English

9
Released 2008

GRADE
Achievement Language Arts
Test Part B: Readings and
Questions
This document contains released items from the 2008 Grade 9 English Language Arts
Achievement Test.

Released test items, which contained approximately 25% of the total number of test items from
previously secured achievement tests, were mailed to school administrators each fall from 2004 to
2006 and have been made available to teachers in only print form because of copyright
limitations. Every second year, as of the fall of 2007, a complete test for all achievement test
subjects and grades (except grades 6 and 9 Social Studies; grades 3, 6, and 9 Français/French
Language Arts; and Grade 9 Knowledge and Employability courses) will be mailed to school
administrators in conjunction with the Assessment Highlights report for that year. In this way,
teachers will receive complete forms of achievement tests. The parts of those tests that are
released in print form for which electronic copyright permission is received will subsequently be
posted on the Alberta Education website. A test blueprint and an answer key that includes the
difficulty, reporting category, language function, and item description for each test item will also
be included. These materials, along with the Program of Studies and Subject Bulletin, provide
information that can be used to inform instructional practice.

Assessment highlights provide information about the overall test, the test blueprints, and student
performance on the 2009 Grade 9 English Language Arts Achievement Test. Also provided is
commentary on student performance at the acceptable standard and the standard of excellence on
selected items from the 2009 achievement test. This information is intended for teachers and is
best used in conjunction with the multi-year and detailed school reports that are available to
schools via the extranet. Assessment Highlights reports for all achievement test subjects and
grades will be posted on the Alberta Education website every year in the fall.

For further information, contact

Harvey Stables, Grade 9 Humanities Examination Manager, at Harvey.Stables@gov.ab.ca;
Maureen Milne, Grade 9 Humanities Examiner, at Maureen.Milne@gov.ab.ca; or
Jo-Anne Hug, Director, Achievement Testing, at Jo-Anne.Hug@gov.ab.ca at Learner Assessment,
or call (780) 427-0010. To call toll-free from outside Edmonton, dial (780) 310-0000.

The Alberta Education Internet address is education.alberta.ca.

Copyright 2009, the Crown in Right of Alberta, as represented by the Minister of Education,
Alberta Education, Learner Assessment, 44 Capital Boulevard, 10044 108 Street NW, Edmonton,
Alberta T5J 5E6, and its licensors. All rights reserved.

Special permission is granted to Alberta educators only to reproduce, for educational purposes
and on a non-profit basis, parts of this document that do not contain excerpted material.

Excerpted material in this document shall not be reproduced without the written permission of
the original publisher (see credits, where applicable).
 Part B: Reading—2008 Achievement Test Readings and Questions

The readings and questions presented in this document are from the previously secured
2008 Part B: Reading Grade 9 English Language Arts Achievement Test and are
representative of the readings and questions that form these tests. These readings and
questions are released by Alberta Education.

Grade 9 Achievement Test

2008

English Language Arts

Part B: Reading

Readings and Questions

1
 Grade 9 Achievement Test

English Language Arts

Part B: Reading
Readings Booklet

Description Instructions
Part B: Reading of the Grade 9 English • Be sure that you have a Readings
Language Arts Achievement Test has Booklet and a Questions Booklet.
2 booklets:
• You may not use a dictionary, a
• the Readings Booklet, which contains thesaurus, or other reference materials.
9 selections

• the Questions Booklet, which contains

55 questions

This test was developed to be

completed in 75 minutes; however, you
may take an additional 30 minutes to
complete the test.

You may write in this booklet if you find

it helpful. Make sure that your answers
are placed on the answer sheet.

2008
2
 I. Read the magazine article below and answer questions 1 to 9 on
pages 22 and 23.

