Selection: H-31

H-31

Grade level: 8

Word count: 1705 words

Author: Luke Cooper

Synopsis: After World War II ended, the Monuments Men helped return looted treasures to their rightful owners.

Excerpt: Experts are hopeful that more lost or stolen works will emerge in the years to come. "Things will keep appearing," said a spokesman for a group working to recover art lost in the war. "Everything will surface eventually."

Question: In the years ahead, what will probably happen to the rest of the art treasures lost or stolen during the war?

1. They will be uncovered gradually and returned to descendants of the rightful owners.
2. They will be displayed in a museum dedicated to showing the atrocities of the Hitler regime.
3. They will deteriorate in their hidden storage places, from which they will never be recovered.
4. They will become the legal property of the people who are in possession of them.

Selection: H-22

H-22

Grade level: 8

Word count: 1857 words

Author: Peter Brassai

Synopsis: Your sense of small can tell you a lot about the world around you.

Excerpt: When you smell a flower, for example, you really are smelling the odor molecules, called esters, evaporating from the flower.

So how do you tell one smell from another? Part of the answer lies in the space behind your nose, where millions of tiny smell receptors are located. Each receptor is encoded by a specific gene that enables it to distinguish certain odor molecules. When these smell receptors are stimulated, they send signals to your brain. The brain then interprets the signals as a smell you may recognize -- like the smell of chocolate-chip cookies. Scientists believe the brain can recognize as many as 10,000 different smells.

Question: Put the process of how the nose identifies a smell in the correct order, starting with the first.

1. Odor molecules travel through the nose.
2. Smell receptors send signals to the brain.
3. The brain interprets signals from smell receptors.
4. The brain recognizes a familiar smell.

Selection: H-51

H-51

Grade level: 8

Word count: 1624 words

Author: David Alexander

Synopsis: Tennis legends Arthur Ashe and Billie Jean King shared many of the same qualities and used their fame for good causes.

Excerpt: In 1974, Billie Jean established the Women's Sports Foundation to make the lives of women and girls better through sports. "In the 1970s, we had to make it acceptable for people to accept girls and women as athletes," she said. "We had to make it okay for them to be active."

Ashe was active in protesting the apartheid policies that discriminated against blacks in South Africa. In 1985, he was arrested at an anti-apartheid rally outside the South African embassy in Washington, D.C. He was arrested again in 1992 while protesting a crackdown on refugees from Haiti.

Question: Read these two excerpts. What two things do they tell you about King and Ashe?

1. They both were active in fighting discrimination.
2. They both experienced some kind of discrimination.
3. They both were willing to be arrested for protesting unfair government policies.
4. They both retired from tennis and became owners of successful tennis businesses.
5. They both thought all boys and girls should join the tennis teams at their schools.

Selection: H-64

H-64

Grade level: 8

Word count: 1684 words

Author: Ellen R. Braaf

Synopsis: So where did dogs come from? Scientists have narrowed down the dog's ancestors to a single species—the gray wolf.

Excerpt: During the last Ice Age, about 60,000 to 12,000 years ago, ancient humans and wolves had much in common. They were hunters who shared the same lands and competed for the same prey. And both lived in well-organized social groups.

Question: Which list of words best describes the similarities between wolves and ancient humans?

1. hunters, territorial, organized, social
2. gatherers, peaceful, messy, aloof
3. scavengers, dangerous, smart, quick
4. vicious, aggressive, productive, lonely

Selection: H-3

H-3

Grade level: 8

Word count: 1920 words

Author: Mary R. Dunn

Synopsis: Scientists hope to uncover buried secrets about dinosaurs.

Excerpt: No excerpt is available for this question.

Question: This selection is mainly about dinosaurs and

1. what scientists are doing to learn more about them.
2. how they roamed Earth during the Cretaceous Period.
3. why they disappeared from the face of Earth.
4. where exhibits of their skeletal remains can be seen.

Selection: H-12

H-12

Grade level: 8

Word count: 1910 words

Author: Mary R. Dunn

Synopsis: Many Japanese families living in the United States were uprooted during the war.

Excerpt: When the truck finally reached its destination, Jackson yanked aside the tarp and surveyed the strange world outside. A barbed-wire fence enclosed the property and armed soldiers paced back and forth near a sign that read, "Manzanar War Relocation Center." In a tower high above the grounds, another armed soldier stood guard, surveying the landscape and shouting orders to soldiers below.

Question: What does this excerpt tell you about the relocation center?

1. The people inside were treated like prisoners.
2. The armed soldiers were there to protect the people inside.
3. The people inside could come and go as they pleased.
4. The tower was a good place for the people inside to view the landscape.

