READING COMPREHENSION (MAIN IDEAS)

If you’re a fitness walker, there is no need for a commute to a health club. Your neighborhood can be your health club. You don’t need a lot of fancy equipment to get a good workout either. All you need is a well-designed pair of athletic shoes.

>> This paragraph best supports the statement that:

• fitness walking is a better form of exercise

  than weight lifting.

• a membership in a health club is a poor

  investment.

• fitness walking is a convenient and valuable

  form of exercise.

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One New York publisher has estimated that 50,000 to 60,000 people in the United States want an anthology that includes the complete works of William Shakespeare. And what accounts for this renewed interest in Shakespeare? As scholars point out, the psychological insights he portrays in both male and female characters are amazing even today.

>> This paragraph best supports the statement that:

• Shakespeare’s characters are more interest-

  ing than fictional characters today.

• people today are interested in Shakespeare’s

  work because of the characters.

• Shakespeare was a psychiatrist as well as a

  playwright.

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Critical reading is a demanding process. To read critically, you must slow down your reading and, with pencil in hand, perform specific operations on the text. Mark up the text with your reactions, conclusions, and questions. When you read, become an active participant.

>> This paragraph best supports the statement that:

• critical reading is a slow, dull, but essential

  process.

• the best critical reading happens at critical

  times in a person’s life.

• critical reading requires thoughtful and

  careful attention.

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There are no effective boundaries when it comes to pollutants. Studies have shown that toxic insecticides that have been banned in many countries are riding the wind from countries where they remain legal. Compounds such as DDT and toxaphene have been found in remote places like the Yukon and other Arctic regions.

>> This paragraph best supports the statement that:

• toxic insecticides such as DDT have not

  been banned throughout the world.

• more pollutants find their way into polar climates than they do into warmer areas.

• DDT and toxaphene are the two most toxic

  insecticides in the world.

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The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution protects citizens against unreasonable searches and seizures. No search of a person’s home or personal effects may be conducted without a written search warrant issued on probable cause. This means that a neutral judge must approve the factual basis justifying a search before it can be conducted.

>> This paragraph best supports the statement that the police cannot search a person’s home or private papers unless they have:

• legal authorization.

• direct evidence of a crime.

• a reasonable belief that a crime has

  occurred.

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Mathematics allows us to expand our conscious- ness. Mathematics tells us about economic trends, patterns of disease, and the growth of populations. Math is good at exposing the truth, but it can also perpetuate misunderstandings and untruths. Figures have the power to mislead people.

>> This paragraph best supports the statement that:

• the study of mathematics is dangerous.

• words are more truthful than figures.

• figures are sometimes used to deceive people.

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Human technology developed from the first stone tools about two and a half million years ago. In the beginning, the rate of development was slow. Hundreds of thousands of years passed without much change. Today, new technologies are reported daily on television and in newspapers.

>> This paragraph best supports the statement that:

• stone tools were not really technology.

• stone tools were in use for two and a half

  million years.

• In today’s world, new technologies are constantly being developed.

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