Reading Comprehension · Humanities
PrepTest 116 · Section 1 · Passage 4
Questions 21–27
Before you start
Open PrepTest 116, Section 1 in your official copy from LSAC and read the passage for Questions 21–27, using the structure guide below. The passage is not reprinted here.
Structure guide
- P1: states what a movement's supporters believed, then points out an irony
- P2: claims the supporters' stubbornness helped cause the decline, traces the movement's rise, and gives examples of their selective praise
- P3: lists further causes of the decline, describes a change in practice the movement did not foresee, and shows how one central ideal clashed with it at great cost
- P4: notes that a later group saw the problem and concludes by restating the author's verdict
Step 2 · The kid passage
The Rise and Fall of the Show-Every-Call Movement
Fans of the Show-Every-Call Movement said it fit today's recess better than the old ways and matched the new sign-up sheets. Funny, then, that the movement pushed ideas that did not fit how games really got played.
Its stubborn fans helped sink it. It began as a tiny group of fifth graders, and most kids never liked it. That made the fans feel like heroes: they stopped asking what players wanted and started bossing. By spring they ran most games and the recess newsletter. Kids whose games did not push the movement got brushed aside. When fans praised someone as a pioneer, like Owen or young Kevin, they talked only about the parts of their games that matched the movement and, how handy, forgot the rest.
The fall came partly because the fans did not know how games really ran, and partly because they would not admit they mostly cared how games looked. Also, recess changed in a way they never expected. Games used to be run by two big kids. Now each game had many helpers (ball, bases, score), each working alone and each a little sloppy. Yet the movement's top ideal was to explain every call out loud, on the spot. That took nearly perfect helpers and ate so much time that the movement fairly earned the nickname Recess Wrecker.
As the later Just Play Club saw, forcing every call into the open was needless. The fans' refusal to drop their ideals helped kids lose interest.
Step 4 · The courtroom tale
The Case of the Open Kitchen Society
Judge Okafor frowned. "Mr. Whitfield, why did the Open Kitchen Society fade?" Mr. Whitfield hooked his thumbs in his suspenders. "Your Honor, its members insisted that every dish be cooked in full view of the diners. They said it suited modern dining. But kitchens changed. Now ten cooks each make one part, each slightly off. Cooking every part perfectly in public needed flawless cooks, so meals cost a fortune." "Did the members notice?" "They lectured the diners instead. They praised a few famous chefs, but only the parts that fit their rule." The judge sighed. "So the rule was really about looks?" "Exactly. They would not let it go, and the diners walked away."