English Olympiad Practice Test 1 — IEO-style (Class 9)
A free Maths, Science, English and Reasoning Olympiads (IMO, NSO, IEO style) practice paper for Grade 9 in the format of the real test: 50 questions in 60 minutes, covering Word and Structure Knowledge; Reading; Spoken and Written Expression; Achievers' Section. Choose one answer for each question. Word and Structure Knowledge, Reading and Spoken and Written Expression questions carry 1 mark each; Achievers’ Section questions carry 3 marks each (60 marks in all). There is no negative marking. On this portal each correct answer counts once. Attempt it online — every question is marked instantly and the correct answers are shown at the end.
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Q1. Choose the correctly spelt word.
Q2. Which word is misspelt?
Q3. Fill in the missing letters: The committee reached a unan_m_us decision.
Q4. Choose the word closest in meaning to the word in bold: The speaker's lucid explanation helped everyone follow the argument.
Q5. Choose the word most nearly opposite in meaning to the word in bold: The minister's reply was deliberately ambiguous.
Q6. Choose the pair of words that correctly fills the blanks: The bus remained ______ for an hour outside the ______ shop, where Anu was buying pens and notebooks.
Q7. In which sentence is the word in capitals used correctly?
Q8. Choose the meaning of the idiom in bold: Rohan knew he was wrong, so he decided to bite the bullet and apologise to his friend.
Q9. Choose the idiom that best completes the sentence: After years of quarrelling, the two neighbours finally decided to ______ and become friends again.
Q10. Choose the one word for: an abnormal fear of heights.
Q11. What part of speech is the word in bold? The earth moves round the sun.
Q12. What part of speech is the word in bold? Meena worked hard to clear the entrance test.
Q13. Fill in the blank: By the time we reach the station, the train ______.
Q14. Fill in the blank: Mrs Sharma ______ in this school since 2019.
Q15. Fill in the blank: If I ______ you, I would accept the scholarship at once.
Q16. Fill in the blanks with the correct articles: He is ______ honest man and ______ asset to the team.
Q17. Fill in the blanks with the correct articles: ______ Himalayas are ______ highest mountain range in the world.
Q18. Fill in the blank with the correct preposition: My grandmother has been suffering ______ fever for three days.
Q19. Fill in the blank with the correct preposition: Having grown up in a village, Karan was not accustomed ______ the noise of city traffic.
Q20. Fill in the blank: Neither the teacher nor the students ______ aware of the change in the timetable.
Q21. Fill in the blank: Each of the players ______ given a new kit before the final.
Q22. Choose the correctly punctuated sentence.
Q23. Choose the correct passive form of: Who wrote this letter?
Q24. Choose the correct passive form of: The workers are repairing the old bridge.
Q25. Choose the correct reported speech: He said to me, “I will meet you tomorrow.”
Q26. Choose the correct reported speech: The teacher said, “The earth revolves around the sun.”
Q27. What kind of clause is the part in bold? I still remember the day when we first met.
Q28. What kind of clause is the part in bold? What the coach said surprised everyone.
Q29. Which part of the sentence has an error? One of my friends / have gone / to Shimla / for a holiday.
Q30. Choose the sentence that means the same as: No other planet in the solar system is as large as Jupiter.
The Pond Keeper
When Tara's family moved from Pune to the small town of Kherwadi, the first thing she noticed was the pond. It lay behind the government school like a tired green eye, half-choked with weeds, its edges littered with plastic bags. The older residents spoke of it fondly. “In my childhood,” her neighbour Mr D'Souza told her, “we swam in it every summer. Even in May, the water came up to a grown man's chest.” Tara, who had never seen it deeper than her knees, found this hard to believe.
Her science teacher, Mrs Kulkarni, was not surprised by her doubts. “Memories grow deeper with the years,” she said with a smile, “but ponds can certainly grow shallower. The real questions are by how much, and why.” She suggested that Tara stop arguing and start measuring.
So, for the whole of the monsoon, Tara kept a diary. Every morning before school she checked a rain gauge she had made from a plastic bottle and a ruler, and every evening she waded in with a bamboo pole marked in centimetres to measure the depth at the centre of the pond. Her younger brother, Arjun, grumbled that she cared more about the pond than about him, but he held the torch for her on cloudy evenings all the same.
By September the pattern in her diary was impossible to ignore. After every heavy shower the depth rose sharply, but within four or five days it fell back almost to where it had been. The water was not staying. When she walked slowly around the pond, she discovered why. The two narrow channels that had once carried rainwater in from the surrounding fields had been blocked by a new road, while at the lowest corner a crack in the old stone wall let water trickle out into a drain.
Tara presented her findings at the school science fair. She had expected polite nods; instead, the panchayat member who was judging the exhibits asked to borrow her diary. Within a month, pipes had been laid under the road to reopen the channels, and volunteers from the town — Mr D'Souza among them, grumbling cheerfully about his knees — spent three Sundays clearing weeds and repairing the wall.
The following monsoon the pond filled, and this time the water stayed. Tara did not win the science fair; a model of a solar-powered fan took the prize. But on a hot evening the next May, when she watched Arjun and his friends splashing in water up to their waists, she decided that she did not mind in the least.
Q31. Why did Tara find Mr D'Souza's story hard to believe?
Q32. What does Mrs Kulkarni suggest when she says, “Memories grow deeper with the years”?
Q33. Which of these did Tara not use in her investigation?
Q34. The words “like a tired green eye” in paragraph 1 are an example of
Q35. What pattern did Tara's diary show?
Q36. According to the passage, why did the pond not stay full?
Q37. What did the panchayat member do after seeing Tara's exhibit?
Q38. “Mr D'Souza among them, grumbling cheerfully about his knees” suggests that Mr D'Souza
Q39. As used in paragraph 4, the word trickle means
Q40. What does the last paragraph suggest about Tara?
Q41. Complete the conversation.
Tourist: Excuse me, could you tell me how to get to the railway station?
Local resident: ______
Q42. Complete the conversation.
Riya: I'm really sorry I couldn't come to your birthday party.
Sameer: ______
Q43. Arrange the sentences in the correct order.
P: Then she poured the batter into a greased tin and put it in the oven.
Q: First, Leela mixed the flour, sugar and butter in a large bowl.
R: Forty minutes later, the kitchen was filled with the smell of a freshly baked cake.
S: Next, she added two eggs and beat the mixture until it was smooth.
Q44. Rahul is writing to his school principal to ask for two days' leave. Which sentence is the most suitable for his letter?
Q45. Choose the correctly phrased sentence.
Q46. Choose the grammatically correct sentence.
Q47. Choose the word that best fills the blank: The scientist was known for her ______ attention to detail; not a single figure in her reports was ever out of place.
Q48. Choose the sentence in which the meaning is expressed clearly and correctly.
Q49. Choose the pair of words that are related in the same way as PRODIGAL : THRIFTY.
Q50. Three of these sentences have the same meaning. Which sentence has a different meaning?
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