Reading Comprehension Passage and Assessment: The Abominable Snowman

Item description

The Abominable Snowman, or yeti, is a giant monster said to live in the snowy Himalaya Mountains of China, Nepal, and Tibet. But is this a real living creature or just an imaginary monster of the superstitious local people? This article examines expeditions and investigations that claim to have proven the Abominable Snowman is real and those that have concluded that it’s all just a case of mistaken identity or a hoax. Also included is a description of the appearance, habitat, and diet of these legendary mountain beasts. This Common Core-aligned informational reading and assessment can be used in Grades 4-8 depending on your students’ ability levels and in a number of ways by teachers (teacher-directed study in class, close reading, independent practice, homework, test prep, etc). This is a high interest article that works equally well with either reluctant readers or in the regular classroom!

This passage and assessment is ideal as part of a close reading program in your classroom based around mastery of the Common Core! What does that mean to you as a classroom teacher? It means that this is not the typical “one reading I’m done” comprehension work often given before the Common Core Standards were created. To complete the assessment for the passage, students will need “to undertake the close, attentive reading and re-reading that is at the heart of understanding and enjoying complex and worthy works.”

The printable includes:
1) An engaging, high-interest informational article of 950+ words called “The Abominable Snowman” Flesch Kincaid Reading Level = 6.7
2) A set of 26 questions, from simple to more challenging, written to align with these Common Core Informational Text Standards:
RI.3.6. Distinguish their own point of view from that of the author of a text.
RI.4.1. Refer to details and examples in a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text.
RI.5.4. Determine the meaning of general academic and domain-specific words and phrases in a text relevant to a grade 5 topic or subject area.
RI.5.8. Explain how an author uses reasons and evidence to support particular points in a text, identifying which reasons and evidence support which point(s).
RI.6.5. Analyze how a particular sentence, paragraph, chapter, or section fits into the overall structure of a text and contributes to the development of the ideas.
3) An additional crossword puzzle for your early finishers or to use as another form of assessment.
4) Answers to every question.