PETERSON TOEFL PBT PRACTICE TEST 3 PART 10 READING

PETERSON TOEFL PBT

PRACTICE TEST 3 PART 10

READING

QUESTION 54-60

Wood has long been a popular building material in North America because it has generally been plentiful and cheap. Swedish settlers in Delaware built log cabins as early as the 1630s. in New England, British colonists built wooden “saltbox houses.” Most of the wooden homes of Colonial times could be built with simple tools and minimal skills.

In the early nineteenth century, the standard wooden house was built with beams set into heavy posts and held together with wooden pegs. This method of construction was time consuming and required highly-skilled workers with special tools. The balloon – frame house, invented in 1833 in Chicago by a carpenter from Hartford, Connecticut, used a framework of lightweight lumber, mostly 2 x 4 and 2 x 6 inches. This type of house could be assembled by any careful worker who could saw in a straight line and drive a nail.

The revolution in building was made possible by improved sawmills that could quickly cut boards to standard sizes and the lower cost of lumber that resulted. There were also new machines that could produce huge quantities of inexpensive nails. Skeptics predicted that a strong wind would send such houses flying through the air like balloons and, at first “balloon-frame” was a term of derision. But the light frames proved practical, and wooden houses have been basically built this way ever since.

54.               54.  What is the main purpose of this passage?

A.                  To trace the influence of Swedish and British settlers on American styles of building

B.                  To stress the importance of wood as a building material

C.                   To compare methods of constructing wooden houses in various parts of the country

D.                  To describe a revolutionary technique for constructing wooded houses

55.              55.   According to the passage, where did the inventor of the balloon frame house originally   come from?

A.                  Connecticut

B.                  Chicago

C.                   Sweden

D.                  Delaware

56.              56.   Which of the following questions about the balloon-frame house is NOT answered in the passage?

A.                  Where was it invented?

B.                  What was its inventor’s name?

C.                   What size was most of the lumber used in its framework?

D.                  In what year was it invented?

57.             57.   The author implies that which of the following types of houses required the most skill to produce?

A.                  The log cabins built by Swedish settlers

B.                  Saltbox houses

C.                   Standard wooden houses of the early nineteenth century

D.                  Balloon-frame houses

58.              58.     All of the following are factors in the development of the balloon frame house EXCEPT

A.                  the invention of sophisticated tools

B.                  the production of cheap nails

C.                   improvements in sawmills

D.                  the falling price of lumber

59.            59.     According to the passage, why was the term balloon-frame (lines 8-9) applied to certain houses?

A.                  They could be moved from place to place.

B.                  They could be easily expanded.

C.                   They had rounded frames that slightly resembled balloons.

D.                  They were made of lightweight materials.

60.             60.       The word derision in line 17 is closest in meaning to

A.                  affection

B.                  ignorance

C.                   ridicule

D.                  regret

ANSWER KEY

54.             D

The primary purpose of the passage is to discuss the development of balloon-frame houses, a “revolution in building” (line 13).

55.             A

Line 9 indicates that the balloon-frame was “invented … by a carpenter from Hartford, Connecticut.”

56.             B

Choice (A) is answered: it was invented in Chicago (line 9). Choice (C) is answered: it was 2x4 and 2x6 inches (line 10). Choice (D) is answered: it was invented in 1833 (line 9). However, the inventor is not named in the passage.

57.             C

Choice (A) and (B) are colonial wooden homes, and, according to the passage, most of these “could be built with simple tools and minimal skills” (lines 4-5). Choice (D) “could be assembled by any careful worker who could saw in a straight line and drive a nail” (lines 11-12). Choice (C), however, “required highly-skilled workers with special tools”(lines 7-8).

58.             A

Choices (B), (C), and (D) are listed in the third paragraph. Choice (A) is not given. In fact, the author implies that sophisticated tools were not needed to build this type of house.

59.             D

Because of the lightweight materials used to build balloon-frame houses, “Skeptics predicted that a strong wind would send such houses flying through the air like balloons” (lines 16-17).

60.             C

The word derision means ridicule, mockery.