Summarize a complex text fairly
Grade 11 Reading Worksheet
Circle the best answer.
Read this first
The Pit (story)
[1] At the regional robotics competition, Kira and Luz shared a narrow workbench in the pit, the crowded hall where teams repaired their robots between matches. [2] Their robot's lifting arm had jammed twice during practice, and Kira refused to send it onto the field until it was fixed, insisting that a team should never show an unfinished machine. [3] Luz pointed out that the team would forfeit its first match if the robot stayed on the bench, but Kira answered that a forfeit beat an embarrassing failure in front of the judges. [4] So, while other teams hurried robots back and forth, the two took the arm apart a third time, hiding it under a towel whenever anyone passed.
[5] Late that morning, Mr. Ferraro, a rival team's mentor, stopped to borrow a hex key and saw the arm before anyone could cover it. [6] Instead of leaving, he described a nearly identical jam that his own team had suffered a year earlier, caused by a gear sitting a millimeter too far along its shaft. [7] Kira hesitated, but Luz held out the arm, and within ten minutes the three of them had found the same gear in the same wrong place. [8] The robot made its second match with a working arm, though it lost by a few points because the drivers had not practiced with it.
[9] Over the afternoon, Kira watched teams lend batteries and trade advice across the aisle, and noticed that the strongest teams seemed to work in the open. [10] Before the final round, Kira left the arm uncovered on the bench beside a short note explaining the gear problem for anyone who might face it. [11] Two teams stopped to read it, and one found and fixed the same fault in its own robot before its next match. [12] Kira and Luz did not reach the finals, but the judges gave the team an award for helping others, a prize they had not known existed. [13] Riding home, Kira admitted that keeping the arm hidden had cost them one match and nearly a second. [14] Luz added that showing the arm had cost nothing and had earned them the only award they carried home.
Milo wants a two-sentence summary that keeps both idea lines and shows how one shaped the other. Which summary does that?
- Kira foolishly hid the jammed arm to avoid embarrassment, until a generous rival mentor saw it and found the gear. Kira finally learned the obvious lesson, left the arm out with a note, and the team deservedly won an award.
- After the team won an award for helping others, Kira stopped hiding the robot's jammed arm. A rival mentor then saw the arm and helped the team find the misplaced gear that caused the jam.
- Kira hid the robot's jammed arm rather than show an unfinished machine, until a rival mentor saw it and helped find the misplaced gear. Having seen what showing it brought, Kira left the arm and a note out for others, and the team won an award for helping.
- Kira hid the robot's jammed arm rather than show an unfinished machine. The team also traded advice with others in the pit and later won an award for helping other teams.
The Pit (story)
[1] At the regional robotics competition, Kira and Luz shared a narrow workbench in the pit, the crowded hall where teams repaired their robots between matches. [2] Their robot's lifting arm had jammed twice during practice, and Kira refused to send it onto the field until it was fixed, insisting that a team should never show an unfinished machine. [3] Luz pointed out that the team would forfeit its first match if the robot stayed on the bench, but Kira answered that a forfeit beat an embarrassing failure in front of the judges. [4] So, while other teams hurried robots back and forth, the two took the arm apart a third time, hiding it under a towel whenever anyone passed.
[5] Late that morning, Mr. Ferraro, a rival team's mentor, stopped to borrow a hex key and saw the arm before anyone could cover it. [6] Instead of leaving, he described a nearly identical jam that his own team had suffered a year earlier, caused by a gear sitting a millimeter too far along its shaft. [7] Kira hesitated, but Luz held out the arm, and within ten minutes the three of them had found the same gear in the same wrong place. [8] The robot made its second match with a working arm, though it lost by a few points because the drivers had not practiced with it.