GAMES ANIMALS PLAY

While scientists study the serious business of animal play behaviour, their
subjects are having a ball

by any scientific measure, Pigface the turtle, who succumbed to old age in
October 1993, had no business playing basketball. The enormous African soft-
5 shell was, at 50-something, much too old to be belting a ball around his aquarium
with his snout. And while having fun is common among mammals and birds,
cold-blooded reptiles aren’t exactly party animals. Prewired at birth for survival,
they rarely exhibit what scientists classify as play behaviour.
But Pigface didn’t know that. He used to delight visitors at the National Zoo
10 in Washington, D.C., for several hours each day. Zookeepers first tossed him a
ball as a temporary distraction. They did not expect him to play with it, but the
turtle seemed to relish the daily exercise, says Gordon Burghardt, a
biopsychologist at the University of Tennessee who is preparing a paper that is
almost certain to provoke controversy in the field of play science. Turtles are
15 among the oldest species on Earth, and Burghardt suggests that their
“mammalian” play behaviour can be traced back to the reptilelike ancestors of
warm-blooded species.
Full of new interest in ball-whacking turtles, monkeys splashing one another,
and moose chasing windblown leaves, scientists are looking beyond the endearing
20 anecdotes to more controlled studies of just why animals play. The subject
remains both complex and puzzling.
When University of Alaska biologist Robert Fagen first observed the fawns
of white-tailed deer running repeatedly through water, twisting their bodies and
shaking their heads, “my immediate response was that they had gone mad or that I
25 was seeing things. Only later did I realize that the fawns had been playing.”
Researchers generally define play in three basic ways: mock chasing and
fighting, repetition of locomotor skills, and a tendency of young animals to take
dangerous risks.
Many animal antics echo children’s games. Monkeys play leap-frog, otters
30 love king-of-the-hill, young hyenas engage in tug-of-war contests, and young
vampire bats play tag, chasing and slapping one another with their wings.
Birds and mammals in the same ecological niche seem to share similarities in
their play. Woodpeckers, parrots and warblers play mouselike hopping games of
chase. Young hawks, owls and eagles often toy with dead prey just as cats,
35 martens and bears do.

Continued

3
 But animal play isn’t always fun and games. In the wild it can be dangerous.
Not only are playful young animals sitting ducks for predators, they can hurt
themselves. In Africa baboons lie in wait for young vervet monkeys horsing
around and nail them as snacks, while Siberian-ibex young take injurious,
40 sometimes fatal, spills romping on rocky terrain. Yet despite such dangers, play
may be a way of firing up the engines of survival.
Ground-breaking evidence from University of Idaho zoologist John Byers
and others suggests that animals play the hardest when their brain cells and
nervous systems are developing the most rapidly. Playfulness seems to be more
45 deeply ingrained in animals with larger brains and longer maturation cycles.  Thus
whales and chimpanzees play more elaborately and for a longer time than
hedgehogs and shrews.
According to Byers, 90 percent of mammal species’ play actions represent
one of three distinct behaviours used later in life – capturing prey, fleeing capture
50 or fighting other members of the species. The fact that most animals spend as
much as ten percent of their youth just fooling around, says Byers, “implies that
nature is getting the maximum benefit at minimum cost.”
For many animals, however, playing also serves elaborate functions of social
bonding and establishing rules. “Animals that play together stay together,” is how
55 Marc Bekoff of the University of Colorado at Boulder puts it. Indeed, new studies
show that through play animals learn how to negotiate with their own species and
just how far they can push.
Take harbour seals, who, for reasons known only to them, don’t like being
touched. John W. Lawson, an ethologist at the Department of Fisheries and
60 Oceans in St. John’s, Nfld., has spent years observing colonies of harbour seals on
nearby islands. When they rested, he noticed, they always separated a seal’s
length from one another. Once, Lawson inadvertently1 dropped a plastic bag,
which blew over and grazed a juvenile. “He freaked out,” says Lawson. “He ran
into an adult, who bit him and bumped into another. The entire group ended up
65 fleeing into the water.”
This same touchiness appears in young harbour seals at play. Youngsters
congregate offshore and “torpedo” themselves towards land, splashing the loudly
objecting adults with ocean spray. The trick is to stop just short of touching a
grown-up to avoid getting bitten. Says Lawson: “The animals seemed to be
70 learning what they could and couldn’t get away with.”
Maxeen Biben, a zoologist who studied primate play at the National
Institutes of Health in Washington, D.C., says play for young monkeys is a way to
get experience in social roles “without getting killed or injured.” Call it natural
selection’s idea of fair play.

