Unit: Main ideas.

Name: Doris Cárdenas ID: 9-701-415

Instructions: send just the answers for practice 1 (page 27); practice 2 (page 31); and practice 3
(page 40).
PRACTICE 1
In each of the following groups—many based on textbook selections—one statement is the general
point, and the other statements are specific support for the point.
Identify each point with a P and each statement of support with an S.
Example
_S__ Women are less likely than men to become full professors.
_S__ Women who become professors are generally paid less than their male counterparts.
_P__ Women often face discrimination in the field of education.
_S__ Female professors are not given an equal number of important committee
assignments.
(The third statement is the general idea. It is supported by three examples of discrimination against
women.)
CHAPTER 1 Main Ideas 27
1. _S__ a. Lottery winners have been known to use their winnings to feed their addictions to gambling
and/or drugs.
__S_ b. Other lottery winners report squandering their money to help out a neverending stream of “hard
luck” relatives and friends.
__S_ c. Some lottery winners invest large sums on business ventures they know nothing about and wind
up losing all they have invested.
_P__ d. Winning the lottery can create as many problems as it solves.
2. _S__ a. People like to interact with other people as they shop.
__S_ b. People like to see, touch, try on, and sometimes even smell the items they intend to buy.
_S__ c. Many people still use shopping as simply an excuse to get out of the house.
_P__ d. Despite its growing popularity, Internet shopping will never entirely replace shopping in stores.
3. __S_ a. For much of the 1900s, people regarded cancer as a death sentence.
_P__ b. Attitudes toward cancer used to be very different from those of today.
_S__ c. Few people with cancer were willing to speak openly about battling the disease.
_S__ d. Many people thought that having cancer was contagious.
4. _S__ a. Instead of simply offering printed material on loan, modern libraries now allow patrons to
borrow CDs, videos, and DVDs.
_S_ b. Even very small libraries now provide computers, which patrons may use to access the Internet.
_P__ c. Libraries have changed drastically in the past decade to keep up with the demands of an ever-
changing society.
__S_ d. Some libraries even feature refreshment stands that sell beverages and snacks.
5. __S_ a. By age 14, 81 percent of young people have tried drinking.
__S_ b. By the time they graduate from high school, more than 43 percent of teenagers have
experimented with illegal drugs.
__P_ c. In the United States, teenage drug and alcohol use is especially common.
__S_ d. About one-third of teenagers who have tried illegal drugs have also tried at least one highly
addictive and toxic substance, such as cocaine or heroin.
28 PART ONE Ten Steps to Advanced Reading Skills
6. _S__ a. Female wigs sometimes rose as much as two and a half feet, making the average wearer
roughly seven and a half feet tall.
__P_ b. Wigs were so valuable that people often willed them to their descendants.
_S__ c. When traveling, women wearing large wigs often had to sit on the floor of their carriages or ride
with their heads sticking out of the windows.
__S_ d. In the 1700s, it was considered the height of fashion among the European upper classes to wear
elaborate wigs.
7. _S__ a. Many infant girls are given up for adoption by couples in other countries.
_P__ b. The traditional Chinese preference for boys, coupled with that country’s “one child” policy, has
led to some disturbing consequences.
__S_ c. Other infant girls are not given adequate medical care.
__S_ d. The development of ultrasound technology to determine a child’s gender prior to birth has led to
the death by abortion of hundreds of thousands of unborn Chinese girls.
8. _S__ a. Before Abraham Lincoln was nominated for president, he provided material for a biography
that helped to solidify his image as “Honest Abe, the railsplitter.”
__P_ b. A number of presidential candidates have written or co-written books in order to bypass the press
and speak directly to voters, giving their viewpoint about events and policies.
_S__ c. John F. Kennedy’s Profiles in Courage, which won the 1955 Pulitzer Prize for biography, helped
Kennedy impress voters as a high-minded public servant.
__S_ d. The Audacity of Hope and Dreams from My Father introduced a little known candidate named
Barack Obama to the American public.
9. _S__ a. The number of Category 4 and Category 5 hurricanes has nearly doubled in the past three
decades, fulfilling some scientists’ predictions that global warming will lead to more severe weather.
_P__ b. There is growing evidence that global warming is real.
_S__ c. In the past 100-plus years of record-keeping, eight of the ten hottest years have occurred since
1996.
_S__ d. According to scientists who study the movement of fields of ice, the ice surrounding the North
Pole has entered a state of accelerating, long-term decline.