[9] Over the afternoon, Kira watched teams lend batteries and trade advice across the aisle, and noticed that the strongest teams seemed to work in the open. [10] Before the final round, Kira left the arm uncovered on the bench beside a short note explaining the gear problem for anyone who might face it. [11] Two teams stopped to read it, and one found and fixed the same fault in its own robot before its next match. [12] Kira and Luz did not reach the finals, but the judges gave the team an award for helping others, a prize they had not known existed. [13] Riding home, Kira admitted that keeping the arm hidden had cost them one match and nearly a second. [14] Luz added that showing the arm had cost nothing and had earned them the only award they carried home. Draft summary: (1) Kira then left the arm and a note in the open, and another team found and fixed the same fault. (2) Kira kept the jammed arm hidden, believing a team should never show an unfinished machine. (3) Still, the team lost its second match and did not reach the finals. (4) When a rival mentor saw the arm, he described a similar jam and helped find the misplaced gear.
Noah has four summary sentences in a scrambled order. Which order keeps the logic, with each idea before what follows from it?
- 2, 4, 3, 1
- 2, 4, 1, 3
- 2, 1, 4, 3
- 4, 2, 1, 3
The Pit (story)
[1] At the regional robotics competition, Kira and Luz shared a narrow workbench in the pit, the crowded hall where teams repaired their robots between matches. [2] Their robot's lifting arm had jammed twice during practice, and Kira refused to send it onto the field until it was fixed, insisting that a team should never show an unfinished machine. [3] Luz pointed out that the team would forfeit its first match if the robot stayed on the bench, but Kira answered that a forfeit beat an embarrassing failure in front of the judges. [4] So, while other teams hurried robots back and forth, the two took the arm apart a third time, hiding it under a towel whenever anyone passed.
[5] Late that morning, Mr. Ferraro, a rival team's mentor, stopped to borrow a hex key and saw the arm before anyone could cover it. [6] Instead of leaving, he described a nearly identical jam that his own team had suffered a year earlier, caused by a gear sitting a millimeter too far along its shaft. [7] Kira hesitated, but Luz held out the arm, and within ten minutes the three of them had found the same gear in the same wrong place. [8] The robot made its second match with a working arm, though it lost by a few points because the drivers had not practiced with it.
[9] Over the afternoon, Kira watched teams lend batteries and trade advice across the aisle, and noticed that the strongest teams seemed to work in the open. [10] Before the final round, Kira left the arm uncovered on the bench beside a short note explaining the gear problem for anyone who might face it. [11] Two teams stopped to read it, and one found and fixed the same fault in its own robot before its next match. [12] Kira and Luz did not reach the finals, but the judges gave the team an award for helping others, a prize they had not known existed. [13] Riding home, Kira admitted that keeping the arm hidden had cost them one match and nearly a second. [14] Luz added that showing the arm had cost nothing and had earned them the only award they carried home.
Pia needs one summary sentence that reports Kira's first view and the story's answer to it fairly. Which sentence does that?
- Kira believed a team should hide every flaw from everyone, always and forever, but showing the jammed arm brought help, a fix and an award.
- Kira held that a team should never show an unfinished machine, since a forfeit beat an embarrassing failure in front of the judges.
- Kira first held that a team should never show an unfinished machine, but showing the jammed arm brought help, a fix and an award.
- Kira first held the silly belief that a team should never show an unfinished machine, a belief the story rightly mocks.
The Social (story)
[1] Milo signed up for American Sign Language at the community college in the fall, expecting a course much like Spanish, with lists of words to memorize and quizzes every Friday. [2] By October, Milo could sign more than three hundred words, and Noah, who sat in the next seat, joked that Milo's flashcards needed their own backpack. [3] Their teacher, Ms. Adair, who is Deaf, praised the class for its vocabulary but said that a language lives in conversation, and she invited everyone to a monthly signing social at the public library.