1
inadvertently—accidentally or unintentionally

4
 75 Youngsters deliberately choose playmates they can dominate in wrestling
and then allow the playmates a turn dominating. These games give practice for
adulthood, letting both participants hone2 movements and social skills they will
need later.
Such social play is signalled in a variety of ways. Common ferrets indicate
80 that it’s playtime by hopping around stiff-legged, with backs arched and tails held
high. Coyotes and wolves crouch on all fours and shoot their behinds in the air,
much like a dog laying a stick at his master’s feet. Keas, a type of parrot found in
New Zealand, lie on their backs and balance small objects on their feet, then toss
and chase after the objects, apparently all in an attempt to get other keas to
85 play too.
The one question that most intrigues scientists is the one that is answered so
enchantingly in the laughter of a child on the playground. Do animals experience
beneficial rewards from all this play? Was Pigface, the basketball-swatting turtle,
actually bubbling an aquatic “ahriiight” after each slam dunk into the water lilies?
90 Indeed, some scientists are reluctant to classify any animal behaviour as play
until they have studied it exhaustively. Among cats there is a phenomenon some
researchers have called “play of relief,” in which a young feline flings its catch
savagely about for an hour or more. To some this activity appears to be a
celebration. But is it more than just play? Does it have something to do with a
95 predator’s prewired survival mechanisms being forced into overload?
Similarly, are otters repeatedly sliding down a snowy bank into the water
having fun? Or is zooming down the slope just a response to the terrain built into
otter brains as a successful locomotion trick for an otherwise land-impaired
species?
100 Field biologists often see such a distinction as hairsplitting. They view an
otter on a water slide as analogous3 to, say, a kid charging gleefully around the
school yard, waving a stick. In defining play, says Marc Bekoff, “you can call it
peanut butter or chicken soup, but there’s no mistaking it.”

Douglas Harbrecht

2
hone—refine
3
analogous—comparable

Reprinted with permission from the September/October 1993 issue of International Wildlife magazine. Copyright 1993 by the
National Wildlife Federation.

5
 II. Read the poem below and answer questions 10 to 15 on pages 24 and 25.

THE FACTORY HOUR

The sun up through a blue mist

draws its own tide: this is the factory hour.
As I drive east, I pass dozens like myself
waiting on the curb for buses, for company crummies,1
5 for car pools; grey plastic lunch buckets,
safety boots, old clothes. All of us pulled
on the same factory tide.

The plant’s parking lot

is the dock; the small van of the industrial caterers
10 has opened at the furthest gate through the fence: coffee, cigarettes,
sandwiches. Walking in through the asphalt yard
we enter the hull of the vessel.

The great hold is readying itself for the voyage. Steam

rises slowly from the acid cleaning tanks
15 near the small parts conveyor and spray booth.
We pass to the racks of cards; sudden clang of machine shears
but otherwise only the hum of voices, generators, compressors.
Click and thump of the cards at the clock. The slow movement
of those already changed into blue coveralls.

20 The hooter sounds, and we’re cast off. First coughs

and the mutter of the forklift engines.
Then the first rivets shot home in the cab shop’s metal line.
Air hoses everywhere connected, beginning to hiss, the whir
of the hood line’s drills. The first bolts are tightened:
25 the ship underway on the water of time.

1
company crummies—train cars

6
 Howl of the routers:2 smell of fibreglass dust.
Noise of the suction vacuum, the cutter, the roar
of dollies trundled in for a finished hood. And the PA endlessly calling
for partsmen, for foremen, for chargehands:
30 Neil Watt to Receiving please, Neil Watt.
Jeff Adamanchuck to Sheet Metal.
Dave Giberson to Gear Shop . . . to Parts Desk . . . Sub-Assembly.

The hooters marking the half-hours, the breaks,

the ship plunging ahead. The PA sounding
35 Call 1 for the superintendent; Call 273; Call guardhouse; Call switchboard.
Lunch at sea: sprawled by the hoods in ordinary weather
or outside at the doors to the parts-yard if fine; whine of the fans
and the constant shuttling of the forklifts
show that the ship still steams. Then the hooter
40 returns us back to the hours of eyebolts,
grilles, wiring headlamps, hoodguides, shaping and
sanding smooth the air-cleaner cutouts. On and on
under the whir of the half-ton crane, rattle of the impact wrench,
grating of new hood shells as they are dragged onto a pallet.

45 To the last note of the hooter: the boat returned to its City
a final lineup at the timeclock, and out through the doors
to the dockside parking lot. Late afternoon:
I drive into the tide of homebound traffic, headed west now
still moving into the sun.

