SAT Reading and Writing
Form, Structure, and Sense
Form, Structure, and Sense is a skill in the Standard English Conventions domain of the Digital SAT Reading and Writing section. These are practice questions on it, and each answer choice comes with an explanation of why it is right or wrong.
17 questions. After every answer you’ll see why each choice is right or wrong, not just the one you picked.
Sample questions
Open a question to see the answer choices and the correct answer.
The collection of rare manuscripts, donated by a private estate decades ago, ______ housed in a climate-controlled wing of the university library. Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A. were
- B. are
- C. have been
- D. is ✓
Correct answer: D. The subject of the sentence is the singular noun "collection," not the plural "manuscripts" in the intervening phrase, so the singular verb "is" is required.
By the time archaeologists excavated the site in 2015, looters ______ most of the valuable artifacts decades earlier. Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A. had already removed ✓
- B. have removed
- C. will have removed
- D. removed
Correct answer: A. The past perfect "had already removed" correctly signals that the looting was completed before the excavation, an earlier past action relative to another past action.
The new city ordinance requires that restaurants clearly label allergens, post nutritional information, and ______ inspection certificates in a visible location. Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A. will display
- B. display ✓
- C. displaying
- D. displayed
Correct answer: B. "display" maintains parallel structure with the other base-form verbs in the series, "label" and "post."
The collection of rare manuscripts housed in the university's basement archive ______ far older than most of the building itself. Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A. is ✓
- B. are
- C. were
- D. have been
Correct answer: A. Correct — the sentence's true subject is the singular noun collection, not the intervening plural noun manuscripts, so the verb must be singular to agree with it.
The internship taught her how to negotiate contracts, how to manage a team under deadline pressure, and ______. Which choice completes the text so that it conforms to the conventions of Standard English?
- A. presenting findings to skeptical executives
- B. how to present findings to skeptical executives ✓
- C. she learned to present findings to skeptical executives
- D. to present findings was a skill she gained
Correct answer: B. Correct — this choice matches the how to plus verb pattern already established by the first two items in the series, keeping the list grammatically parallel.