[4] Milo went expecting to show off, but within minutes found that the fluent signers moved too quickly, and that many familiar words looked different in their hands. [5] A retired carpenter named Mr. Dunleavy slowed down for the newcomers and showed them that his eyebrows were doing half the work. [6] Raised eyebrows, Ms. Adair explained later, mark a yes-or-no question in American Sign Language, and other expressions of the face carry grammar that a list of hand signs leaves out. [7] Noah, who knew fewer words but watched faces closely, followed far more of the evening and spent an hour in a slow conversation about baseball. [8] Milo left the library unsettled, having discovered that knowing three hundred words was not the same as being able to talk with anyone.
[9] For the rest of the term, Milo practiced in front of a mirror, signing whole questions with the face as well as the hands, and returned to the social each month. [10] By December, Milo could hold a slow conversation with Mr. Dunleavy, who taught the class several signs for tools that were not in the textbook. [11] The flashcards did not disappear, but Milo now learned each new sign by using it in a sentence at the social, and remembered it longer. [12] Ms. Adair noticed that the students who attended the socials did best on the final exam, which was a recorded conversation rather than a quiz. [13] Milo still believed that vocabulary mattered, since a conversation needs words to work with. [14] What had changed was the order: the conversation came first, and the words now followed from it.
Ren wants a two-sentence summary that keeps both idea lines and shows how one shaped the other. Which summary does that?
- Because Milo already knew three hundred signs, the monthly signing socials at the library were easy to follow. Milo then used the conversations there to review words already learned.
- Milo signed up for an American Sign Language course and learned more than three hundred signs by October using flashcards. Milo kept adding new signs to the flashcards for the rest of the term and remembered them longer, drilling the cards at home.
- Milo treated sign language as a list of words to memorize, until a signing social showed that the face carries grammar the lists left out. Milo then practiced whole conversations and learned new signs by using them, which made them stick.
- Milo memorized more than three hundred signs from flashcards by October. Milo also went to monthly signing socials at the library, where the face carries part of the grammar.
The Social (story)
[1] Milo signed up for American Sign Language at the community college in the fall, expecting a course much like Spanish, with lists of words to memorize and quizzes every Friday. [2] By October, Milo could sign more than three hundred words, and Noah, who sat in the next seat, joked that Milo's flashcards needed their own backpack. [3] Their teacher, Ms. Adair, who is Deaf, praised the class for its vocabulary but said that a language lives in conversation, and she invited everyone to a monthly signing social at the public library.
[4] Milo went expecting to show off, but within minutes found that the fluent signers moved too quickly, and that many familiar words looked different in their hands. [5] A retired carpenter named Mr. Dunleavy slowed down for the newcomers and showed them that his eyebrows were doing half the work. [6] Raised eyebrows, Ms. Adair explained later, mark a yes-or-no question in American Sign Language, and other expressions of the face carry grammar that a list of hand signs leaves out. [7] Noah, who knew fewer words but watched faces closely, followed far more of the evening and spent an hour in a slow conversation about baseball. [8] Milo left the library unsettled, having discovered that knowing three hundred words was not the same as being able to talk with anyone.
[9] For the rest of the term, Milo practiced in front of a mirror, signing whole questions with the face as well as the hands, and returned to the social each month. [10] By December, Milo could hold a slow conversation with Mr. Dunleavy, who taught the class several signs for tools that were not in the textbook. [11] The flashcards did not disappear, but Milo now learned each new sign by using it in a sentence at the social, and remembered it longer. [12] Ms. Adair noticed that the students who attended the socials did best on the final exam, which was a recorded conversation rather than a quiz. [13] Milo still believed that vocabulary mattered, since a conversation needs words to work with. [14] What had changed was the order: the conversation came first, and the words now followed from it. Draft summary: (1) Even so, Milo still believed that vocabulary mattered, since a conversation needs words. (2) At a signing social, Milo found that fluent signers use the face to carry grammar the word lists left out. (3) Milo first learned sign language as lists of words for weekly quizzes. (4) Milo began practicing whole questions with the face and learning each new sign by using it in conversation.