Tom Wayman

2
routers—machines that cut metal

“The Factory Hour” by Tom Wayman, Did I Miss Anything? Selected Poems 1973–1993, Harbour Publishing, 1993.

7
 III. Read the excerpt from a novel below and answer questions 16 to 24 on
pages 26 and 27.

The narrator of this excerpt is a dog named Boy. Here, he recounts one of his
experiences with a cat.

from A DOG’S LIFE

This excerpt is unavailable.

Mayle, Peter. A Dog’s Life. New York: Vintage Books, 1995, pp. 100–105.

8
Illustration by Edward Koren. In A Dog’s Life. By Peter Mayle. New York: Vintage Books, 1995. Reproduced with permission from
Edward Koren.

This excerpt is unavailable.

9
This excerpt is unavailable.

10
 IV. Read the excerpt from a novel below and answer questions 25 to 27 on page 28.

This novel is set in the distant future, on an Earth where Tripods—huge, three-
legged machines that control people’s minds—have ruled for as long as anyone
can remember. To escape becoming a slave to the Tripods forever, Will Parker,
the 13-year-old narrator, journeys across Europe. In this excerpt, he has arrived
in the White Mountains of Switzerland, a region outside the control of the Tripods,
of which Will had been informed by a traveller named Ozymandias.

from THE WHITE MOUNTAINS

A long, difficult, and dangerous journey, Ozymandias told me. So it proved.

And with a hard life at the journey’s end. He was right in that, too. We have
nothing in the way of luxury, and would not want it if we could: minds and bodies
must be kept taut and trim for the tasks that lie ahead.
5 But there are wonders, of which our new home itself is the greatest. We live not
only among the White Mountains but inside one of them. For the ancients built a
Shmand-Fair1 here, too—six miles long, rising a mile high through a tunnel hewn
out of solid rock. Why they did it, for what great purpose, we cannot tell; but now,
with new tunnels carried still farther into the mountain’s heart, it provides us with a
10 stronghold. Even when we came to it, in summer, there was snow and ice around
the opening to the main tunnel, and it emerges to a place that looks over a river of
ice, inching its way down between frozen peaks to be lost in the distance. But
inside the mountain, the air is no more than cool, protected as we are by the thick
layers of rock.
15 There are viewing points where one can look out from the side of the mountain.
Sometimes I go to one of these and stare down into the green sunlit valley far
below. I can see villages, tiny fields, roads, the pinhead specks of cattle. Life looks
warm there, and easy, compared with the harshness of rock and ice by which
we are surrounded. But I do not envy the valley people their ease.
20 For it is not quite true to say that we have no luxuries. We have two: freedom,
and hope. We live among men whose minds are their own, who do not accept the
dominion of the Tripods and who, having endured in patience for long enough, are
even now preparing to carry the war to the enemy.
Our leaders keep their counsel, and we are only newcomers and boys—we
25 could not expect to know what the projects are, or what our part in them may be.
But we shall have a part, that is certain. And another thing is certain, too: in the end
we shall destroy the Tripods, and free men will enjoy the goodness of the earth.

John Christopher
1
Shmand-Fair—train
From THE WHITE MOUNTAINS by John Christopher. Copyright © 1967 John Christopher; copyright renewed © 1995 John
Christopher. Reprinted by permission of the author and the author’s agents, Scovil Chichak Galen Literary Agency, Inc.