CHAPTER 1 Main Ideas 29
10. _S__ a. The separation stage involves the removal of the individual from his or her former status.
__S_ b. The third stage is the rite of aggregation, which is the readmission of the individual into society in
the newly acquired status.
__P_ c. Rites of passage, which mark the transition of an individual from one stage of life to another,
involve three crucial stages.
__S_ d. The rite of marginality is a period of transition involving specific rituals and often suspension
from normal social contact.

PRACTICE 2
The following practice will sharpen your sense of the difference between a topic, the point about the
topic (the main idea), and supporting details.
Read each paragraph below and do the following:
Paragraph 1
1
Halloween is often associated with ancient, pagan festivals or with the Catholic observance of All Saint’s
Day. 2But the truth is that Halloween as we celebrate it today is mostly an American invention. 3 The Irish
and Scottish, who may have first observed the holiday, didn’t even carve pumpkins before coming to the
United States. 4 Because the pumpkin is an American fruit, they carved their jack-o’- lanterns only out of
turnips and potatoes. 5 So it wasn’t until immigrants brought the holiday to the United States around 1840
that scary, glowing orange faces became a regular sight on Halloween. 6 Observers of Halloween didn’t
dress up in scary costumes, either, until the holiday had been American for over sixty years. 7 That
practice originated around 1900, when communities started organizing costume parties to prevent
children from taking part in the vandalism that was then the tradition. 8 Before 1900, people were more
likely to see children tipping over outhouses than walking around in costumes on Halloween. 9 Finally,
even “trick-or-treating” was an American invention. 10It was the Boy Scouts of America who popularized
the practice in the 1930s, as an even more appealing alternative to getting into mischief. 11Many
Americans might be surprised to learn that their own grandparents were some of the first people in history
to go door-to-door asking for candy on Halloween.
1. What is the topic of the paragraph? In other words, what (in one or more
words) is the paragraph about? Halloween
__2___ 2. What point is the writer making about the topic? In other words, which sentence states the
main idea of the paragraph? In the space provided, write the number of the sentence containing the main
idea.
Paragraph 2
1
The American criminal justice system is often unjust. 2 Many of the poor spend months awaiting trial,
while those with money are able to use bonds to secure their release. 3Defense attorneys encourage plea
bargaining or pleading guilty (whether or not one committed the crime) in return for being charged with a
lesser offense. 4 Judges dislike “unnecessary trials,” and they impose harsher sentences on those who
insist on going to trial. 5Judges also have biases which influence their sentencing. 6 Factors that have
nothing to do with the offense, but which affect sentencing, include age, employment, and the number of
previous arrests. 7 Even when the offense is the same, older defendants receive more lenient sentences, as
do those with higher-status jobs and those with a better employment history.
1. What is the topic of the paragraph? American criminal justice system
___6__ 2. What point is the writer making about the topic? In the space provided, write the number of the
sentence containing the main idea.
Paragraph 3
1 The ability to empathize seems to exist in a rudimentary form in even the youngest children. 2 Research
sponsored by the National Institute of Mental Health revealed what many parents know from experience:
Virtually from birth, infants become visibly upset when they hear another baby crying, and children who
are a few months old cry when they observe another child in tears. 3 Young children have trouble
distinguishing others’ distress from their own. 4 If, for example, one child hurts his finger, another baby
might put her own finger into her mouth as if she were feeling pain. 5 Researchers report cases in which
children who see their parents in tears wipe their own eyes, even though they might not be crying.
1. What is the topic of the paragraph? The ability to empathize
___3__ 2. What point is the writer making about the topic? In the space provided, write the number of the
sentence containing the main idea.
Paragraph 4
1
Popular during the 1950s, the drive-in movie disappeared for a number of reasons. 2 The most important
was land value. 3 Drive-ins were built on undeveloped edges of cities and towns. 4 When these areas
expanded in the 1960s and 1970s, it didn’t make sense for a business used only after dark and mostly in
warm weather to take up valuable space. 5 Drive-ins were replaced by industrial parks, tract housing, and
shopping malls with indoor theaters. 6 Another reason was daylight savings time, which became
standardized in most areas by the late 1960s. 7 Theaters had to synchronize their first show with the setting
sun. 8 In the summer, they couldn’t get started until nine o’clock, too late for families that had to get up
early. 9 Also, moviegoers began to expect more sophisticated projection and sound than those offered by
drive-ins. 10 Furthermore, people lost interest in drive-ins for family entertainment as movies became
more violent and sexually explicit. 11The last of the drive-ins vanished when cable television and VCRs
came on the scene. 12People could now see recent movies without leaving their homes.