Tala has four summary sentences in a scrambled order. Which order keeps the logic, with each idea before what follows from it?
- 3, 4, 2, 1
- 3, 2, 4, 1
- 4, 3, 2, 1
- 3, 2, 1, 4
The Social (story)
[1] Milo signed up for American Sign Language at the community college in the fall, expecting a course much like Spanish, with lists of words to memorize and quizzes every Friday. [2] By October, Milo could sign more than three hundred words, and Noah, who sat in the next seat, joked that Milo's flashcards needed their own backpack. [3] Their teacher, Ms. Adair, who is Deaf, praised the class for its vocabulary but said that a language lives in conversation, and she invited everyone to a monthly signing social at the public library.
[4] Milo went expecting to show off, but within minutes found that the fluent signers moved too quickly, and that many familiar words looked different in their hands. [5] A retired carpenter named Mr. Dunleavy slowed down for the newcomers and showed them that his eyebrows were doing half the work. [6] Raised eyebrows, Ms. Adair explained later, mark a yes-or-no question in American Sign Language, and other expressions of the face carry grammar that a list of hand signs leaves out. [7] Noah, who knew fewer words but watched faces closely, followed far more of the evening and spent an hour in a slow conversation about baseball. [8] Milo left the library unsettled, having discovered that knowing three hundred words was not the same as being able to talk with anyone.
[9] For the rest of the term, Milo practiced in front of a mirror, signing whole questions with the face as well as the hands, and returned to the social each month. [10] By December, Milo could hold a slow conversation with Mr. Dunleavy, who taught the class several signs for tools that were not in the textbook. [11] The flashcards did not disappear, but Milo now learned each new sign by using it in a sentence at the social, and remembered it longer. [12] Ms. Adair noticed that the students who attended the socials did best on the final exam, which was a recorded conversation rather than a quiz. [13] Milo still believed that vocabulary mattered, since a conversation needs words to work with. [14] What had changed was the order: the conversation came first, and the words now followed from it.
Zee needs one summary sentence that reports Milo's first view of learning a language and the story's answer to it fairly. Which sentence does that?
- Milo first saw a language as words to memorize and could sign more than three hundred of them by October.
- Since a language lives in conversation, as Ms. Adair says, the three hundred signs Milo memorized from flashcards were of no use at the social that evening.
- Milo first held the narrow view that a language is words to memorize, a view the wise Ms. Adair quickly corrected.
- Milo first saw a language as words to memorize, and the socials showed that conversation, face included, comes first, though words still matter.
The Clock and the Board (article)
[1] In the early 1700s, sailors could find their latitude, their position north or south, from the height of the sun at noon, but had no reliable way to find their longitude, their position east or west. [2] Because the earth turns fifteen degrees every hour, a navigator who knew the exact time at the home port could compare it with the local time at sea and work out how far east or west the ship had sailed. [3] The difficulty was that no clock of the day kept accurate time for weeks on a rolling, damp ship. [4] In 1714, the British Parliament passed the Longitude Act, which offered a prize of twenty thousand pounds for a practical method of finding longitude at sea.
[5] John Harrison, a self-taught clockmaker who had trained as a carpenter, spent decades building sea clocks, each smaller and more accurate than the last. [6] His fourth timekeeper, H4, looked like a large pocket watch, and on a test voyage to Jamaica in 1761 and 1762 it kept time to within a few seconds. [7] Harrison believed that this result met the terms of the act and that the prize was now his.
