FSA Reading Practice 6th Grade Answer Key

Every year, I get my students to solve these free practice test to ensure that they are prepared for their standardized FSA testing questions.

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Grade 6 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key The Grade 6 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key provides the correct response(s) for each item on the practice test. The practice questions and answers are not intended to demonstrate the length of the actual test, nor should student responses be used as an indicator of student performance on the actual test.

To offer students a variety of texts on the FSA ELA Reading tests, authentic and copyrighted stories, poems, and articles appear as they were originally published, as requested by the publisher and/or author. While these real-world examples do not always adhere to strict style conventions and/or grammar rules, inconsistencies among passages should not detract from students ability to understand and answer questions about the texts. All trademarks and trade names found in this publication are the property of their respective owners and are not associated with the publishers of this publication. Every effort has been made to trace the ownership of all copyrighted material and to secure the necessary permissions to reprint selections. Some items are reproduced with permission from the American Institutes for Research as copyright holder or under license from third parties. Page 2

Session 1 Page 3

Session 1 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Passage 1: Beautiful as the Day by E. Nesbit 1 2 3 4 5 6 I say, let s take our spades and dig in the gravel-pits. We can pretend it s seaside. Father says it was once, Anthea said; he says there are shells there thousands of years old. So they went. Of course they had been to the edge of the gravel-pit and looked over, but they had not gone down into it for fear father should say they mustn t play there, and it was the same with the chalkquarry. The gravel-pit is not really dangerous if you don t try to climb down the edges, but go the slow safe way round by the road, as if you were a cart. Each of the children carried its own spade, and took it in turns to carry the Lamb. He was the baby, and they called him that because Baa was the first thing he ever said. They called Anthea Panther, which seems silly when you read it, but when you say it it sounds a little like her name. The gravel-pit is very large and wide, with grass growing round the edges at the top, and dry stringy wildflowers, purple and yellow. It is like a giant s washbowl. And there are mounds of gravel, and holes in the sides of the bowl where gravel has been taken out, and high up in the steep sides there are the little holes that are the little front doors of the little bank-martins 1 little houses. The children built a castle, of course, but castle-building is rather poor fun when you have no hope of the swishing tide ever coming in to fill up the moat and wash away the drawbridge, and, at the happy last, to wet everybody up to the waist at least. 1 bank-martins: small birds that make their nests in tunnels dug in clay or sand Page 4

FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 1 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 Cyril wanted to dig out a cave to play smugglers in, but the others thought it might bury them alive, so it ended in all spades going to work to dig a hole through the castle to Australia. These children, you see, believed that the world was round, and that on the other side the little Australian boys and girls were really walking wrong way up, like flies on the ceiling, with their heads hanging down into the air. The children dug and they dug and they dug, and their hands got sandy and hot and red, and their faces got damp and shiny. The Lamb had tried to eat the sand, and had cried so hard when he found that it was not, as he had supposed, brown sugar, that he was now tired out, and was lying asleep in a warm fat bunch in the middle of the halffinished castle. This left his brothers and sisters free to work really hard, and the hole that was to come out in Australia soon grew so deep that Jane... begged the others to stop. Suppose the bottom of the hole gave way suddenly, said she, and you tumbled out among the little Australians, all the sand would get in their eyes. Yes, said Robert; and they would hate us, and throw stones at us, and not let us see the kangaroos, or opossums,... or Emu Brand birds, or anything. Cyril and Anthea knew that Australia was not quite so near as all that, but they agreed to stop using the spades and to go on with their hands. This was quite easy, because the sand at the bottom of the hole was very soft and fine and dry, like sea-sand. And there were little shells in it. Fancy it having been wet sea here once, all sloppy and shiny, said Jane, with fishes and conger-eels and coral and mermaids. And masts of ships and wrecked Spanish treasure. I wish we could find a gold doubloon, or something, Cyril said. How did the sea get carried away? Robert asked. Not in a pail, silly, said his brother. Father says the earth got too hot underneath, as you do in bed sometimes, so it just hunched up its shoulders, and the sea had to slip off, like the blankets do us, and the shoulder was left sticking out, and turned into dry land. Let s go and look for shells; I think that little cave looks likely, and I see something sticking out there like a bit of wrecked ships anchor, and it s beastly hot in the Australian hole. Page 5

Session 1 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key 17 The others agreed, but Anthea went on digging. She always liked to finish a thing when she had once begun it. She felt it would be a disgrace to leave that hole without getting through to Australia. Excerpt from Beautiful as the Day by E. Nesbit. In the public domain. Passage 2: Pirate Story by Robert Louis Stevenson 1 Three of us afloat in the meadow by the swing, Three of us aboard in the basket on the lea. Winds are in the air, they are blowing in the spring, And waves are on the meadow like the waves there are at sea. 5 Where shall we adventure, to-day that we re afloat, Wary of the weather and steering by a star? Shall it be to Africa, a-steering of the boat, To Providence, or Babylon, or off to Malabar? 10 Hi! but here s a squadron a-rowing on the sea Cattle on the meadow a-charging with a roar! Quick, and we ll escape them, they re as mad as they can be, The wicket is the harbour and the garden is the shore. Pirate Story by Robert Louis Stevenson. In the public domain. 1001 Page 6

FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 1 1. Option D: This answer is correct. In this quotation, Jane not only imagines what the place was like ages ago, she also imagines it with a mythical mermaid. 14831 Page 7

Session 1 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key 2. The chart below shows the correct answers for this question. Page 8

FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 1 3. The chart below shows the correct answers for this question. 14837 Page 9

Session 1 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key 4. Option D: This answer is correct. The author uses personification to describe the physical process of the geography of the area changing over time so that the sea receded. 14838 Page 10

FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 1 5. Option A: This answer is correct. The passage focuses on the children's use of creativity and imagination to create a kind of alternate world to play in, and this description of the setting enhances that. 14839 Page 11

Session 1 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key 6. Option D: This answer is correct. With this line, the speaker begins to address the question of how or where to seek adventure within the game that the friends are playing. Option E: This answer is correct. With this line, the speaker imagines that the friends are being pursued by a dangerous "squadron... a-rowing," which shows how the game the friends are playing results in a sense of adventure. 14840 Page 12

FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 1 7. Part A Option C: This answer is correct. Both passages focus on using one's imagination to make life more exciting. Part B Option B: This answer is correct. This sentence from Passage 1 shows the main characters using their imaginations to create an adventure that makes playtime more exciting. Option F: This answer is correct. This line from Passage 2 shows the speaker using imagination to turn a normal environment into an exciting adventure. 14841 Page 13

Session 1 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key This is the end of Session 1. Page 14

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Session 2 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Passage 1: What on Earth are Moon Trees? by Elaine M. Marconi 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Anything having to do with the moon is still an unfolding mystery. And Moon Trees are part of that lunar mystique. Are there actually trees on the moon? Not really... but tree seeds flown into space by NASA astronaut Stuart Roosa on the Apollo 14 mission in 1971, now grow strong and tall out of the Earth s soil. It all began after Roosa was selected to pilot the Apollo 14 command module. As a former smoke jumper with the U.S. Forest Service, he was contacted by then chief of the Forest Service, Ed Cliff, and asked if he would be willing to take tree seeds into space. As his way of paying tribute to the Forest Service, Roosa agreed and packed hundreds of seeds from redwood, loblolly pine, sycamore, Douglas fir and sweet gum trees into his personal travel kit. Roosa and his seeds orbited the moon 34 times while stationed in the command module Kitty Hawk. Scientists were curious to know if the seeds, after their journey into the microgravity of space, would sprout and look the same as Earth-grown trees. In the early 70s there were very few experiments done in space. Unfortunately, after returning to Earth the seed canister burst open during the decontamination process 1 and all the different species of seeds, not only were mixed together, but thought to be no longer useful and able to germinate. After being shipped to the Forest Service labs, it was found that most of the seeds did survive and ultimately were planted. After 20 years of growing side-by-side with their Earth-bound equivalent as controls, no one could tell the difference. 1 decontamination process: the procedure through which astronauts (and some objects) were cleansed of any potentially harmful material they may have carried back from space Page 16

FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 2 9 10 11 12 13 The seedlings, now known as Moon Trees, were planted across the United States and throughout the world. Many were planted as part of the nation s bicentennial celebration in 1976 and grow at national landmarks, such as the White House, Independence Square in Philadelphia, state capitols and university campuses. There also was a Moon Tree 1976 planting ceremony at NASA s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on June 25 during the center s Bicentennial Expo on Science and Technology. That tree still thrives at the center. Second-generation trees, called half-moon trees, have been planted from seeds or cuttings from an original Moon Tree and are thriving as well. Roosa passed away in December of 1994, but the Moon Trees continue to flourish a tribute to our first visits to the moon and a memorial to Roosa. A moon sycamore graces Roosa s grave at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia. What on Earth are Moon Trees? by Elaine M. Marconi. In the public domain. Passage 2: Audio Clip: In Search of Moon Trees This audio clip describes what happened to the Moon Tree seeds after the return of the Apollo 14 mission. Alan Shepard and Ed Mitchell were astronauts on the mission. Stan Krugman was the U.S. Forest Service research director who chose the seeds that traveled to the moon. Listen to the audio clip. 990 In Search of Moon Trees by NASA. In the public domain. Page 17

Session 2 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key 8. The highlighted sentence shows the correct answer for this question. 14612 Page 18

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Session 2 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key 9. The chart on the next page shows the correct answers for this question. Page 20

FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 2 9. 14613 Page 21

Session 2 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key 10. Part A Option C: This answer is correct. The passage illustrates the importance of the Moon Trees by describing how unusual space experiments were and by showing how people in the U.S. and around the world responded to their introduction. Part B Option B: This answer is correct. This paragraph mentions how rare experiments in space were at the time and supports the answer in Part A. 14614 Page 22

11. FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 2 Option B: This answer is correct. The Moon Trees grew next to the same type of trees; however, the Earth-bound trees had not been to space. The word equivalent suggests the trees are similar in all other ways. 14616 Page 23

Session 2 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key 12. Option A: This answer is correct. This rhetorical question leads into the author's definition of Moon Trees in the following sentence. 14618 Page 24

FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 2 13. The highlighted sentences show correct answers for this question. 14619 Page 25

Session 2 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key 14. Option B: This answer is correct. Passage 2 provides more details about how the Moon Trees grew and reproduced than Passage 1. 14620 Page 26

15. FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 2 A correct response includes: Both passages talk about the popularity of moon trees, mentioning that they were sent to places like the White House. However, the speaker mentions that the whereabouts of many moon trees are unknown because people didn t keep careful records. 15065 Page 27

Session 2 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key 16. Option B: This answer is correct. This option is correct because it addresses things that scientists did not know about the moon that their experiments with Moon Trees answered. Option C: This answer is correct. This option is correct because it helps explain why so much about the moon was seen as an unfolding mystery. 14621 Page 28

FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 2 17. The chart below shows the correct answers for this question. 15066 Page 29

Session 2 FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key The highlighted phrases show correct answers for numbers 18 21. For each highlight select the word or phrase that is correct. 18. 14679 19. 14680 Page 30

20. FSA ELA Reading Practice Test Answer Key Session 2 14681 21. 14682 Page 31

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