11
 V. Read the magazine article below and answer questions 28 to 35 on
pages 29 and 30.

OF DUCKS, TRUCKS AND BUCKS

When I dropped out of the rat race I was after something more than the endless
pursuit of money, the constant echo of bucks, bucks, bucks. I was lured by another
dream, the grail1 of rural self-sufficiency. Not that I was ever granted the whole
utopian vision, mind you — just glimmerings of a life lived closer to nature. There
5 was always, of course, the problem of making that living, of financing the dream.
I don’t need to take up space here describing the urban/suburban treadmill or
the environmental, social and psychological messes created by modern civilization.
Just read the daily news. By the age of twenty-one I knew enough to start looking
for something better.
10 I jumped cold-turkey from the hothouse of academia into the granitic2 soil of
New Hampshire, one of North America’s most economically depressed areas. Land
was cheap because the former generations of farmers had given up and moved on.
A fellow ex-student had sunk his borrowed fortune into a large chunk of wooded
hillside for a co-operative homesteading venture and was seeking willing bodies
15 to help flesh out his vision. I came full of theories about gypsy economics,3
constructive anarchism4 and apocalyptic survival.5 But I had no money, no useful
trade.
I took a job on the district highway crew, manning the street sweeper unit which
the old boys dragged over the undulating6 roads of the county, and which spewed
20 road grime over me, head to toe, for $2.17 per. I drove to work in a yellow lemon
of a Karman-Ghia that I bought from a 14-year-old boy for $140. It was my first
car. It worked fine until I decided to treat it to a quart of high-quality detergent oil.
The detergent action dissolved whatever carbonaceous glop was holding the pistons
together and the car promptly died. It was a sign. As were the eleven days and
25 nights of rain that dismal spring. I counted them off like Noah7 watching the end of
the world.
On day 12 I left my drenched dreams behind and took off for California with
thirty dollars in my pocket and another gleam in my eye: the riches to be made
in the sunny, booming West. I figured that with a big bank account, I could better
30 cushion the rocky landing on my next sojourn back to the earth. But the California
cities, I found, were not made of gold.

1
grail—something earnestly pursued
2
granitic—firm and unyielding
3
gypsy economics—living off the land by migrating from place to place
4
constructive anarchism—a political theory that stresses voluntary cooperation and individual freedom
5
apocalyptic survival—living through global disaster
6
undulating—rising and falling like waves
7
Noah—in the Bible, Noah builds a boat so that he and his family can escape from drowning in a flood.

12
 After two years of odd jobs as an unskilled urban labourer-house painter, clerk,
gas jockey, parking valet — I dreamed up a new way to get back to nature. On the
inside track, so to speak. I would go back to my books and find nature in literature.
35 The bonus would be a paying job, a career as a teacher. And I might even find a
nice pastoral place to settle down. According to this latest conception, nature was
mostly a state of mind, an aesthetic quality of life; and so “self-sufficiency” was
confined to the status of financial equilibrium.
Drawn by the compelling beauty of the rugged Northwest, I came to British
40 Columbia for more university study. The setting proved apt for delving into the
rich natural resources of Canadian literature — an entity which, until registration, I
didn’t know existed. Upon graduating two years later, I discovered that a Master’s
degree in English is worth exactly as much as the paper spelling it out. But I finally
landed a job in the midst of a nature more vast and remote, yet also more human,
45 than I had yet imagined.
I was hired by a school board in northern Quebec to teach junior high students
in an Inuit village. I ended up learning more than I taught. In that wild, white
world the people had no ducks, few trucks and fewer bucks. What they did have
was an attitude, a history, a culture based on living with nature, in nature, of
50 nature. I would not, however, describe them as “primitive.” Their own nature was
warm, friendly, infinitely patient and optimistic — and above all, adaptable. Their
history is full of change, of using what practical things come to hand — from
whalebone, to steel knives, to flour and tea, to rifles and snowmobiles, to aircraft
and development corporations. With every innovation comes a compromise with
55 a former, “more natural” way of life. The Inuit are no longer self-sufficient, in
material terms. Yet in bearing, in outlook, in grounding in the matter of survival in
an always challenging environment, they are supremely self-reliant. I learned that
when I saw the hunters using knives to operate on skidoos in open-air surgery at 40
below in the middle of nowhere.
60 I left the North with a new appreciation of what it means to live on the land, with
renewed resolve to try it myself, and with the capital required to begin. I bought
a share of a land co-op in the interior mountains of B.C. and started carving a
homestead out of the bush.
My skills in the basics of rural living were still negligible. Tapping neighbors
65 for help and advice, I cleared a driveway and laid a waterline; cleared space for a
garden, orchard and house; built a woodshed and temporary chicken coop number
one. Then came housebuilding — a project which would take seven years.
For the first three years I paid little attention to schemes for making money.
When my savings account finally ran dry, I had to start hustling. There were a few
70 useful trades I’d learned by experience, and some others to learn from scratch. I
hired myself out as carpenter, stonemason, firefighter, treeplanter.
In the meantime I was joined by two other people at home — Sarah, and a baby
daughter. Now money earned meant time spent away from family as well as from
the lagging house construction. I began to look closer at ways to work at home:
75 both to generate income and to produce what I would otherwise buy.

