eurekami
Finding and retrieving information
3rd grade (Year 4 in England) · 16 questions · Common Core: RI.3.1, RL.3.1 · England: Y3/4 Reading (retrieval), KS2 SATs Reading
Name
Date
Score/ 16
Inside a Volcano
Deep beneath our feet, the Earth is extremely hot – hot enough to melt rock. This melted rock is called magma. Because magma is lighter than the solid rock around it, it slowly rises upward. Sometimes it collects in a huge underground pool called a magma chamber.
A volcano forms where magma finds a way to the surface. When the pressure in the magma chamber becomes too great, the magma bursts out through cracks or vents. Once it reaches the surface, it is called lava. Over time, layers of cooled lava and ash can build up to form a mountain.
Most volcanoes are found near the edges of tectonic plates, the giant slabs of rock that make up the Earth's outer layer. More than half of the world's active volcanoes surround the Pacific Ocean, in a horseshoe-shaped zone known as the Ring of Fire.
Scientists sort volcanoes into three groups. Active volcanoes have erupted recently and could erupt again. Dormant volcanoes have not erupted for a very long time but might wake up in the future. Extinct volcanoes are not expected to erupt ever again.
Although eruptions can be deadly, volcanoes also bring benefits. Volcanic ash breaks down into rich soil, which is why many farms are found on the slopes of old volcanoes. In some countries, such as Iceland, the heat from underground is used to warm homes and produce electricity.
Question 1
Read "Inside a Volcano". A volcano has not erupted for a very long time but might erupt again. What kind is it?
- A. tectonic
- B. dormant
- C. active
- D. extinct
Lady Montagu and the Smallpox Gamble
In the early eighteenth century, smallpox was one of the most feared diseases in Europe. It killed around three in every ten people it infected and left many survivors scarred or blind. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu knew its cruelty personally: the disease had killed her brother and marked her own face.
In 1717, while living in Constantinople (now Istanbul), where her husband was the British ambassador, she observed a remarkable practice. Local women would take a small amount of material from a mild smallpox sore and scratch it into the skin of a healthy person. The person usually developed a mild illness and was then protected for life. This process was called variolation.
Montagu was so impressed that she had her young son variolated. When she returned to England, she campaigned to spread the practice, despite fierce opposition. Some doctors resented being taught by a woman; others distrusted a practice from abroad. To win public confidence, Montagu had her daughter variolated in front of physicians from the royal court.
Variolation was not without risk: a small number of patients developed severe smallpox, and they could infect others. Decades later, in 1796, Edward Jenner developed a safer method using cowpox, a related but much milder disease. His method, called vaccination after the Latin word for cow, gradually replaced variolation.
Smallpox was declared eradicated worldwide in 1980. Jenner is often called the father of vaccination, but the story began with the courage of a woman who noticed what others had overlooked.
Question 2
Read "Lady Montagu and the Smallpox Gamble". What were TWO reasons some people opposed Montagu?
- A. It used cowpox and caused scars.
- B. She was a woman, and the practice came from abroad.
- C. It was too expensive and too slow.
- D. Jenner disagreed and the king banned it.
The Fennec Fox
The fennec fox is the smallest fox in the world. It weighs about as much as a bag of sugar. It lives in the Sahara Desert in North Africa, one of the hottest places on Earth.
The first thing most people notice about the fennec fox is its enormous ears. They can be as long as 15 centimetres, which is huge for such a small animal. The ears do two important jobs. First, they let heat escape from the fox's body, helping it to stay cool. Second, they are so sensitive that the fox can hear insects moving under the sand.
The fennec fox has other ways to survive in the desert, too. Thick fur on the bottoms of its feet protects it from the burning sand. During the hottest part of the day, it rests in a cool burrow underground. It comes out to hunt at night, when the air is cooler.
Water is hard to find in the desert, but the fennec fox can go a long time without drinking. It gets most of the water it needs from the food it eats, such as insects, plants and small animals.
Question 3
Read "The Fennec Fox". What are the TWO jobs of the fox's ears?
- A. keeping it cool and hearing prey
- B. scaring enemies and climbing
- C. keeping it warm and smelling food
- D. digging and swimming
Question 4
The blue whale is the largest animal that has ever lived. It can grow longer than two buses and eats tiny shrimp-like animals called krill. What do blue whales eat?
- A. fish
- B. krill
- C. seaweed
- D. sharks
The Mapmaker's Apprentice
Ines had worked in Master Corvo's shop for three years, and in all that time he had never let her draw a single line on a real map. She ground his inks, stretched his parchment and swept up the shavings from his quills. When she asked why she could not draw, he only said, "A mapmaker must first learn to see."