1. What is the topic of the paragraph? Drive ins
___5__ 2. What point is the writer making about the topic? In the space provided, write the number of the
sentence containing the main idea.

PRACTICE 3
The main ideas of the following paragraphs appear at different locations—in the beginning, somewhere in
the middle, or at the end. Identify each main idea by filling in its sentence number in the space provided.
___3__ 1. 1 Everyone knows what it’s like to have the “jitters” after one cup of coffee too many. 2 Those
shaking hands and sleepless nights have convinced many that coffee is as unhealthy as alcohol or
cigarettes. 3However, the health benefits of coffee greatly outweigh its negative effects. 4In addition to
reducing the risk of diseases like diabetes and cirrhosis of the liver, those morning cups of joe have been
shown to ward off two of America’s most common killers: heart disease and cancer. 5Coffee flushes the
bloodstream of the excess fat that clogs arteries and also supplies a large dose of antioxidants, which
prevent the formation of tumors. 6Psychologically, the stimulant effects of a daily cup have proven to
reduce suicide rates. 7And as for the fear of a troublesome addiction to caffeine, that risk is often
overstated. 8Physical dependence on coffee becomes a possibility only after drinking five or more cups
daily, significantly more than the two or three cups a day that Americans drink on average.
___1__ 2. 1Offering on-site childcare for employees’ children provides many physical and financial
benefits to companies. 2Such child-care facilities ease the strain on parents. 3While they are at work, they
can keep in touch with a baby or toddler and observe the care their child is receiving. 4They are able to
spend time with their children during breaks and lunch hours, and mothers can even nurse their babies at
the center. 5These benefits attract and keep capable workers with the company. 6Surprisingly, providing
child care can even reduce labor costs. 7When the United Bank of Monterey, California, decided to
measure the cost of its daycare center, officials found that the annual turnover of employees who used the
center was just one-fourth that of employees who did not use it. 8Users of the centers were also absent
from work less often, and they took shorter maternity leaves. 9After subtracting the center’s costs from
these savings, the bank saved more than $200,000.
___6__ 3. 1In today’s world, crops are raised in soil where nutrients have been depleted. 2Plants are
treated with pesticides and other chemicals so they no longer have to fight to live, which further
diminishes their nutrient levels—not to mention the toxic exposure we receive from such chemicals.
3
Animals are cooped up in pens or giant feedlots instead of roaming free and eating the nutrientrich wild
grains and grasses they once consumed. 4Since cows’ stomachs are adapted to grass instead of corn, they
must take antibiotics to prevent them from exploding. 5To complicate this further, all of us are exposed to
hazardous toxins and chemicals that poison our bodies; we live with too much stress; we don’t sleep
enough; we don’t exercise enough; and we eat foods that cause inflammatory reactions—making the
nutrient demands on our bodies even greater. 6For all these reasons, the foods we eat no longer contain the
nutrient levels we require for optimal health.
___7__ 4. 1What do you think of as “cute”? 2Kittens? 3Paintings of children with big sad eyes? 4Little
dolls? 5Golden retriever puppies? 6If none of these examples triggers a fond “awwwwww” response in
you, you are truly a rare individual. 7Scientists who study human behavior say that we are hard-wired not
only to identify certain characteristics as “cute,” but to respond to them with affection and protectiveness.
8Simply put, cute (as opposed to beautiful) means “baby-like, vulnerable, young, helpless.” 9And what we
identify as “cute” are characteristics borrowed from our own human babies. 10Those include big round
faces, forward-facing eyes set low on the face, awkward floppy arms and legs, and a clumsy, side-to-side
walk. 11Because human babies are so helpless for so long, it is essential for our species’ survival that
adults respond strongly to such “cute” signals. 12And indeed, nature has been so successful in this regard
that we respond to collections of “cute” characteristics that are outside our own species—just witness our
reaction to pandas, penguins, and puppies. 13We have such a deeply-rooted response to cuteness that we
respond even to cute non-animals. 14It’s no mystery why designers of cars like the Beetle and the Mini
Cooper made their vehicles look round-headed and smiling. 15They know that as absurd as it may be,
people want to take “cute” things home and care for them.