No wonder they go grey at 16

[quote=“beautifulspam”][quote]Wow. And what level is this exam?

Second sentence is missing 3 commas, btw.[/quote]

They are just practice question from a test prep website. Dunno what level. Here’s the URL:

testmagic.com/Knowledge_Base … /index.htm

Looks like it’s based out of a cram school in california.[/quote]

I get stuff like this where I work and have to edit the shit out of it. I suspect the real TOEFL tests have proper sentences that work both logically, grammatically and historically. Your stuff was written by hacks.

[quote=“Muzha Man”][quote=“Chris”]I’ll give it a shot:

[quote=“beautifulspam”]
Almost ninety per cent of [American] high school [students] claim they know [how to read], yet this figure is probably [somewhat lower].[/quote]

somewhat low

(Lower than what?)

(Note: I prefer “percent” as one word)

, which overlooks

(Does the house overlook the campus, or was it Jefferson?)[/quote]

Yes, I agree with Chris. If you say the percentage is 90 percent you cannot then claim the number is actually lower. “Incorrect” would be better. Also, he built the house “to overlook” the river.

The second sentence even when corrected is awful. [/quote]

This is how I interpreted it when I read it:

“Architect and founder of the University of Virginia, Thomas Jefferson built his house Monticello, which (today) overlooks the campus in Charlottesville. Virginia.”

I would hope so, but most of the TOEFL schools in taiwan use “material written by hacks” to train the poor little buggers for the test. Back when I taught full time, students would bring me a stumper like this at least once a week. They looked so disappointed when teacher gave the “wrong” answer :slight_smile:

I don’t think looking at the campus was his main objective in building the house, so “he built it to overlook the campus” is still wrong.

“He built it so as to overlook the campus” would be okay, I guess.

[quote=“Brendon”]I don’t think looking at the campus was his main objective in building the house, so “he built it to overlook the campus” is still wrong.

“He built it so as to overlook the campus” would be okay, I guess.[/quote]

No, not wrong, just not the meaning you want to convey, or not the meaning you think the sentence is meant to convey. There’s a difference.

So it’s semantically wrong, rather than syntactically wrong. It’s still wrong :wink: