Link the parts with varied transitions and syntax

Grade 11 Reading Worksheet - Building Confidence

Circle the best answer.

1. Read this first

   Use this

   Sorting the Lunch Trays (argument draft to an invented school board, about an invented school): [1] Every school day, the cafeteria at Delmar Union High School sends roughly 140 pounds of uneaten food and soiled paper to the county landfill. [2] The school board should approve a composting program for the cafeteria this spring, because the program would shrink that waste, cost the district very little and teach students how materials can be reused.

   [3] The extent of the problem became apparent only after the waste was measured and weighed. [4] During a two-week audit last October, the environmental science class weighed every tray scraped into the bins and found that about two-thirds of the weight was food scraps, which rot and return to the soil. [5] The remaining third, mostly paper and plastic wrappers, could not be composted, but it could be sorted out at the same time.

   [6] In March, the same class ran a pilot at two of the six lunch tables, giving each table a bin for food scraps and a second bin for everything else. [7] Once the labeled bins were in place, students at those tables sorted their trays without reminders, and the lunch line moved no more slowly than before. [8] The custodians reported that the scrap bin held about 20 pounds a day, an amount small enough for one person to carry out in a single trip. [9] This ______ suggests that the whole cafeteria could sort its waste without hiring anyone.

   [10] A set of eight covered bins would cost the district about $400, and the custodians already know how to empty and wash them. [11] Also, a nearby farm has offered to collect the scraps every week at no charge. [12] Also, the science class has agreed to post sorting guides above each bin and to track the totals every month.

   [13] Although some board members may fear that sorting adds one more chore to a short lunch period, the pilot tables showed that a student needs only seconds to sort a tray. [14] That ______ answers the worry about lunch time, so the board should approve the program this spring.

2. 1.

   Ari annotates the link that opens sentence 7, “Once the labeled bins were in place,”. Which margin note is right?

   • Summarizing phrase; time; picks up the bins set out in sentence 6
   • Subordinate clause; time; picks up the bins set out in sentence 6
   • Subordinate clause; time; picks up the two-week audit in sentence 4
   • Subordinate clause; cause; picks up the bins set out in sentence 6
3. 2.

   Kira sees that sentences 11 and 12 both open with “Also,”. Which revision of 11 swaps in a link that names an earlier idea and keeps every fact?

   • Additionally, a nearby farm has offered to collect the scraps every week at no charge.
   • Beyond the low price of the bins, a nearby farm has offered to collect the scraps every week at no charge.
   • Beyond the low price of the bins, a nearby farm has offered to collect the scraps every week at no charge, so the program will pay for itself.
   • Despite the low price of the bins, a nearby farm has offered to collect the scraps every week at no charge.
4. 3.

   Luz annotates the link that opens sentence 13, “Although some board members may fear that sorting adds one more chore to a short lunch period,”. Which margin note is right?

   • Subordinate clause; concession; grants a worry that the pilot result then answers
   • Bare link word; concession; grants a worry that the pilot result then answers
   • Subordinate clause; concession; picks up the farm’s weekly offer in sentence 11
   • Subordinate clause; cause; grants a worry that the pilot result then answers
5. 4.

   Milo fills the blank in sentence 14. Which phrase names what sentence 13 showed?

   • effortless sorting
   • evidence
   • short sorting time
   • free weekly farm pickup
6. 5.

   Noah sees that sentence 12 repeats the opener “Also,”. Which revision of 12 names an earlier idea, keeps the relation and keeps every fact?

   • Alongside the farm’s weekly pickup, the science class has agreed to post sorting guides above each bin and to track the totals every month, showing that students care about the planet.
   • Instead of the farm’s weekly pickup, the science class has agreed to post sorting guides above each bin and to track the totals every month.
   • Alongside the farm’s weekly pickup, the science class has agreed to post sorting guides above each bin.
   • Alongside the farm’s weekly pickup, the science class has agreed to post sorting guides above each bin and to track the totals every month.

7. The Dance in the Dark Hive (science magazine article about honeybees)

   [1] When a honeybee forager finds a rich patch of flowers, she returns to the dark hive and performs a short dance on the vertical surface of the honeycomb. [2] Other bees crowd around her, and within minutes many of them fly directly to the same patch, even though none of them has seen it. [3] The dance, in other words, is a message, and biologists spent decades working out what it says.

   [4] The Austrian scientist Karl von Frisch found that the dancer repeats a straight run during which she shakes her abdomen from side to side, and then circles back to begin again. [5] The angle of that straight run, measured from straight up on the comb, matches the angle between the flowers and the sun as the bees see them outside the hive. [6] A longer run tells the watching bees that the flowers are farther away, so direction and distance are both written into a single movement.

   [7] To test this reading, von Frisch set out dishes of sugar water at different distances and directions, and he recorded each dance that followed. [8] Also, he watched what the recruits did, and they gathered at the dish that the dancer’s runs had indicated. [9] Also, he repeated the tests on cloudy days and found that the bees still danced the correct angle, because they can detect patterns of polarized light in the sky. [10] This ______ earned von Frisch a share of the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, which he received with two other scientists who studied animal behavior.

   [11] Not every biologist was persuaded, however, and in the 1960s a few researchers argued that recruits followed the scent clinging to the dancer instead of the dance itself. [12] Although the scent explanation could account for some of the recruits that found the dish, it could not explain why the recruits also chose the direction and distance the dance had described. [13] Researchers who tracked recruits with tiny radar transponders in 2005 reported that the bees flew toward the location the dance described. [14] That ______ makes the dance a striking example of animals communicating about a place that none of the listeners can see.

8. 6.

   Pia annotates the link in sentence 3, “The dance, in other words, is a message.” Which margin note names “in other words” correctly?

   • Transitional phrase; contrast; sums up the dance and the crowd of bees in sentences 1 and 2
   • Transitional phrase; restatement; sums up the dance and the crowd of bees in sentences 1 and 2
   • Subordinate clause; restatement; sums up the dance and the crowd of bees in sentences 1 and 2
   • Transitional phrase; restatement; points ahead to von Frisch’s findings in sentences 4 to 6
9. 7.

   Ren fills the blank in sentence 10. Which phrase names the idea that sentences 7 to 9 explained?

   • development
   • straight run of the dance
   • series of experiments
   • flawless set of experiments
10. 8.

    Tala sees that sentences 8 and 9 both open with “Also,”. Which revision of 8 swaps in a link that names an earlier idea and keeps every fact?

    • Beyond recording each dance, he watched what the recruits did, and they gathered at the dish that the dancer’s runs had indicated.
    • Beyond recording each dance, he watched what the recruits did, and they gathered at the dish that the dancer’s runs had indicated, which shows that no dancer ever made a mistake.
    • Moreover, he watched what the recruits did, and they gathered at the dish that the dancer’s runs had indicated.
    • Beyond recording each dance, he watched what the recruits did.
11. 9.

    Zee annotates the link that opens sentence 12, “Although the scent explanation could account for some of the recruits that found the dish,”. Which margin note is right?

    • Prepositional phrase; concession; admits what the scent idea of sentence 11 explains
    • Subordinate clause; addition; admits what the scent idea of sentence 11 explains
    • Bare link word; concession; admits what the scent idea of sentence 11 explains
    • Subordinate clause; concession; admits what the scent idea of sentence 11 explains
12. 10.

    Ari fills the blank in sentence 14. Which phrase names what sentence 13 reported?

    • tiny transponders
    • radar tracking of recruits
    • idea
    • conclusive proof