<p>@ akahmed-- i'm happy to show you how i'd approach the question. but remember, what's important with this approach (or with any other strategy) is to adapt it to your own purposes and make it your own. i'd recommend that you focus on the question and its answer, and try to figure out what's going on here in a way that makes sense to you. you'll never see this question again, but you'll see questions that use the same types of inter-relationships between the words.</p>
<p>first, let's look at the context. we're talking about what "critics" think, which suggests that the word in the first blank will be negative. also, as 714nD1 notes, the word "precludes" basically means "prevents," so it's setting up a contrast between the first blank and the second blank. that means the second blank probably needs to be positive. (we'll talk about how you might handle not knowing "precludes" at the end).</p>
<p>so we need a negative first word and a positive last word. since most of the words we're assuming we don't know are for the first blank, we'll look at the second blank.</p>
<p>in "expendable" we should recognize a suffix "-able" which means something can be done to something. it also means the root is a verb. there's also potentially a prefix "ex-." what can we think of that sounds or looks like "expend"? i can come up with "expand," "spend," "extend," and that's about it. of course you might come up with something different.</p>
<p>"meaningful" we probably know. "meaningful discourse" would definitely be a good thing, so this word looks pretty good for the second blank.</p>
<p>"libelous" has a probable suffix "-ous," which suggests that the root is "libel." i can think of possible cognates like "liberty," and i'm also reminded of the syllable "lib" which can mean something related to books (as in "library," for example).</p>
<p>"repetitive" we know--it has "repeat" in it.</p>
<p>"orderly" we also know--take off the suffix "-ly," which indicates either a noun turning into an adjective or an adjective turning into an adverb, and we have the root "order," which is a good thing. "orderly discourse" would be a good idea, so we know this is also a good possibility for the second blank.</p>
<p>so we have two words that could work for the second blank, and a few words we don't have much of an idea about. when we look for words for the first blank, let's focus, first, on the answer choices that we know have good words for the second blank: (b) and (e).</p>
<p>for (b), the word "paucity" seems to have a suffix "-ity," leaving a probable root "pauc." can we think of anything that sounds like it might fit with that root? i can think of "pauper" in english, and the word "pauvre" in french (which means "poor," i believe). that's about all i can come up with. if those words, which both seem to point in a similar direction, are a good indicator of what "paucity" might mean, then this is probably not the right answer. a small number of denunciations wouldn't be a very bad thing, and we want a negative idea for the first blank.</p>
<p>for (e), "cacophony" has "phon" in it, which indicates some kind of sound. is it possible to imagine that "cacophony" might be a loud sort of sound? if that's so, a "cacophony of denunciations" could be the loud, unpleasant sound of a lot of people denouncing each other. a thing like that would make it impossible to engage in "orderly discourse." (e) looks like a winner.</p>
<p>now, what if we don't know what "precludes" means? we can break it down into a probable prefix "pre-" and a possible root "clude." can we think of any other words that might have "clude" in them? i can think of "include," "exclude," "seclude," and "occlude" from harry potter ("occlumens," remember?). i know that "include" means to add something in, "exclude" means to keep something out," "seclude" means to hide something away, and "occlude" means to close off. hmmmm . . . actually, as i'm writing this it occurs to me that "clude" and "close" seem possibly vaguely similar. can i substitute "close" for "clude" in all those words and come up with something meaningful?</p>
<p>"include" becomes "close in."
"exclude" becomes "close out."
"seclude" becomes "close . . . ?" hmm. if the "se" has a similar meaning to the pronouns in french, maybe "seclude" means "to close itself"? this one is a reach.
"occlude" becomes "close" with . . . well, i can't think of anything really for this one.</p>
<p>now let's combine this with what we know about SAT sentence completion questions. "preclude" either has to set up a reinforcement of the idea in the first blank or a contradiction of that idea. that's how the SAT works. so "preclude" either means "encourage" or "discourage," for the most part.</p>
<p>if my hunch about "clude" being similar to "close" is a good one, then "preclude" would mean something like "close (off) beforehand." that sounds plausible. if that's what it is, then we want a negative word for the first blank (to go with "critics" and "mar") and a positive word for the second blank.</p>
<p>if "preclude" means "encourage," though, then we need a negative word for the first blank and another negative word for the second blank.</p>
<p>i'm actually late to a meeting at this moment, so i won't go through all the other answer choices on the theory that "preclude" means "encourage." but if you go through them, you'll see that it's very hard to make the question work. none of the words in the second blank seem bad enough to make the sentence work properly when paired with their first-blank words.</p>
<p>of course, this is just how i'd look at it. the important question for anybody reading this is how THEY would look at it.</p>
<p>so let me make a quick proposal, and of course you don't have to follow it if you don't want to: if anybody posts more of these sentence completions, could you explain to the rest of the group how you tried to approach the question? the most important thing isn't that you watch me try to figure out the questions, but that you try to figure them out on your own as well.</p>
<p>okay, gotta run--back in a bit</p>
<p>mike</p>