completion at a future point, which the sentence does not establish.
- A.
An octopus has three ______ two of them pump blood through the gills, and the third sends blood to the rest of the body. Because the third heart stops beating while the animal swims, an octopus tires quickly and usually prefers to crawl along the seafloor.
10.Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A.
hearts:
- B.
hearts,
- C.
hearts
- D.
hearts, which
Answer: A.The independent clause "An octopus has three hearts" is followed by a second independent clause that explains what the three hearts do, and a colon correctly introduces that explanation. A comma alone would create a comma splice, and no punctuation would create a run-on. "Hearts, which two of them pump" is ungrammatical because "which" has nothing to attach to.
- A.
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