[8] The Board of Longitude, which judged the prize, included leading astronomers, many of whom favored a different solution, the method of lunar distances. [9] That method found the time by measuring the moon's position against the stars and consulting printed tables, so it depended on no single maker's skill. [10] Some members doubted that a watch built by one craftsman could be copied reliably, and the board demanded further trials and a full explanation of how H4 worked. [11] Harrison was paid in stages, and the last large sum came from Parliament only in 1773, after an appeal to King George III, when Harrison was eighty. [12] The board's doubt was not entirely mistaken, since for years sea clocks remained expensive and many ships went on using the lunar tables. [13] Once copies of Harrison's design became affordable, however, the marine chronometer became standard on ocean-going ships. [14] The problem, in the end, was solved twice: once at the workbench, and again, more slowly, in the minds of experts who had expected a different answer. Draft summary: (1) John Harrison built a sea clock, H4, that kept time within a few seconds on a test voyage. (2) Even so, once copies became affordable, the sea clock became standard on ocean-going ships. (3) The board, many of whose members favored a lunar method, demanded more trials before paying. (4) Sailors in the 1700s had no way to find longitude, because no clock kept time at sea.
Bo has four summary sentences in a scrambled order. Which order keeps the logic, with each idea before what follows from it?
- 4, 3, 1, 2
- 1, 4, 3, 2
- 3, 4, 1, 2
- 4, 1, 3, 2
The Gift and the Promise (article)
[1] From 1883 until 1917, the steel industrialist Andrew Carnegie and his foundation gave money for more than 2,500 library buildings around the world, about 1,700 of them in the United States. [2] Carnegie, who had grown up poor and educated himself partly by borrowing books from a neighbor's private library, believed that a free library offered anyone willing to read a way to improve a life. [3] Yet his gifts came with conditions, and those conditions mattered as much as the money. [4] A town that wanted a Carnegie library had to provide the land for the building, and its government had to promise to spend about one tenth of the gift every year on running the library. [5] Under this rule, a town that received ten thousand dollars agreed to spend a thousand dollars each year on books, staff, heating and repairs.
[6] Carnegie's reasoning was that a library paid for entirely by a gift would belong to no one, while a library supported by local taxes would belong to the town. [7] Not every town agreed, and some councils turned the offer down, unwilling to raise taxes for upkeep, while others accepted only after long public debate. [8] Where towns did accept, the yearly promise meant that libraries kept buying books and paying librarians long after the opening ceremony was over. [9] Carnegie's office also sent towns suggested floor plans, which favored simple, practical rooms over grand halls. [10] Many Carnegie libraries used open shelves, which let readers choose books for themselves instead of asking a clerk to fetch them from a closed room.
[11] Together, the shared costs and the open shelves helped turn the public library from a quiet reading room for a few into a place that ordinary residents treated as their own. [12] Today, many of the original buildings still stand, and hundreds still serve as libraries, while others have become museums, offices or community centers. [13] Their survival owes something to sturdy brick and stone, but more to the habit of local support that the conditions began. [14] The gift built the libraries, but the promise kept them open.
Jun wants a two-sentence summary that keeps both idea lines and shows how one shaped the other. Which summary does that?
- Andrew Carnegie generously paid for more than 2,500 library buildings, wisely requiring towns to fund them every year. That clever rule is the best thing about the gifts and the reason the libraries deserve to survive for many years to come.
- Andrew Carnegie, who educated himself with borrowed books, paid for more than 2,500 library buildings. Many of those buildings, with their open shelves and simple rooms, still stand today.
- Because towns already supported their libraries with taxes every year, Andrew Carnegie agreed to pay for new library buildings. That steady local support is why many of the buildings still stand today.
- Andrew Carnegie paid for more than 2,500 library buildings, but only for towns that promised to fund each library every year. That promise made the libraries the towns' own, which kept them buying books and helped many last to this day.
The Gift and the Promise (article)
[1] From 1883 until 1917, the steel industrialist Andrew Carnegie and his foundation gave money for more than 2,500 library buildings around the world, about 1,700 of them in the United States. [2] Carnegie, who had grown up poor and educated himself partly by borrowing books from a neighbor's private library, believed that a free library offered anyone willing to read a way to improve a life. [3] Yet his gifts came with conditions, and those conditions mattered as much as the money. [4] A town that wanted a Carnegie library had to provide the land for the building, and its government had to promise to spend about one tenth of the gift every year on running the library. [5] Under this rule, a town that received ten thousand dollars agreed to spend a thousand dollars each year on books, staff, heating and repairs.
