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ELA 8

English Language Arts 8 · Worksheets

Reading closely

Ten questions of mixed difficulty, covering Reading closely. Print it, or work through it on screen — the answer key starts on its own page.

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Reading closely

English Language Arts 8 · maddyhelps.com

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Circle the best answer for each question. Use the space to note the evidence or reasoning that decided it.

  1. Read: “Starting at a new school in March is like walking into a movie halfway through. Everyone else already knows the characters and the jokes, and you spend the first hour working out who is who.” The analogy mainly helps the reader understand

    1. a) why a new student needs a map of the school building
    2. b) why schools should not let new students switch in March
    3. c) why it is rude to walk into a movie after it has already started
    4. d) how hard it is to join a group that already knows each other

  2. Read: “Every morning for thirty years, Mr. Okafor unlocked the bakery at six and set two cups on the counter, one for himself and one for his wife. This morning he set out the two cups, stopped, and put one back on the shelf. Then he turned the sign on the door to Open, as usual.” The best inference is that

    1. a) he has decided to stop drinking coffee at the bakery
    2. b) his wife no longer shares the mornings with him
    3. c) he broke one of the cups and must buy another
    4. d) he is planning to close the bakery for good

  3. Which pair of words has the same relationship as “thermometer : temperature”?

    1. a) window : glass
    2. b) ruler : length
    3. c) blanket : cold
    4. d) oven : heat

  4. Read: “By the time we reached the cabin, the windshield wipers had frozen stiff, the road had disappeared under white, and Dad had to shovel a path before we could open the door.” The best inference is that

    1. a) there had been a heavy snowfall
    2. b) Dad had forgotten the cabin key
    3. c) the family had taken a wrong turn
    4. d) the cabin was far from any road

  5. Read: “For years, the town of Birch Lake sent all its garbage to one landfill. By 2019 the landfill was nearly full, and a new one would cost millions of dollars. The town started a green-bin program for food scraps and paid students to explain it door to door. Within three years, the town was sending a third less garbage to the landfill.” Which is the best summary?

    1. a) Every town in Alberta should start a green-bin program so that its landfill will last longer.
    2. b) Facing a full landfill, Birch Lake started a green-bin program that cut its garbage by a third.
    3. c) Birch Lake's landfill was nearly full in 2019, and a new one would have cost millions of dollars.
    4. d) Birch Lake paid students to go door to door explaining its new green-bin program for food scraps.

  6. A student is summarizing this passage in two sentences: “Last spring, the creek behind our school turned brown and smelled of oil. Our class tested the water every Friday and sent the results to the town. Mrs. Kowalski's test kit was bright orange. By June, the town had found a leaking pipe and fixed it, and the creek ran clear again.” Which detail should the summary leave out?

    1. a) that the creek turned brown and smelled of oil
    2. b) that Mrs. Kowalski's test kit was bright orange
    3. c) that the town found and fixed a leaking pipe
    4. d) that the class tested the water and told the town

  7. Read: “People say someone who cannot see well is ‘blind as a bat,’ but the saying gets bats wrong. Every kind of bat can see. Fruit bats have large eyes and find their food mostly by sight and smell. Many small bats also hunt by echolocation: they send out high-pitched calls and listen for the echoes bouncing off insects.” Which statement best expresses the writer's main idea?

    1. a) Bats cannot see well, so most of them find their way by sound.
    2. b) People who cannot see well should not be compared to animals.
    3. c) Many small bats hunt insects by listening for the echoes of their calls.
    4. d) Bats are not blind, even though a common saying claims they are.

  8. Read: “A chinook is a warm, dry wind that pours down the eastern slopes of the Rockies in winter. In a few hours, it can raise the temperature in southern Alberta by twenty degrees. Snow slides off roofs by noon, and people who left home in parkas walk around with them tied at their waists.” Which sentence best states the main idea?

    1. a) The Rockies have the warmest winter weather anywhere in Canada.
    2. b) A chinook can change a winter day in southern Alberta very quickly.
    3. c) People in southern Alberta often carry their parkas instead of wearing them.
    4. d) During a chinook, the snow slides off the roofs of houses by noon.

  9. Read: “The gym smelled of popcorn. Parents squeezed into the bleachers holding up their phones, and the Grade 8 band sat in rows of folding chairs, adjusting their music stands one last time.” What is most likely about to happen?

    1. a) the parents are getting ready to leave
    2. b) the band is about to play a concert
    3. c) a basketball game is about to begin
    4. d) the band is about to start a practice

  10. Read: “All afternoon the lake had been calm. Then the sky over the far shore turned an ominous green-black, the birds went quiet, and the lifeguard began waving everyone out of the water.” In this passage, “ominous” most likely means

    1. a) strange and beautiful to look at
    2. b) warning that something bad is coming
    3. c) calm and still, like the lake
    4. d) dark because night is falling

Answer key · Reading closely

English Language Arts 8 · maddyhelps.com

  1. d) how hard it is to join a group that already knows each other — An analogy explains something unfamiliar by comparing it to something familiar. Arriving halfway through a movie, when everyone knows the characters and the jokes, matches arriving at a school where friendships and in-jokes already exist; the analogy is about the new student's experience, not about movies or school rules.
  2. b) his wife no longer shares the mornings with him — The second cup was always for his wife, so putting it away shows she is gone, whether she has died or left. He still keeps his own cup and still opens the shop as usual, which rules out giving up coffee or closing the bakery.
  3. b) ruler : length — A thermometer measures temperature, and a ruler measures length. An oven has to do with heat, which is why it tempts, but an oven makes heat instead of measuring it; in an analogy the relationship has to match, not just the topic.
  4. a) there had been a heavy snowfall — Frozen wipers, a road buried in white and a door blocked by snow all point to one cause, a heavy snowfall. A wrong turn might explain a missing road, but not the frozen wipers or the snowed-in door; a good inference fits every clue, not just one.
  5. b) Facing a full landfill, Birch Lake started a green-bin program that cut its garbage by a third. — A summary covers the problem, the response and the result, and only the sentence about the green bins cutting garbage by a third has all three. The landfill sentence stops at the problem, the door-to-door detail is one small part of the response, and the advice to every town is an opinion the passage never gives.
  6. b) that Mrs. Kowalski's test kit was bright orange — A summary keeps the problem, what was done about it and how it ended, and the colour of the test kit changes none of those. It is the kind of vivid detail that sticks in your memory, which is exactly why it sneaks into summaries.
  7. d) Bats are not blind, even though a common saying claims they are. — The writer quotes the saying only to argue against it, and every later detail backs that up: all bats see, and some rely mainly on sight. The answer about finding their way by sound comes from mixing the echolocation detail with the very saying the writer rejects.
  8. b) A chinook can change a winter day in southern Alberta very quickly. — Every detail, from the twenty-degree jump to the melting snow and the parkas, shows how fast a chinook changes the day. The snow sliding off roofs is true, but it is one piece of evidence for that idea, not the idea itself.
  9. b) the band is about to play a concert — Parents crowding in with phones ready and a band making last adjustments point to a performance. The gym and the bleachers suggest a basketball game, but nothing in the passage mentions players, and the band is the group getting ready.
  10. b) warning that something bad is coming — The clues around the word are signs of danger: the birds go quiet and the lifeguard clears the water. A green-black sky is unusual, which tempts readers toward “strange and beautiful,” but the people in the passage treat it as a threat.