Selection: H-32

H-32

Grade level: 8

Word count: 2030 words

Author: Anna Fisher

Synopsis: Many people escaped from East Germany through tunnels under the Berlin Wall, but some did not make it.

Excerpt: "It's the anniversary of the construction of the Berlin Wall," Gram unexpectedly remarked, as Maggie started back into the kitchen. "Do you know about the wall that separated West Berlin from East Berlin?"

Maggie paused and faced her grandmother. "Of course, Gram, we studied the Cold War in history class. People from the eastern side couldn't escape, while those on the western side were free."

Then, one day, we watched as members of the Soviet militia brought out rolls of barbed wire, stringing it along the east-west border. Living conditions had worsened in East Germany, as the economic situation became bleak; in fact, government officials forced people to work on state-owned farms because there was a food shortage.

Question: In which two ways were the lives of people in East Berlin different from those in West Berlin?

1. East Berliners could not travel freely to and from the area.
2. East Berliners experienced shortages of food.
3. East Berliners were not permitted to get an education.
4. East Berliners had to turn in all their valuables to the government.
5. East Berliners had no means of sending letters through the mail.

Selection: H-34

H-34

Grade level: 8

Word count: 2065 words

Author: Claire O'Connell

Synopsis: The pressure is on Lucas. He is the only one of his brothers left to take over the family fishing business.

Excerpt: Lucas Tanner scratched a mosquito bite on his arm and then cast his line. "Saw the rest of the riggers go out to Minette Point this morning, so I guess we'll be the only fishing smack in Oyster Bay."

Mr. Tanner wrenched a dead shrimp from his barb, threw it over the side of the skiff, and hooked the curve of his Eagle Claw into an eyelet. "There's too much competition unless we find more remote inlets. After the oil spill of 2010, it's been near impossible to make a living, especially with your brothers off truck driving.

Question: Choose the sentence in this excerpt that indicates why Lucas and his father decided to fish in Oyster Bay.

Selection: H-2

H-2

Grade level: 8

Word count: 1800 words

Author: Jules Verne

Synopsis: Is the mysterious object a floating island, a gigantic whale, or a creature unknown to science?

Excerpt: In every big city the monster was the latest rage. The people sang about it in the coffee houses. They ridiculed it in the newspapers. They dramatized it in the theaters. And the tabloids found it a fine opportunity for hatching all sorts of hoaxes. In those newspapers short of copy, you saw the revival of every huge imaginary creature from "Moby Dick," that dreadful white whale, to the amazing squid that could entwine a 500-ton ship and drag it into the bottom of the ocean. They even reprinted reports from ancient times.

Question: Based on this excerpt, how could coverage of the monster by the media be described?

1. making it the current fad
2. ignoring it as a news item
3. presenting just the facts
4. calmly studying the situation

Selection: H-9

H-9

Grade level: 8

Word count: 1657 words

Author: Ben Robinson

Synopsis: Germs are everywhere so it's a good idea to have a plan of protection.

Excerpt: The club, called "Clean Is Cool," was responsible for instituting many healthful and informative programs. This step was already in place, but the club helped educate students on the importance of immunizations.

Next up was another strong move: hand sanitizers. Steve and "Clean Is Cool" instituted a program to install large bottles on the walls in hallways, the cafeteria, and classrooms.

"Clean Is Cool" stopped this practice in its tracks by popularizing the slogan, "In the Cafeteria, Sharing is NOT Caring." It let students know that they should stick to what their parents packed them, and not swap food, and consequently germs.

One final move was to encourage classmates to regularly clean their backpacks. "Clean Is Cool" encouraged kids to either wash their bags completely, or use a wet cloth or wipe with rubbing alcohol to really get down to business.

Question: Put these steps in the order in which they were initiated at Steve's school, starting with the first.

1. Students were educated on the importance of immunizations.
2. Hand sanitizers were installed in the hallways, classrooms, and cafeteria.
3. Students were made aware of the danger of sharing school lunches.
4. Backpacks needed to be washed regularly to rid them of germs.

Selection: H-4

H-4

Grade level: 8

Word count: 1968 words

Author: Anonymous

Synopsis: Things go wrong when Cupid wounds himself with his own arrow.

Excerpt: Cupid, beholding her as she lay in the dust, stopped his flight for an instant, saying, "Oh foolish Psyche, is it thus you repay my love? After I disobeyed my mother's commands and made you my wife, will you think me a monster and cut off my head? Go, and return to your sisters, whose advice you seem to think preferable to mine. I inflict no other punishment on you than to leave you forever. Love cannot dwell with suspicion."

Question: The author uses Psyche's decision to see her husband's face to show

1. a betrayal of trust.
2. an act of kindness.
3. a declaration of love.
4. a sign of strength.