So Ines watched. She watched sailors come in, sunburnt and impatient, to buy charts of the southern coast. She watched merchants argue over which mountain pass was fastest. Most of all, she watched Master Corvo, who spent far longer listening to travellers than he did holding his pen.
One winter morning, a fisherman stumbled into the shop, soaked and shaking. A storm had pushed his boat far north, past the edge of every chart in the city. He had found a narrow channel between two islands that no map showed, and it had saved his life.
Master Corvo was in bed with a fever. The fisherman was leaving on the evening tide.
Ines hesitated only for a moment. Then she sat the fisherman by the fire and asked him questions — not just where the channel was, but how the water changed colour near the rocks, where the gulls gathered, how long it took to row from one island to the other. She wrote down every answer. Only when she had heard everything did she pick up a pen.
When Master Corvo recovered, she laid the new chart in front of him. He studied it for a long time without speaking. Then he took his own pen, signed his name in the corner, and beneath it, for the first time, he wrote hers.
Question 5
Read "The Mapmaker's Apprentice". What jobs did Ines do in the shop for three years?
- A. She sailed with the fishermen.
- B. She drew maps of the coast.
- C. She prepared materials and cleaned up.
- D. She sold charts to merchants.
The Lemonade Stand
Marcus wanted a new bike helmet, but it cost twenty dollars. He had only five.
"Why not set up a lemonade stand?" suggested his grandmother. She helped him squeeze a big bowl of lemons and stir in sugar and cold water. Marcus painted a sign that said LEMONADE – 50 CENTS.
On Saturday morning, Marcus put his table at the end of the driveway. For the first hour, nobody came. Cars zoomed past. Marcus began to think it was a silly idea.
Then he noticed that people were walking to the park across the road for a football match. He picked up his sign and moved the table right next to the park gate. Within ten minutes, a line had formed. By lunchtime, the jug was empty.
Marcus counted his coins. He had earned exactly fifteen dollars. With the five he already had, it was enough.
"You did it!" said Grandma.
"We did it," said Marcus. "And next time, I'll think about where the customers are before I start."
Question 6
Read "The Lemonade Stand". Who suggested the lemonade stand?
- A. his teacher
- B. his grandmother
- C. a customer
- D. Marcus's friend
The Camera in the Hedge
For my birthday, Aunt Jo gave me a wildlife camera. It is small and green, and it takes a photo whenever something moves in front of it. I strapped it to the fence post at the bottom of our garden, pointing at a gap in the hedge.
The first morning, I ran outside in my pyjamas to check it. There were forty-two photos! Most of them were of leaves blowing in the wind. One was of our cat, Biscuit, looking very surprised.
But on the second night, something different appeared. At 11:14 p.m., a hedgehog shuffled out of the hedge. At 11:16 p.m., it was sniffing at the flower bed. At 11:20 p.m., it was gone.
I wanted to know where it went, so I read about hedgehogs in a library book. I learned that a hedgehog can walk more than a kilometre in one night, looking for beetles and worms. Walls and fences with no gaps can stop it from finding enough food.
Dad and I cut a small hole, about the size of a CD case, at the bottom of our fence. Our neighbour, Mr Okafor, made one in his fence too. Now the hedgehog can travel from garden to garden.
Last night, the camera caught the hedgehog again. This time, it was squeezing through our new hole, heading for Mr Okafor's garden. I think it was saying thank you.
Question 7
Read "The Camera in the Hedge". Where did the narrator put the camera?
- A. on the garden shed roof
- B. on a fence post at the bottom of the garden
- C. inside the kitchen
- D. in Mr Okafor's garden
The Long Wall
The Great Wall of China is not one wall at all. It is a network of walls, trenches and watchtowers built and rebuilt over more than two thousand years by different dynasties. If all its sections were laid end to end, they would stretch over 21,000 kilometres – more than half the distance around the Earth.
The earliest walls were built from packed earth around the seventh century BCE, when rival Chinese states defended their borders from one another. In about 220 BCE, the first emperor of a united China, Qin Shi Huang, ordered many of these separate walls to be joined together to protect the north from raiding groups.
The sections that most visitors see today are far younger. They were built during the Ming dynasty, between the fourteenth and seventeenth centuries. Ming builders used bricks and stone, which is why these sections have survived so well. Watchtowers were placed close enough together for soldiers to send signals using smoke by day and fire by night.
The wall came at a terrible cost. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers, prisoners and farmers were forced to work on it, often in freezing mountains or burning deserts. Many died, and stories and songs about their suffering are still told.
Did the wall work? Historians disagree. It slowed down small raids and helped control trade and travel, but determined armies could still break through or simply go around it. Today, its greatest power may be as a symbol – of human effort, of history and of a nation's identity.
Question 8
Read "The Long Wall". Why have the Ming sections survived so well?
- A. They were rebuilt last year.
- B. They were built with bricks and stone.