Continued

13
 Short of pure self-sufficiency, I’ve found instead a place in a fabric of
interdependence. It seems neither possible nor desirable to produce every food,
every tool here — either on the homestead, or in the nearby community. Barter,
home business, homestead production, paying jobs all play a part. It is efficient to
80 grow all one’s vegetables, plus extra garlic, and then to sell the garlic and buy grain,
which is not so easy to grow here. Another example: Sarah has designed box labels
in exchange for the products they advertise — apples and a kitchen stool. And
after gaining experience building rock walls for our own house, we were both hired
to build a planter for a local artist who’d received a bed-full of lilies in trade for a
85 painting.
Sometimes the tradeoffs are inefficient, sometimes unexpected. Take the case
of the ducks. We ordered ducklings from a distant supplier to raise for eggs,
manure, and slug-control. Instead of being shipped direct as arranged, they had to
be rescued from town, two hours away. I drove, let’s see, truck number four (we’ve
90 gone through six) and on that trip the transmission disintegrated, losing its last
gear at the foot of the driveway. The ducks lived on to trample the garden, before
succumbing to the hawks. Then there’s the story of the donkey we bought to save
on truck use. Several months later we watched in complete surprise as she gave
birth. The next year we recovered mama’s original cost by selling the young jenny
95 — or rather, trading her, for two ducks, some truck repairs and a bit of cash.
Living on the land doesn’t usually pay well, but then it’s more than an
occupation. It’s a relationship with the natural world. It takes a commitment to
a lowered level of consumption which can only help in reducing the total human
impact on the fragile planet. The learning process goes on, gradual and endless. If
100 the homestead books don’t yet balance, I’ll keep on tinkering with the equation,
seeking the right combination of ducks, trucks and bucks, keeping the larger
balance at heart.

Nowick Gray

Gray, Nowick. “Of Ducks, Trucks and Bucks.” NeWest Review, June/July 1989. Reproduced with permission from Nowick Gray.

14
 VI. Read the poem below and answer questions 36 to 39 on page 31.

Dana Moran

I was in such a hurry to get out of school

That I took a shortcut.
I dropped out.
Now I work full-time at the local K Mart
5 Putting out stock,
Handling the register,
Dealing with the crazy customers
Who hassle me about returns,
Who cut the line,
10 Who think I cheat them by ringing up
the wrong prices.
Taking stock of what I’ve done
I see that the shelves of my life are kinda empty,
Bare, in fact.
15 When will it register that
There are no express lines to happiness?
I am such a fool.
Check it out.

Mel Glenn

Glenn, Mel. “Dana Moran.” In Class Dismissed II. New York: Clarion Books, 1986. Reproduced with permission from Mel Glenn.

15
 VII. Read the essay below and answer questions 40 to 44 on page 32.

I WISH FOR A LITTLE STREET MUSIC

THERE are times when this city seems actually to disapprove of people. In gloomy
moments, I think we are allowed to stay alive here but not to live, much less to enjoy
ourselves or take pleasure in what we see when we look out of our windows or walk
around our streets. If we have the fortitude to get up out of bed in the morning and
5 get going to face the day, we should also have the freedom to rejoice, and I think
the freedom to rejoice is being denied us when our senses are dulled at every turn
by streets that are inimical1 when they are not simply sad. Tonight at seven o’clock,
I stood at the corner of Forty-fourth Street and Broadway waiting for the light to
change. It is a crowded place there, where a huge fenced-in parking lot occupies the
10 site of the recently executed Astor Hotel. Broadway is dying, but the big street still
looks much as it has looked for some time now — a garish2 architectural shambles
with cheap shop fronts and a few movie houses. At seven o’clock, in summertime,
the celebrated lights had not yet begun to stretch and lift and distort the scene into
night’s dazzling skeleton of what might have been if Broadway, the entertainment
15 center, had been able to prove her own importance. The people crowding the
sidewalks moved steadily, jostling along like sheep in a pen that has no end, except
that this Broadway pen must have had an end, because some of the people were
coming back. They seemed to be the same people coming back. Not that the crowd
was faceless but that there was a common expression — not passive, not alert, not
20 expectant, not disappointed: a crowd expression that conveyed nothing because it
said nothing. There were few, if any, tourists in the crowd, and it was not a holiday
night, not even a weekend night. The people on the sidewalks were ordinary New
Yorkers after working hours. I thought to myself: All these people are sheep and I
am a sheep. Somebody behind me gave a push, but I did not look around, for fear
25 they might become angry and push me again. Instead, I watched the light and I
thought: There are too many people in this world. I looked up. Over there the pale
moon was rising to meet the night. At that moment I wished very much for a little
street music: a man with a melodeon, or a brass band, or a piper, or a barrel organ,
or a person with a big voice and a tuneful song — something surprising and friendly.
30 The light changed and I started across Broadway along with the rest of the people
who had been waiting. I was about halfway across when I heard a wild shout of
“Father, Father!” and a young man ran forward so that I only saw his back. He was
a very tall young man, fat and untidy in a tweed jacket that was too short for him,
and gray flannel trousers, and he ran as awkwardly as though he had seven arms and
35 seven legs to control instead of only two of each. He seemed to be keeping all his
knees high in the air, and he held one arm up, like Mercury.3 Then I saw, on the

