ACT English Sentence Placement Questions: Practice Drill #2
This FREE exercise will help you master ACT (and paper SAT) Sentence Placement Questions. Make sure to study the linked strategies before doing the drill!
The below drill is designed to help you increase your skill with Sentence Placement Questions, which appear frequently on ACT English (and paper SAT Writing & Language). Before doing the exercise, take a few minutes to review the strategies for this question type.
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Drill
Consider the following passage:
[1] When Amanda started her job as a project manager at a tech firm, she was impressed by the level of innovation in her department. [2] In the very first month, she proposed several ideas to her team. [3] To her delight, most of these suggestions were met with enthusiasm. [4] Through teamwork, Amanda and her colleagues initiated projects that led to several groundbreaking advancements. [5] In that new role, Amanda quickly realized that collaboration would be essential for success.
To make the paragraph most logical, Sentence 5 should be placed:
A) where it is now.
B) after Sentence 1.
C) after Sentence 2.
D) after Sentence 3.
Answer Explanations
This is a Sentence Placement Question. To get the most out of the answer explanations, you should first familiarize yourself with the strategies and tactics for this question type.
A) where it is now.
This option is incorrect because Sentence 5 contains the pronoun phrase "that new role”. Sentence 1 contains this pronoun’s antecedent: Amanda's "job as a project manager at a tech firm”. Placing Sentence 5 after sentence 4 fails to provide a clear antecedent for "that new role”. This placement also disrupts the logical flow of the passage.
B) after sentence 1.
Using pronouns as an “analytical tool”, we can quickly see that this is the correct answer. Sentence 5 contains the pronoun phrase "that new role", whose antecedent is clearly Amanda’s new “job as a project manager at a tech firm”, which is mentioned in Sentence 1.
Additionally, this answer choice improves the overall logical structure of the paragraph. Placing Sentence 5 here sets up the general idea that Amanda realized collaboration would be essential for success, which is then built upon by sentence 2, where she acts on this realization by proposing ideas to her team.
C) after sentence 2.
This option is incorrect because, again, there's no clear antecedent for "that new role" in Sentence 2. Additionally, this placement creates a second vague pronoun reference, as it obscures the antecedent for the pronoun “these” in Sentence 3.
Finally, placing sentence 5 here disrupts the paragraph’s logical structure by inserting Amanda’s general observation about collaboration between two supporting details: the specific instances of Amanda contributing ideas and those ideas being met with enthusiasm.
D) after sentence 3.
This option suffers from the same problems as choices A and C: there's no clear antecedent for "that new role”. Also, this placement weakens the paragraph's logical structure.
Logic coherence dictates that Sentences 3 and 4 remain adjacent, as Sentence 3 discusses the enthusiasm Amanda’s ideas received, and Sentence 4 notes the groundbreaking projects that these ideas led to. However, this answer choice places Amanda’s general observation regarding collaboration (Sentence 5) between Sentences 3 and 4, disrupting the logical structure.
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