ACT Blast 2022 Correct Verb Tense and Consistency

A badge was pinned to her shirt indicated she was a biochemist, here, I guessed, to research the organism.

• NO CHANGE

• had been

• it was

• DELETE the underlined portion.

Answer explanation

The helping verb was is unnecessary and creates sentence problems with the next verb indicated.

Cultivating hybrid-teas having involved a process of grafting two species of rose together, but the grafted area remains weak and susceptible to viruses.

• NO CHANGE

• which involves

• involves

• involving

Answer explanation

The other answer choices create sentence fragments.

Then creating highly elaborate versions of the sturdy utility baskets that have been used by generations of Passamaquoddy fishermen from Maine.

• NO CHANGE

• Going on to create

• Frey creates

• Creating

Answer explanation

All other answer choices create sentence fragments.

And while braids of grass are customarily woven into ash baskets to make them better, Frey incorporates braided cedar bark to create striking new textures.

• NO CHANGE

• has been

• is seen

• is

Answer explanation

The verb are is in the correct tense and agrees with its subject braids, which is plural. All other choices work only for a singular subject.

During the flake’s

descent from Earth’s upper atmosphere, other water

vapor molecules bumps into the hexagonal structure.

• NO CHANGE

• has bumped

• bumped

• bump

Answer explanation

The verb bump is the best choice because it is in present tense and is a plural verb for its subject molecules. The other answer choices are in the wrong tense or go with a singular subject.

In 2009, Libbrecht and Arnold’s experiments

revealed that triangular snowflakes begin with the

same process of chemical bonding and forms a hexagonal

shape.

• NO CHANGE

• were they to form

• if they formed

• form

Answer explanation

The subject of the verb is snowflakes, so a plural verb is necessary. Also, the verb needs to match the other present tense verb begin. The only verb that fulfills both requirements is form.

It was August and our clothes were stifling,

but we would have needed the warmth from our bodies

sealed around us as we hiked into the high altitudes.

• NO CHANGE

• would need

• will need

• need

Answer explanation

The sentence begins in the past tense with the verb was and ends with the past tense verb hiked. Would need is the correct tense that matches the simple past tense.

These

untruths—whether deliberate exaggerations or

slips of the memory—ultimately matters very

little, for the autobiography isn’t about the life of

Mary Harris Jones.

• NO CHANGE

• has mattered

• had mattered

• matter

Answer explanation

The subject of the verb is untruths, which is plural; therefore, a plural verb is necessary.

Rivera’s frescoes appeared

on the outside walls of buildings in Mexico City, in plain

sight of any passerby. This brought art out of the elite

galleries by catering to the upper class and literally to the

public.

• NO CHANGE

• that catered

• while catering

• and catered

Answer explanation

Attaching the word while to the verb catering helps show that the "upper class" and "public" were catered to AT THE SAME TIME.

The central panel on the north wall shows the

manufacture of a 1932 Ford V-8 engine, and the central

panel on the south wall shows the production of this same

car’s exterior. Smaller panels depicting workers in a

variety of other Detroit industries.

• NO CHANGE

• depict

• depicting some

• had depicted

Answer explanation

Depict is the only verb that maintains the present tense established in the previous sentence.