OE


Begin with the second blank and determine who/what the blank is describing. The blank is the second half of a comparison about water. Determine what else gives insight into the word for the blank. The first half of the comparison is water as a solid, so a good word for the blank will be something like “liquid.” Choices (D) and (E) do not match “liquid,” but (F) is an exact match, so keep (F). Now work with the first blank and determine who/what the blank is describing. The blank is describing what water…as a solid. Determine what else gives insight into the word for the blank. The sentence states that the blank will be a word for what water is less of as a solid than as a liquid. The sentence also states to look at the floating ice in your water glass, so water will float as a solid inside its liquid form. If something
is lighter than the liquid it sits in, that thing will float, and because of the transition word less, the sentence is discussing the opposite of lighter, so use a word like “heavy” for the blank. Choice (A) is not a good match, so eliminate it. Choice (B), dense, is a match for “heavy,” so keep (B). Choice (C) is not a match for “heavy,” so despite that aqueous could be used to describe water, eliminate (C). Work with the third blank and determine who/what the blank is describing. The third blank describes something the reader might need.

Determine what else gives insight into the word for the blank. The sentence states that what the reader might need is to look at the floating ice in your water glass. The semicolon is a transition that indicates the same direction, so the third blank is an “example” of the statements in the first part of the sentence. Choice (G), an illustration, is a good match for “example” so keep (G). Choices (H) and (I) are not matches for “example,” so eliminate them both.