[6] Carnegie's reasoning was that a library paid for entirely by a gift would belong to no one, while a library supported by local taxes would belong to the town. [7] Not every town agreed, and some councils turned the offer down, unwilling to raise taxes for upkeep, while others accepted only after long public debate. [8] Where towns did accept, the yearly promise meant that libraries kept buying books and paying librarians long after the opening ceremony was over. [9] Carnegie's office also sent towns suggested floor plans, which favored simple, practical rooms over grand halls. [10] Many Carnegie libraries used open shelves, which let readers choose books for themselves instead of asking a clerk to fetch them from a closed room.
[11] Together, the shared costs and the open shelves helped turn the public library from a quiet reading room for a few into a place that ordinary residents treated as their own. [12] Today, many of the original buildings still stand, and hundreds still serve as libraries, while others have become museums, offices or community centers. [13] Their survival owes something to sturdy brick and stone, but more to the habit of local support that the conditions began. [14] The gift built the libraries, but the promise kept them open. Draft summary: (1) That yearly promise kept the libraries buying books, and many still serve their towns. (2) Each town had to provide land and promise yearly funds of about a tenth of the gift. (3) Brick and stone helped them last too, but less than the habit of local support. (4) Andrew Carnegie paid for library buildings in towns across the country.
Kira has four summary sentences in a scrambled order. Which order keeps the logic, with each idea before what follows from it?
- 4, 2, 3, 1
- 4, 2, 1, 3
- 2, 4, 1, 3
- 1, 4, 2, 3
The Gift and the Promise (article)
[1] From 1883 until 1917, the steel industrialist Andrew Carnegie and his foundation gave money for more than 2,500 library buildings around the world, about 1,700 of them in the United States. [2] Carnegie, who had grown up poor and educated himself partly by borrowing books from a neighbor's private library, believed that a free library offered anyone willing to read a way to improve a life. [3] Yet his gifts came with conditions, and those conditions mattered as much as the money. [4] A town that wanted a Carnegie library had to provide the land for the building, and its government had to promise to spend about one tenth of the gift every year on running the library. [5] Under this rule, a town that received ten thousand dollars agreed to spend a thousand dollars each year on books, staff, heating and repairs.
[6] Carnegie's reasoning was that a library paid for entirely by a gift would belong to no one, while a library supported by local taxes would belong to the town. [7] Not every town agreed, and some councils turned the offer down, unwilling to raise taxes for upkeep, while others accepted only after long public debate. [8] Where towns did accept, the yearly promise meant that libraries kept buying books and paying librarians long after the opening ceremony was over. [9] Carnegie's office also sent towns suggested floor plans, which favored simple, practical rooms over grand halls. [10] Many Carnegie libraries used open shelves, which let readers choose books for themselves instead of asking a clerk to fetch them from a closed room.
[11] Together, the shared costs and the open shelves helped turn the public library from a quiet reading room for a few into a place that ordinary residents treated as their own. [12] Today, many of the original buildings still stand, and hundreds still serve as libraries, while others have become museums, offices or community centers. [13] Their survival owes something to sturdy brick and stone, but more to the habit of local support that the conditions began. [14] The gift built the libraries, but the promise kept them open.
Luz needs one summary sentence that reports the towns that refused the offer and the article's answer to them fairly. Which sentence does that?
- Some towns refused to build a public library of any kind, but where towns accepted, the yearly promise kept their libraries open long after they were built.
- Some towns refused Carnegie's gift because they were unwilling to raise taxes to pay for a library's upkeep each year.
- Some towns refused the gift rather than raise taxes for upkeep, but where towns accepted, the yearly promise kept libraries open long afterward.
- Since a yearly tax for upkeep was too heavy for a town to carry, some towns sensibly refused the gift.
