ShmoopTube

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Here’s your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by baby plants. Awwwww.

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Check out the following passage and answer the question below.

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For the sake of logic and the coherence of this paragraph, Sentence 4 should be placed, where?

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And here are the potential answers...

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It’s important that the sentences in a paragraph flow logically together.

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As writers, we need to take our readers on a smooth ride from one point to the next.

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If the ride gets too bumpy or jarring, readers might get confused and lost.

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And well, go elsewhere.

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And when readers get lost, they stop reading, and everything we’ve written becomes a waste of time.

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As it is, the paragraph in question definitely takes readers on a bumpy ride.

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Choice (A) suggests leaving it as it is, but we can’t in good conscience do that since we know readers

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will be lost without a map.

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This is because Sentence 4 inserts a topic kinda randomly. Sentence 3 tell us about the

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shoots that emerge from the pores of a coconut, and sentence 5 continues the thought by informing

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us that the “shoots eventually make a new fruit.” Sentence 4, however, is focused

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on defining what a seed is in general.

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Since Sentence 4 has nothing specifically to do with “shoots,” it interrupts the flow of logic.

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It’s clear then that this sentence needs to relocate.

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Choice (D) claims that we should make Sentence 4 the final sentence of the paragraph.

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Just like choice (A), however, this puts a major bump in the road.

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As we said earlier, Sentence 5 is about how shoots turn into fruit.

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Placing a definition for seeds after it makes no more sense than placing such a definition before it.

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Thus, we can nix choice (D) for the good of the paragraph

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and all those readers who are desperate for a clear understanding of how coconuts reproduce.

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Choice (B) also interrupts the train of logic.

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It doesn’t work to place Sentence 4 between Sentences 2 and 3.

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Sentence 2 fills us in on coconut pores, and Sentence 3 carries on the thought.

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Breaking up the flow with Sentence 4 would only cause confusion.

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The correct answer is (C).

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The topic of Sentence 4 is the "seed" of the coconut, an idea that

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is introduced in the first sentence of the paragraph, but not discussed in any of the

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following sentences. This tells us that the best place for Sentence 4 is after Sentence 1.

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Disturbing thought: if we eat coconut seeds, will baby coconuts grow in our bellies?

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