Reading Comprehension · Science
PrepTest 136 · Section 1 · Passage 4
Questions 23–27
Before you start
Open PrepTest 136, Section 1 in your official copy from LSAC and read the passage for Questions 23–27, using the structure guide below. The passage is not reprinted here.
Structure guide
- P1: states a general claim about how progress often happens, then introduces one case as an example
- P2: gives earlier background showing the key idea was available, and explains why the people working on it were not open to it
- P3: walks through the puzzling results, gives reasons they went unexplained, and describes a surprising new clue
- P4: shows one person making the key connection and others confirming the evidence had been there all along
Step 2 · The kid passage
The Mystery of the Short Crayons
Kid detectives do not always solve cases in a straight line, and looking back, it can seem odd that the answer was missed for so long. Take the Mystery of the Short Crayons. From September, when Marcus's team started counting the art bin, to December, when Lulu gave the answer, the team piled up more and more clues that crayons were being snapped, without seeing it.
Even before the counting started, Aunt Rosa, a craft teacher, had figured out that the bin's heavy lid could in principle snap a crayon if it slammed. But Marcus's counting was not meant to find broken crayons, and the team was not open to the idea. Most of them said a lid snapping a crayon would be like a feather knocking over a bookshelf.
Lulu, sorting the bin in the reading corner, found a strange pile of stubby pieces. Marcus found many more. The stubs stayed unexplained partly because they were tiny and the bin sat on a wobbly high shelf that was risky to climb to, but mostly because everyone expected them to be new mini crayons from the supply closet. In November Lulu moved to the other fourth grade room, but Nadia kept sending her notes. One note held a surprise: a stub had a torn half label, which no mini crayon has. Nadia also noticed two stubs that, end to end, made exactly one full crayon.
Lulu finally saw what it meant: the lid had been snapping crayons. She named it "the Snap" and posted her answer with Priya. When the class rushed to check, it was clear the clues had been sitting there for months. They had only needed the right idea to tie them together.
Step 4 · The courtroom tale
The Case of the Wandering Gnomes
Mrs. Pell sued her neighbor, sure he was stealing her garden gnomes and putting them back. For months she logged every move: gnome by the fence, gnome under the hedge, little paw prints in the mud. Mr. Whitfield, for the neighbor, opened her own logbook. "Your Honor, every clue is right here. The prints are small. The gnomes move only on rainy nights, when the raccoon family is out." The judge peered at the pages. "So the evidence was gathered all along." "Yes," said Mr. Whitfield. "What was missing was the idea. Mrs. Pell expected a thief, so she never asked whether the prints belonged to someone with a tail." Case dismissed. The raccoons were not available for comment.