The sentence tells us that Alan dropped his pack down some kind of hole or other type of chasm that prevented him from retrieving it. The answer choice must be close in meaning to "gap" or "hole," and is therefore a “crevice,” which means a gap or hole in the ground. To help you, "edification" means education that improves a person, a "commuter" is someone who travels from where they live to another town or city or into a nearby city to work, "jetsam" is material that has been thrown from a ship into the sea and washed up on shore, and an "armada" is a massive fleet of ships belonging to a military.

Do not assume anything more than what the sentence states. The room is said to be "dim." By placing light bulbs in the room, John would help make the room brighter. This would improve the lack of brightness, i.e. the lack of "illumination." The word "illumination" comes from the Latin for light—"lumen." When something is "luminous," it is bright and shining. (Also, lightbulbs are measured in "lumens" in addition to watts. Lumens indicate how much light they produce, whereas watts indicate their power consumption. Go ahead, look at a lightbulb box!)

The word "both" is a hint that the word we are looking for is an opposite of "praise," and the answer choice that is the best opposite of "praise" is "criticism," which means disapproval or censure.

Based on the opening phrase, Dennis does not enjoy or partake in holiday cheer. So to call him an angel does not make sense, as he sounds unpleasant to be around. Aficionado and generalist both have to do with how much knowledge someone has of a specific or broad amount of information, and this sentence is not concerned with how much Dennis knows about the holidays, so those are not correct. Finally, pushover does not make sense, since nobody is asking him to do anything in the sentence, so he can't give in. That leaves the answer as scrooge, which describes someone who gets grouchy and closed off around happy festivities.

We can infer from the sentence that we need to pick out a noun that means something like "food," because the sentence tells us that many Americans shop for the missing word "in grocery stores, local markets, or specialty food stores." While many Americans might shop for tools, one doesn't usually buy tools at "grocery stores, local markets, or specialty food stores," so "tools" cannot be the correct answer. "Perishables," however, is an noun that means "things, especially foodstuffs, likely to decay or go bad quickly," and because "perishables" is the answer choice that best fits the sentence's context, it is the correct answer.

The sentence hints that the new teacher was nervous merely to give his class. It is not just questions that make him nervous; it is the very act of being in front of his students that unnerves the poor teacher. Therefore, it is best to say that every "lecture" makes him nervous. The word comes from the Latin meaning to read. Classically, a "lecturer" would read his prepared course text at each session.

The sentence gives a clue for you in referring to the water as being "crystal clear." This implies that it is lacking in anything that would cloud it, meaning that it has no "impurities." It is therefore "pure." The word "pure" means many things, but its general sense is lacking mixture. Pure gold does not have any lead (or copper, iron, or anything else) in it. The water's clarity made it appear pure. It therefore drew people to it in order that they might drink it.

The sense of the sentence means to convey that even though you cannot learn all of a topic, you can learn at least some part of it. An "aspect" is one particular "look" at something. The "-spect" part of the word is related to "spectator," and both words deal with looking at something. An "aspect" provides a particular look at a topic or thing. For instance, the American Revolution can be considered from its military aspect or its political aspect. The first focuses on the army conflicts, while the latter focuses on the various political meanings of the Revolution.

The new computer is apparently much better than the previous types of technology in a number of ways. Such an improvement is an "advance" in technology. To "advance" is to go forward. We often use this word in a physical sense: "He advanced down the hallway toward the classroom." However, it can be used in a more general way to mean any sort of improvement or "forward motion" in a metaphorical sense.

Our goals can often be called our "ideals." They are the goals that we have for accomplishing something in reality. By saying that Raymond has "high" ideals, we mean to say that he has very impressive or exalted goals. We know that we are talking about goals because the sentence then talks about him aiming to do his best no matter what. The only other potential option among those given is "visions," but that does not express the notion of having a goal as strongly as does "ideals."