Free AP Lang Practice Questions

Question 1

Read the following passage.

(1) For six years I taught in a building where the windows did not open. (2) I mention this not to complain about the heat. (3) A room you cannot ventilate is a room someone has already decided to endure rather than repair. (4) That decision, made once about the windows, was made again about the textbooks, the roof, and eventually about us.

Which of the following best describes the rhetorical function of sentence 3?

Accepted Answer

It generalizes a specific condition into a principle that governs the argument

Answer

It provides the sensory detail that allows readers to picture the writer's classroom

Answer

It concedes that the building's disrepair lay outside the school's control

Answer

It states the writer's central thesis about why experienced teachers leave

Question 2

In 1889, a physician addressing the annual meeting of a state medical society opens as follows.

'I had prepared, for this evening, an address on the history of our profession in this state. I have set it aside. Three weeks ago the legislature adjourned without acting on the water bill, and since that adjournment I have signed eleven death certificates in a single ward.'

Which of the following best identifies the exigence of the address?

Accepted Answer

The stalled water bill and the deaths in the weeks since

Answer

The history of the medical profession in the state

Answer

The speaker's aim of persuading the society to endorse sanitation reform

Answer

The annual meeting of the state medical society

Question 3

Read the following two paragraphs.

(Paragraph 2) Supporters of the ordinance point to the three years since its passage: noise complaints have fallen by half, and residents report sleeping better. These are real gains, and no honest account of the policy can ignore them.

(Paragraph 3) But the complaints did not fall because the noise stopped. They fell because the residents most likely to complain - renters near the commercial strip - moved away.

Which of the following best describes the relationship between the two paragraphs?

Accepted Answer

Paragraph 3 accepts the data but disputes the conclusion drawn from it

Answer

Paragraph 3 supplies the statistical evidence needed to support paragraph 2's claim

Answer

Paragraph 3 refutes paragraph 2's data as methodologically unsound and unreliable

Answer

Paragraph 3 offers an example illustrating the trend described in paragraph 2

Question 4

A synthesis essay responds to the prompt with a clear, defensible position. It draws evidence from Source A and Source C, and in each case explains how that evidence supports the argument rather than merely summarizing it. No other sources are referenced. What is the highest score this response can earn in Row B (Evidence and Commentary)?

Accepted Answer

1

Answer

0

Answer

2

Answer

3

Question 5

A rhetorical analysis response supports every claim with specific evidence and consistently explains how that evidence supports its line of reasoning. Across the essay it analyzes four separate instances of the writer's use of understatement, explaining how each instance further contributes to the writer's message. Which of the following best describes its eligibility in Row B?

Accepted Answer

Eligible for 4, because multiple instances of one choice may qualify if each further contributes

Answer

Capped at 3, because the fourth point requires more than one type of rhetorical choice

Answer

Capped at 2, because analysis of a single device cannot establish a line of reasoning

Answer

Capped at 3, because Row B awards the fourth point only for analysis of tone and syntax

Question 6

Read the following portion of a draft.

(11) The city's bike-lane program has not simply moved cyclists onto safer streets; it has brought people onto bicycles who never rode before. (12) ______

In sentence 12 the writer wants to provide specific evidence supporting the claim in sentence 11. Which of the following best accomplishes this goal?

Accepted Answer

First-time riders made up 62 percent of new bike-share registrations after the lanes opened.

Answer

Cycling has long been recognized as an efficient, environmentally responsible form of urban transport.

Answer

Collisions involving cyclists on the affected streets fell by 40 percent over the same period.

Answer

Many residents say they now feel considerably safer riding through the downtown corridor.

Question 7

Read the following portion of a draft.

(4) Opponents argue that the new zoning rules will drive up rents in the very neighborhoods they are meant to protect. (5) This concern deserves a serious answer. (6) In the four cities that adopted comparable rules, median rents rose more slowly than in matched cities that did not.

The writer is considering deleting sentence 5. Should the writer keep or delete it?

Accepted Answer

Keep, because it signals that the opposing view will be answered rather than dismissed

Answer

Keep, because it supplies the statistical support that sentence 4 lacks

Answer

Delete, because it interrupts the flow between the objection and the evidence answering it

Answer

Delete, because it concedes a point that the evidence in sentence 6 then contradicts

Question 8

Read the following passage.

He had studied the maps for nine months. He had memorized the depths, the currents, the names of every shoal between the harbor and the open sea. He had rehearsed the passage in his mind until he could run it with his eyes closed. The channel had moved.

The writer's use of a short simple sentence at the end of the passage primarily serves to

Accepted Answer

suggest that the elaborate preparation just described has been rendered useless

Answer

demonstrate the writer's command of varied sentence structure

Answer

establish a formal tone appropriate to a technical subject

Answer

indicate that the passage is shifting from narration to direct argument

Question 9

Addressing a convention of small-business owners, a speaker opens as follows.

'I am not going to tell you that this regulation will cost you nothing. It will cost you something. What I am going to tell you is what it costs you to keep doing without it - and I am going to show you the invoice.'

The opening most clearly reflects an assumption that the audience

Accepted Answer

distrusts speakers who promise that new requirements will be costless

Answer

is unfamiliar with the regulation and needs its provisions explained in detail

Answer

already accepts the regulation's necessity and requires only reassurance

Answer

values environmental protection more highly than short-term profitability

Question 10

Consider the following sentence from a report.

The program appears, in most of the districts we studied, to have narrowed the gap in reading scores.

The qualifying phrase 'in most of the districts we studied' primarily functions to

Accepted Answer

limit the claim to the evidence actually gathered, making it more defensible

Answer

concede that the program failed in the majority of the districts studied

Answer

suggest that the writer lacks confidence in the program's effectiveness

Answer

indicate that the study's methodology was flawed in several districts

Free AP Lang Practice Questions

Domain 1: Rhetorical Situation: Reading (11%-14%)

Question 1

Question 2

Domain 3: Claims and Evidence: Reading (13%-16%)

Question 3

Question 4

Domain 4: Claims and Evidence: Writing (11%-14%)

Question 5

Domain 5: Reasoning and Organization: Reading (13%-16%)

Question 6

Domain 6: Reasoning and Organization: Writing (11%-14%)

Question 7

Domain 7: Style: Reading (11%-14%)

Question 8

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