Question

Difficulty: MediumContext Clues for Synonyms

The workshop leader introduced collaborative exercises to foster active participation among all team members.

In this sentence, the word foster most nearly means which of the following?

  1. A
    suppress
  2. encourageAnswer
  3. C
    adopt
  4. D
    fasten

Answer

encourage
In the sentence provided, 'foster' means to stimulate, promote, or encourage the growth of something positive. The workshop leader implemented exercises to help participation grow and thrive, making 'encourage' the precise synonym.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Analyze the sentence context and identify the role of the target word.
The sentence indicates that the leader used collaborative exercises to bring about and stimulate active participation.
Contextual clues in the surrounding sentence define the action being performed.
2
Determine the contextual definition of 'foster'.
In this scenario, 'to foster' means to cultivate, nurture, or promote the growth of a quality or behavior.
Matching the semantic intent to the workplace training setting rules out unrelated definitions.
3
Evaluate the answer options for the closest contextual synonym.
The word 'encourage' directly conveys the concept of promoting and supporting participation.
It substitutes cleanly into the sentence while preserving the author's original meaning.

Key Concept

Context Clues for Synonyms
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