- C. They are the oldest sections.
- D. They were built in the desert.
The Vault at the Top of the World
On a frozen island in the Arctic Ocean, between Norway and the North Pole, a narrow concrete doorway sticks out of the side of a mountain. Behind it, a tunnel leads deep into the rock. This is the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, and it holds more than a million packets of seeds from almost every country on Earth.
Why keep seeds in a mountain? Farmers all over the world depend on many different varieties of crops, such as types of rice that survive floods or kinds of wheat that resist disease. If a variety disappears because of war, natural disaster or simple accident, it may be lost for ever. The vault is a back-up copy, like saving a precious file in two places.
The location was chosen with care. The vault is high enough above sea level to stay dry even if ice caps melt. Inside, the seeds are kept at about minus 18 degrees Celsius, cold enough to keep many of them alive for decades or even centuries. The surrounding rock is permanently frozen, so even if the power failed, the seeds would stay cold.
The vault opened in 2008. In 2015, it was used for the first time: scientists who had lost access to their own seed bank during a war in Syria withdrew samples, grew new plants and later sent fresh seeds back to the vault. The back-up had worked.
No one hopes the vault will be needed often. But like a fire extinguisher in a school corridor, it is reassuring to know it is there.
Question 9
Read "The Vault at the Top of the World". When was the vault used for the first time?
- A. in 2015
- B. in 2008
- C. it has never been used
- D. in 1956
A Letter to the Council
Dear Councillors,
I am writing to ask you not to close Elm Street Library. I am nine years old, and the library is one of the most important places in our town.
First, the library helps children learn. Every Saturday, there is a story club where younger children listen to stories and older children like me read aloud. Many families cannot afford to buy lots of books, but at the library everyone can borrow them for free.
Second, the library is not just for children. My neighbour, Mr Haddad, goes there every week to use the computers because he does not have one at home. He uses them to apply for jobs and to talk to his grandchildren in another country.
Some people say that everything is online now, so we do not need libraries. However, not everyone has the internet at home, and a website cannot give you a quiet, warm place to study or a librarian who helps you find exactly the right book.
Please keep our library open. It belongs to all of us.
Yours faithfully, Priya Shah
Question 10
Read "A Letter to the Council". What happens at the library every Saturday?
- A. a computer class
- B. a book sale
- C. a story club
- D. a council meeting
A Helicopter on Mars
In February 2021, NASA's Perseverance rover landed on Mars. Tucked underneath it was a passenger: a tiny helicopter called Ingenuity. It weighed only about 1.8 kilograms, a little less than a big bag of flour.
Flying on Mars is much harder than flying on Earth. The air on Mars is extremely thin, about one hundredth as thick as the air we breathe. Helicopter blades push against the air to lift off, so with so little air, Ingenuity's blades had to spin very fast: about 2,400 times a minute.
On 19 April 2021, Ingenuity rose about three metres into the Martian sky, hovered for about forty seconds and landed again. It was the first powered, controlled flight on another planet. Engineers on Earth cheered, even though the radio signals took several minutes to reach them.
Ingenuity was only meant to make five test flights. Instead, it made 72. It scouted ahead for the rover, taking photos of rocks and slopes so that drivers on Earth could choose safe routes.
In January 2024, one of Ingenuity's blades was damaged during a landing, and the mission ended. The little helicopter still sits on Mars today, and engineers are already using what they learned to design bigger flying machines for future missions.
Question 11
Read "A Helicopter on Mars". How did Ingenuity get to Mars?
- A. carried by astronauts
- B. it flew there by itself
- C. on a separate rocket a year later
- D. tucked underneath the Perseverance rover
A Day at the Fire Station
Firefighters do much more than put out fires. At Station 9, the day begins at eight o'clock sharp with a check of every piece of equipment. The crew test the hoses, check the air tanks and make sure the ladders slide smoothly. "If something is broken, we need to know now, not when there's an emergency," says Captain Rivera.
After the checks, the firefighters exercise for an hour. Their job is very physical. They must carry heavy hoses, climb ladders in thick protective suits and sometimes carry people to safety.
In the afternoon, the crew often visit schools to teach children about fire safety. They show how to check smoke alarms and explain why you should never hide during a fire. "Get out, stay out, and call for help," Captain Rivera tells every class.
When the alarm rings, everything changes. The crew pull on their gear, jump into the fire engine and are on their way in less than a minute. Calls might be for a house fire, a car accident or even a cat stuck up a tree. Whatever the emergency, the firefighters of Station 9 are ready.
Question 12
Read "A Day at the Fire Station". What do the firefighters do first each day?
- A. visit schools
- B. exercise for an hour
- C. check all the equipment
- D. eat breakfast
The Lighthouse Keeper's Daughter
The storm had been building all afternoon. By the time the sun set, waves as tall as houses were hurling themselves against the rocks below Gull Point Lighthouse, and the wind screamed around the tower like a wild animal.
