Reading Comprehension · Humanities
PrepTest 136 · Section 3 · Passage 1
Questions 1–6
Before you start
Open PrepTest 136, Section 3 in your official copy from LSAC and read the passage for Questions 1–6, using the structure guide below. The passage is not reprinted here.
Structure guide
- P1: reports a view many critics share about the artist, then gives the author's own thesis about what makes the artist original
- P2: gives a first set of examples linking the artist's work to an older tradition
- P3: adds a second link, this time in how the works are built and how they end
- P4: adds a final link, then closes by disagreeing with many critics about where one feature comes from
Step 2 · The kid passage
Nadia's Board Games
Most kids at Maple Street School agree that the main thing about Nadia's board games is that they carry a message. Nadia learned game design at her uncle's chess club, and she says her games are not just for fun: they are meant to make players notice what is fair and unfair at recess. But what makes her games truly new is that she took board games, a grown-up hobby from across town, and shaped them to fit the clapping rhymes of our playground.
Many of her pieces come straight from the rhymes. The hopscotch square, which in the rhymes means home and safety, shows up on every board. The sneaky fox, a rhyme character who stands for greed, appears as a line-cutter, a card-swapper, and a snack-hoarder. Most of her pieces are types, not people: the 'new kid' piece has no name and is known only by its lunch tray and the troubles it cannot fix.
Also, clapping rhymes often end with the players shouting out their own ending. Nadia's games do the same: the last space offers three endings, and the players vote.
Last, like the rhymes, her games are 'crossing' games: the player starts as one kind of kid and finishes with new eyes. Her boards set opposites side by side: sharing and hoarding, big kids and little kids. Marcus says the opposites come from her chess training, with its black and white pieces. But the rhymes are full of opposites too, so they are the more likely source.
Step 4 · The courtroom tale
The Case of the Checkerboard Quilt
A quilting school sued Aunt Rosa's neighbor, Mrs. Pell, claiming her prize quilt copied the school's famous light-and-dark squares. 'She took our class!' their lawyer said. 'The contrast is ours.' Mr. Whitfield snapped his suspenders. 'Your Honor, Mrs. Pell did take that class. But look at these quilts from her grandmother's village, a hundred years old. Light beside dark, warm beside cold, on every one. Her stitches, her border knots, even her habit of leaving one corner unfinished for the family to complete: all village tricks.' The judge squinted at the old quilts. 'So the contrast was in her family long before it was in your classroom.' 'Exactly,' said Mr. Whitfield. 'Training is one possible source. Tradition is the likelier one.' Case dismissed.