Worked examples
Two examples
Example 1
A passage written for this example (its sentences are numbered)
What is the most careful reading of these facts?A. Sunscreen causes sunburn.(1) In New York, stores sell far more sunscreen in July than in January. (2) In July, doctors also see far more people with sunburns. (3) If you made a chart of the two, month by month, the lines would rise and fall together. (4) In July, the sun is high and strong, and many people spend hours outdoors at beaches and parks.
B. Sunscreen sales fall when sunburns rise.
C. A third thing, the strong summer sun, raises both.
D. The two facts cannot both be true.
- Sentences 1 to 3 give two things that rise and fall together: sunscreen sales and sunburns. When two things go together, the first question from Skills Quiz 7 is: does a third thing move them both?
- Sentence 4 names one. In July the sun is high and strong, and many people spend hours outdoors. Strong sun sends people to buy sunscreen, and strong sun burns skin. The sun moves both. That is C.
- Now try to say how for A. How could rubbing on sunscreen give someone a sunburn? The passage gives no how, and neither can we. A treats something that only goes along with sunburn as if it were the cause. Going together is not because.
- B contradicts the passage: sentence 3 says the two rise and fall together, not in opposite directions.
- D is wrong as well. Nothing in the passage keeps both facts from being true at once; in July, both are true.
Answer: C
Example 2
A passage written for this example (its sentences are numbered)
Does the passage show that the blue shirt helped Rosa pass?A. Yes. It says how the first led to the second.(1) Rosa wore her blue shirt on the day she took the GED math test, and she passed. (2) For three months before the test, she had worked practice problems most evenings and gone over every wrong answer with her teacher. (3) Now she wears the blue shirt to every test, because she says it brings her luck.
B. No. It shows only that the second came after the first.
C. No. It shows only that the two go together.
- First, find the two events. Rosa wore the blue shirt, and then she passed. Sentence 1 gives them in that order.
- Now try to say how. How could the color of a shirt help a person solve math problems? The passage gives no how. All it shows is that passing came after wearing the shirt. After is not because. That is B.
- A would need a how, and the passage has none for the shirt.
- C does not fit. “Go together” means two things rising and falling side by side, again and again. The passage tells about one test day, one event and then the next.
- Notice that the passage does give something with a how. Sentence 2 says Rosa worked practice problems for three months and went over every wrong answer. Practice builds skill, and skill passes tests. That is a cause you can say how. The shirt is only standing nearby.
Answer: B
Where this is taught: Skills Quiz 7, Cause and effect: First, the idea · Skills Quiz 7: the worked example · Skills Diagnostic, Part 7
In your Kaplan book: Unit 3, Chapter 1, Lesson 4: Evaluate Author's Reasoning and Evidence · Map of the Terrain, topic 7: Cause and effect
The drill
Ten questions
How many:
Read what is in the box first. Then tap your answer; a few questions ask you to choose words from a drop-down instead, the way the GED test does. Press Check my answers at the bottom.Read what is in the box first. Circle your answer; where there are brackets, circle the choice that fits. The answer key, with the reasoning, is on the last page.