Nell pressed her face to the window of the little cottage. Her father had rowed to the mainland that morning to fetch the doctor for Mrs Penrose, and the sea had turned before he could return. Now, for the first time in her twelve years, Nell was alone at the lighthouse.
She knew what that meant. Every night at dusk, the great lamp at the top of the tower had to be lit. Without it, ships would have no warning of the rocks.
Nell grabbed the lantern and her father's oilskin coat, which hung down past her knees, and pushed open the door. The wind nearly knocked her flat. Bent double, she stumbled across the yard and into the tower.
There were one hundred and twelve steps to the top. Nell had climbed them hundreds of times, but never in the dark, never with the whole tower trembling. Halfway up, her lantern flickered and almost went out. She stopped, cupped her hand around the flame and whispered, "Not now. Please, not now."
At the top, her fingers were numb with cold. She trimmed the wick the way her father had shown her, filled the oil and struck a match. Nothing. A second match. Nothing. With the third, a tiny flame caught, grew and then blazed, and the great lens began to turn, sweeping its beam across the furious sea.
Far out in the darkness, a ship's horn sounded twice. Nell did not know whose ship it was. But she knew that, tonight, it would find its way home.
Question 13
Read "The Lighthouse Keeper's Daughter". Why was Nell alone at the lighthouse?
- A. Her father had gone to fetch a doctor and could not get back.
- B. Her father was asleep.
- C. Her father had gone fishing.
- D. She had run away from home.
The Moon's Night Walk (a poem)
The moon puts on her silver coat
and tiptoes up the sky.
She hums a tune to sleepy owls
and winks at clouds nearby.
She paints the rooftops pearly white,
she lights the cat's way home,
she peeps into the children's rooms
to check they're not alone.
She counts the stars like sleeping sheep,
she sings the sea to rest,
she hangs a lantern on the hill
for travellers in the west.
And when the sun yawns in the east
and stretches out his rays,
the moon slips off her silver coat
and hides away for days.
But look up on a quiet night
when all the town's asleep:
she's tiptoeing across the sky
with promises to keep.
Question 14
Read "The Moon's Night Walk (a poem)". What does the moon do for the cat?
- A. wakes it up
- B. paints it white
- C. lights its way home
- D. sings it to sleep
Bugs in the Code
Theo had been looking forward to Coding Club all week. Ms Rivera had promised they would make their own animated story on the classroom tablets.
Theo chose a cartoon cat and wrote the code: when the green flag is clicked, move ten steps, then turn and wave. He clicked the flag. The cat spun round and round like a washing machine and never stopped.
"It's broken!" Theo groaned, and he pushed the tablet away.
Ms Rivera sat down beside him. "It's not broken," she said. "It's got a bug. Every coder gets bugs. The trick is to be a detective." Together they read the code one block at a time. Theo had put the turn block inside a forever loop by mistake, so the cat kept turning for ever.
Theo dragged the block out of the loop and clicked the flag again. The cat walked ten steps, turned and waved. Theo cheered so loudly that the whole club looked up.
The next week, a younger girl called Ivy was close to tears because her rocket would not take off. Theo pulled up a chair. "It's not broken," he told her. "It's got a bug. Let's be detectives."
Question 15
Read "Bugs in the Code". What went wrong with Theo's cat at first?
- A. It spun round and round and never stopped.
- B. It would not move at all.
- C. It disappeared from the screen.
- D. It turned into a rocket.
Why Do Leaves Change in Autumn?
In many parts of the world, autumn turns forests into blazes of yellow, orange and red. But where do these bright shades come from? The answer is hidden inside every leaf.
During spring and summer, leaves are busy making food for the tree. To do this, they use sunlight, water and air. A green substance called chlorophyll captures the energy from sunlight. There is so much chlorophyll in a leaf that it hides all the other shades.
As autumn arrives, the days grow shorter and there is less sunlight. Trees such as maples and oaks begin to get ready for winter. They stop making chlorophyll. As the green fades away, the yellows and oranges that were in the leaf all along begin to show.
Some trees, such as certain maples, also make a brand-new red substance in autumn. This is why some leaves turn bright red or purple.
Finally, the tree seals off each leaf where it joins the branch. The leaf dries out and falls. Without leaves, the tree uses less water during the cold winter months. In spring, new green leaves will grow, and the cycle will begin again.
Question 16
Read "Why Do Leaves Change in Autumn?". Why can't we see yellow and orange in leaves during summer?
- A. Rain washes them away.
- B. The green chlorophyll hides them.
- C. They are not made until autumn.
- D. The sun bleaches them.
All done? Color in the animal! · Free from eurekami.com/math