How an article builds one person, event or idea

Grade 6 Reading Worksheet - Challenge Me

Circle the best answer.

1. Read this first

   Forty-Seven Years of Rain (article)

   [1] Every morning at seven, Leona Whitfield walked to the fence post behind her farmhouse, read the rain gauge there, and wrote the number in a notebook. [2] She did this for forty-seven years without missing more than a handful of days. [3] Neighbors teased her about it, calling the notebook her “water diary.”

   [4] The habit began in a drought summer, when Leona's well ran low and no one could say how unusual the dry spell was. [5] The county kept only one official gauge, twenty miles away, and it did not record what fell on her hillside. [6] Leona decided that if the farm's water mattered, then the farm's rain should be counted.

   [7] Over time she noticed what the county gauge could not show: storms often dropped twice as much rain on her ridge as in the valley. [8] When the county planned a new ditch, an engineer asked to see her notebook and used the figures to size the culvert. [9] That culvert carried a flood safely, in a year when older ditches nearby overflowed.

   [10] Leona never considered herself a scientist, and she once said she was just curious. [11] Yet universities now ask volunteers for records like hers, because small gauges catch details that one station misses. [12] Her notebooks have been donated to the county library, where students can read them.

2. 1.

   Ari imagines cutting paragraph 2 (sentences 4 to 6). What would readers lose about Leona's work?

   • They would lose why she began counting: a low well and no official gauge on her hillside.
   • They would lose proof that she had trained as a scientist before she began counting.
   • They would lose the fact that she kept her notebook each morning for forty-seven years straight.
   • They would lose the neighbors' teasing, which explains why she kept the notebook secret.
3. 2.

   Bo says the article shows Leona's records mattered only to her own farm. Which choice judges this statement correctly?

   • It holds, because paragraph 1 says neighbors teased her for keeping a notebook about her rain on the farm.
   • It does not hold, because paragraph 3 says an engineer used her figures to size a culvert for the county.
   • It does not hold, because paragraph 1 says she wrote down her readings for forty-seven years in a row.
   • It does not hold, because paragraph 4 says her notebooks changed the rules for the gauges in the state.
4. 3.

   Esme asks why the author puts the culvert story (paragraph 3) after the drought story (paragraph 2). Which choice is the best reason?

   • Readers see that the drought ended once she started counting the rain on her farm.
   • Readers learn the final result first, so the drought looks like a minor detail in her long life.
   • Readers first see why her hillside needed its own count, then a use that makes the habit matter.
   • Readers see that the engineer copied Leona's idea instead of building the ditch on his own.

5. The Day the Street Belonged to Walkers (article)

   [1] On the first Sunday in May, the main street of Calloway closes to cars from nine to three. [2] Residents call the day Open Street, and the idea behind it is simple: a street can be used for more than driving. [3] But the first Open Street, four years ago, nearly did not happen.

   [4] Shop owners feared that closing the road would send customers to the mall across the highway. [5] The mayor's office replied with a plan to test it for one Sunday and count visitors at each shop door. [6] Merchants who doubted the idea agreed to the trial, though a few warned that they would ask to end it if sales dropped.

   [7] The results surprised nearly everyone. [8] Sales on the closed blocks rose by about a fifth compared with an ordinary Sunday, and the bakery sold out of bread by noon. [9] Children rode bikes down the center line, and a local band played from a flatbed truck.

   [10] Not every effect was positive, since two shops on a side street, cut off from the crowd, had fewer customers than usual. [11] The city responded by adding signs and a shuttle so visitors could reach them. [12] Open Street now happens every month from May to October, and nearby towns have copied the plan.

6. 4.

   Kira imagines cutting paragraph 4 (sentences 10 to 12). What would readers lose about Open Street?

   • They would lose the news that nearby towns copied the plan, which is a small closing detail.
   • They would lose the claim that Open Street hurt the whole downtown, which paragraph 4 makes clear.
   • They would lose the merchants' doubts and the one-Sunday trial, so readers would not know how it began.
   • They would lose the hurt shops and the city's fix, so the result would look simpler than it was.
7. 5.

   Luz says the article shows that Open Street helped every business. Which choice judges this statement correctly?

   • It does not hold, because sentence 12 says nearby towns have copied the plan.
   • It holds, because sentence 8 says sales on the closed blocks rose by about a fifth.
   • It does not hold, because sentence 4 says shop owners feared losing customers to the mall across the highway.
   • It does not hold, because sentence 10 says two side-street shops had fewer customers.
8. 6.

   Milo asks why paragraph 2 (the fears and the trial) comes before paragraph 3 (the results). Which choice is the best reason?

   • The author is listing the days of the first Open Street in the order that they happened.
   • The results mean more when readers first see the doubts that the trial tested.
   • The results are weaker than the doubts, so the author hides them in the middle of the whole article.
   • The author wants readers to believe the merchants had no doubts about the idea before the trial began.
9. 7.

   Noah imagines cutting sentence 3, “But the first Open Street, four years ago, nearly did not happen.” What would the article lose?

   • The opening would no longer hint that the event faced doubt, so paragraph 2 would lack a setup.
   • The article would lose the evidence that sales rose on the closed blocks of the main street that Sunday.
   • The article would lose its statement of what Open Street is and when it happens in May on Main Street.
   • The article would lose its explanation of why the city added signs and a shuttle for visitors.

10. The Keystone Idea (article)

    [1] In a stone arch, the wedge-shaped block at the top is called the keystone. [2] Remove it, and the whole arch collapses, even though the other stones are still there. [3] Ecologists borrowed the word to describe a living thing that holds an ecosystem together in the same way.

    [4] The sea otter of the Pacific coast is a common example. [5] Otters eat sea urchins, which feed on kelp, and where otters are plentiful the urchins stay few and the kelp forests grow thick. [6] In places where otters were taken for their fur until few remained, urchins multiplied and ate the kelp down to bare rock.

    [7] Fish, seals, and birds all depend on kelp forests for shelter and food. [8] When the kelp vanished, those animals declined too, which shows how one missing species can ripple outward. [9] After otters were protected and returned to some coasts, kelp began to regrow.

    [10] Scientists caution that the keystone idea has limits. [11] In many ecosystems no single species matters as much as the otter does, and its effect can depend on other factors such as ocean temperature and disease. [12] The word is most useful as a way to ask which relationships in a place deserve close study.

11. 8.

    Pia imagines cutting paragraph 1 (the arch). What would readers lose about the keystone idea?

    • They would lose the sea otter example, which is the one place the idea is shown in action.
    • They would lose the warning that scientists see limits to the keystone idea.
    • They would lose the picture that explains why one species can matter to an ecosystem.
    • They would lose the evidence that kelp regrew after otters came back to some coasts.
12. 9.

    Ren says the article claims that every ecosystem has a keystone species. Which choice judges this statement correctly?

    • It does not hold, because paragraph 3 says fish, seals and birds depend on kelp forests for food.
    • It does not hold, because paragraph 1 says ecologists borrowed the word from stone arches and bridges.
    • It holds, because paragraph 2 says otters keep urchins few and kelp forests thick along the coast.
    • It does not hold, because paragraph 4 says no single species matters as much as the otter in many ecosystems.
13. 10.

    Tala asks why the author closes with scientists' cautions (paragraph 4) instead of opening with them. Which choice is the best reason?

    • The cautions are the main point, so the author saves them to make readers curious about the end.
    • The cautions repeat the arch comparison, so the author puts them next to it.
    • Readers must grasp the idea and see it work before its limits can mean much.
    • The cautions are about otters, so they belong after the otter example and nowhere else.