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Praxis Middle School Language Arts

Subjects : praxis, english
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
  • If you are not ready to take this test, you can study here.
  • Match each statement with the correct term.
  • Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.

This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. A figure of speech in which exaggeration is used for emphasis or effect - as in I could sleep for a year or this book weighs a ton.






2. A kind of adjective which is always used with and gives some information about a noun. There are only two _____ a and the.






3. The repetition of initial consonant sounds in words - such a 'Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.'






4. The structure of a work of literature; the sequence of events.






5. Language that is intended to be evasive or to conceal. Ex. 'downsized' actually means fired or loss of job.






6. A type of pun - or play on words - that results when two words become mixed up in the speaker's mind






7. A suspenseful story that deals with a puzzling crime. Examples include Edgar Allan Poe's 'The Murder in Rue Morgue' and Charles Dickens' The Mystery of Edwin Drood.






8. A break in the rhythm of language - particularly a natural pause in a in a line of verse - maked in prosody by a double vertical line ( || ). Ex. Arma virumque cano - || Troiae qui primus ab oris .






9. A story about a person's life written by another person.






10. A person - place - thing - or event used to represent something else - such as the white flag that represents surrender.






11. A person's account of his or hew own life.






12. A group of words containing a subject and a predicate and forming part of a compound or complex sentence.






13. A novel set in the western U.S. featuring the experiences of cowboys and frontiersmen. Examples include Zane Grey's Riders of the Purple Sage and Trail Driver - Larry McMurty's Lonesome Dove - Conrad Richter's The Sea of Grass - Fran Striker's The Lo






14. An expository piece written with eloquence that becomes part of the recognized literature of an era. Often reveal historical facts - the social mores of the times - and the thoughts and personality of the author. Some have recorded and influenced the






15. The main character or hero of a written work.






16. A rhythmical pattern in verse that is made up of stressed and unstressed syllables.






17. A story in which people (or things or actions) represent an idea or a generalization about life. Usually have a strong lesson or moral.






18. A repetition of the same sound in words close to one another






19. A poem that is a mournful lament for the dead. Examples include William Shakespeare's 'Eligy' from Cymbeline - Robert Louis Stevenson's 'Requiem -' and Alfred Lord Tennysone's 'In Memoriam.'






20. Informal language used by a particular group of people among themselves.






21. The role of context in the interpretation of meaning.






22. The overall feeling created by an author's use of words.






23. A variety of a language used by people from a particular geographic area.






24. A word which shows action or state of being. Ex. In the sentence The dog bit the man - bit is the ____.






25. A word which describes or gives more information about a noun or pronoun. Ex. The lazy dog sat on the rug - the word lazy is an ____ which gives more information about the noun dog.






26. A method by which trained readers evaluate a piece of writing for its overall quality. There is no focus on one aspect of the writing.






27. A short story or folktale that contains a moral - which may be expressed explicitly at the end as a maxim. Examples include The Country Mouse and the Town Mouse - The Tortoise and the Hare - and The Wolf in Sheep's Clothing.






28. A short poem about personal feelings and emotions.






29. A contradictory statement that makes sense






30. A narrative that is made up of fantastic characters and creatures - such as witches - goblins - and fairies - and usually begins with the phrase 'Once upon a time...' Examples include Rapunzel - Cinderella - Sleeping Beauty - and Little Red Riding Ho






31. ' U






32. U '






33. A fourteen - line poem - usually written in iambic pentameter - with a varied rhyme scheme. Two main types are Petrarchan (or Italian) and the Shakespearean (or English). A Petrarchan opens with an octave that states a proposition and ends with a ses






34. A variation of a language used by people who live in a particular geographical area.






35. A narrative form - such as an epic - legend - myth - song - poem - or fable - that has been retold within a culture for generations. Examples include The People Couldn't Fly retold by Virginia Hamilton and And Green Grass Grew All Around by Alvin Sch






36. A text or performance that imitates and mocks an author or work.






37. A philosophy that values human freedom and personal responsibility. A few well known _______ writers are Jean - Paul Satre - Soren Kierkegaard ('the father of _______') - Albert Camus - Freidrich Nietzche - Franz Kafka - and Simone de Beauvoir.






38. Rhyme that occurs within a line of verse.






39. A person or thing working against the hero of a literary work (the protagonist).






40. A humorous verse form of five anapestic (Composed of feet that are short - short - long or unaccented - unaccented - accented) lines with rhyme scheme of aabba.






41. Language widely considered crude - disgusting - and oftentimes offensive.






42. Occurs when there are two or more possible meanings to a word or phrase.






43. A brief story that illustrates or makes a point.






44. An extended fictional prose narrative.






45. The study of the structure of sentences.






46. Simple - compound (conjunctions) - complex (subordination) - compound - complex (conjunctions and subordination).






47. A document organized in paragraph form that can be long or short and can be in the form of a letter - dialogue - or discussion. Examples include Politics and the English Language by George Orwell - The American Scholar by Ralph Waldo Emerson - and Mo






48. The most specific or direct meaning of a word - in contrast to its figurative or associated meanings.






49. A literary device in which animals - ideas - and things are represented as having human traits.






50. The study of the sounds of language and their physical properties.