Reading Comprehension Passage and Assessment: What Are UFOs?

Item description

UFOs have fascinated people around the world since the famous first sighting of nine “flying saucers” by pilot Kenneth Arnold in 1947. But what are UFOs? Are they aliens placing the Earth under surveillance, elaborate hoaxes and fabrications, natural phenomena like clouds and meteorites, or something else that we just don’t understand yet? This article examines in an unbiased way the history of UFOs since 1947 and includes details of several alien encounters that have not yet been explained and remain a mystery to this day. The text concludes without judgment or opinion on the original question of “What are UFOs?” and lets the reader decide for themselves what the truth is about UFOs. 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!
The printable includes:
1) An engaging, high-interest informational article of 950 words called “UFOs: Aliens, Hallucinations, or Natural Phenomena?” Flesch Kincaid Reading Level = 6.9
2) A set of 27 questions, from fill-in-the-blank to more challenging, written to align with these Common Core Informational Text Standards:
RI.5.1. Determine the main idea of a text and explain how it is supported by key details; summarize 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.6.6. Determine an author’s point of view or purpose in a text and explain how it is conveyed in the text.
3) An additional crossword puzzle for your early finishers or to use as another form of assessment.
4) Answers to every question.