Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct word or phrase that best fits each of the numbered blanks from 25 to 29.

The United States has many different types of families. (25) ______ most American families are traditional, consisting of a father, a mother and one or more children, 22 percent of all American families in 1998 were headed by one parent, usually a woman. In a few families in the United States, there are no children. These (26) ___________ couples may believe that they would not make good parents; they may want freedom from responsibilities of childbearing; or, perhaps they are not (27) _______ able to have children. Other families in the United States have one adult who is a stepparent. A stepmother or stepfather is a person who joins a family by marrying a father or a mother.

Americans (28) ___________ and accept these different types of families. In the United States people have right to privacy and Americans do not believe in telling other Americans (29) ______ type of family group they must belong to. They respect each other’s choices regarding family groups. Families are very important to Americans.

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions.

It is essential that he __________. His illness seems worse. 

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions.

My parents lent me the money. ________, I couldn’t have afforded the trip. 

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions.

It is stated that we are now in the first stages of a battle for the ______ of life on the earth. 

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions.

You should concentrate ___________ what the interviewer is saying and make a real effort to answer all the questions. 

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions.

______ she could not say anything. 

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions.

________ appears considerably larger at the horizon than it does overhead is merely an illusion.

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the word(s) CLOSEST in meaning to the underlined word(s) in each of the following questions.

If that was done on a national scale, we would wipe out this infectious disease.