GED Writing Practice Test 1

The GED was updated and revised in 2014. The new 2014 GED test does NOT include a separate writing test. Writing is now tested through short answer questions and extended response questions. See our main menu for hundreds of free practice questions: GED Practice Questions

This is our free GED Writing Practice Test 1. To prepare for your GED Writing Test, be sure to work through as many practice questions as possible. After you answer each question, the correct answer will be provided along with a detailed explanation. Click on the right arrow to move on to the next question.

Directions: Read the passage and choose the best answer to each question that follows.

Questions #1-5 refer to the following paragraphs.

Stephen King’s The Stand

(A)

(1) The Stand, by Stephen King, has an overriding theme. (2) The triumph of good over evil. (3) In the novel, a plague wipes out most of the Earth’s population. (4) Survivors begin to have strange dreams, gradually band together, and are seemingly guided by powers much greater than them. (5) Even children and animals seem to be influenced by the forces at work. (6) Many of the survivors travel to the desert to build a new community in Las Vegas under the leadership of Randall Flagg, a charismatic but frightening man. (7) The Stand’s heroes and heroines, according to the story, convene in Boulder, Colorado, to begin new lives there.

(B)

(8) Once they have found homes and organized committees to begin repairing the damage to the city, the people of Boulder begin to rebuild. (9) They find survivors with the training and knowledge to get the electricity, which had gone out when there weren’t enough people left to operate the power plants, running again. (10) This enables them to refrigerate food and use lights and appliances in their homes; these were the first steps toward returning to the “old” (i.e., pre-Apocalypse) ways of life. (11) The book subtly points out that the same progress that allowed humanity to live in such comfort and convenience before might eventually lead once more to society’s downfall. (12) Similarly, this theme is addressed in Marge Piercy’s novel Woman on the Edge of Time.

(C)

(13) The battle between good and evil permeates the entire plot. (14) The battle is waged on both large and small scales, and impacts both individuals and the communities to which they belong. (15) It impacts chains of events in seemingly unforeseeable ways. (16) Furthermore, it was responsible for creating the tension leading to the final showdown and resolution. (17) The novel is worthwhile both as a morality tale and as a work of suspenseful fiction.