Building the Transcontinental Railroad (Nonfiction)

Start with a one page science passage, then move to the 2 page articles such as The Race to Join a Nation. Ask students to underline the detail they use for each written answer.

Read The Race to Join a Nation on the Transcontinental Railroad and weigh its gains and costs. The directions on the page read: Read the passage. It continues on page 2. Then answer the questions on page 3. An answer key is included.

Yes, both. We made it for 6th Grade paragraphs & passages, and the page works the same whether it lands on a kitchen table or a center rotation. At home, most families go through it together and talk the answers out loud, and that talking is where most of the learning happens with nonfiction passages. In class it runs well as independent work while you pull a small group. Print one copy or thirty, whichever the day needs.

Science passages cover fungi, octopuses, lightning, glaciers and Mars rovers. History passages cover the Silk Road, Pompeii, the Rosetta Stone and the Transcontinental Railroad. Biographies include Frederick Douglass, Wangari Maathai and Roberto Clemente.

Each sheet has 6 or 7 questions. The first 2 or 3 are multiple choice, and the rest ask students to answer on lines with details from the text, such as summarizing the passage in two sentences without opinion.

Most passages fit on page 1 with questions on page 2. Longer ones, like Why Glaciers Move and How a Bill Becomes a Law, run across 2 pages with the questions on page 3.

Students find central ideas, explain how ideas develop, define words in context, use headings and text structure, and identify an author's point of view. How Noise-Canceling Headphones Work, for example, asks whether the author presents the headphones fairly.