1
inimical—unfriendly
2
garish—excessively decorated
3
Mercury—in Roman mythology, Mercury was a god who delivered messages.

16
 corner, a middle-aged man standing alone with his hands clasped patiently in front
of him. The middle-aged man was not very tall, and he was very thin and trim
and distinct in a dark blue suit, a white shirt, and a dark tie. His face was pale,
40 and his expression was solemn and almost stern. When he caught sight of his
son, he pursed his lips into an odd smile that was half formal and half shy, and he
extended his hand very formally in greeting. But then, as the son ran up and took
his hand, the father couldn’t help himself and he began grinning. The son bent and
kissed his father, who kissed him back, and as they moved from the corner I saw
45 that the son wasn’t a young man at all but a young boy, not more than fifteen years
old, maybe sixteen, and that he wasn’t fat but simply growing in all directions
at once. His hair was rumpled, and as he talked, gesticulating with his arms and
chattering at full speed, he kept putting one big hand flat on the top of his head and
holding it there, hoping not to grow another inch just yet, I suppose. He wore big
50 spectacles, and his face was red and shiny. He had his father’s brown eyes and his
father’s straight, narrow nose and perhaps his father’s serious mouth, but it was
hard to tell about that, because he was smiling and talking so much. They moved
along slowly, going north, when suddenly the son remembered something more he
wanted to say, and he scrambled around in front of his father and started all over
55 again, talking and waving his arms and getting in the way just as he must have
often done not long ago, when he was a small boy. The father stared admiringly
up at his son, hearing every word, and you could see that what he longed for was
to have the chance, just once again, to pick his child up and walk a few steps with
him in his arms. And it would have taken very little to cause that boy to embrace
60 his father and whirl him around in the air. What a funny trick Time had played
on those two — or was it a trick of Light that made the son so big while the father
remained the size he had been? It was as though some cameraman had enlarged a
picture of the child and left the father life-size. They got themselves side by side
again and went on up the avenue and were lost to my view in the crowd that was
65 gathered outside the Criterion Theatre. I think they were going to have dinner
someplace. Maybe they went to the Howard Johnson’s at Forty-sixth Street. That
is a nice place, especially if you get near the window, so that you can look out at
the crowd passing and see that at a little distance there are no sheep on Broadway.

Maeve Brennan

“I wish for a little street music” from THE LONG-WINDED LADY by Maeve Brennan. Copyright © 1998 by The Estate of Maeve
Brennan. Reprinted by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

17
 VIII. Read the excerpt from a novel below and answer questions 45 to 52 on
pages 33 and 34.

The novel is set in a futuristic land called Senedu. Duff and Gen are two teenage
boys who are close friends. In this excerpt, they are exploring the shafts that
circulate air through the underground caverns of Senedu.

from GUARDIAN OF THE DARK

Air shaft-crawling had been a fine, daring thing to do in their younger days, but
Duff was in line for an apprenticeship as a toolmaker — one of the most respected
skills in Senedu. Duff was ready to settle into the pattern expected of him. Being
caught in the air shafts could change all that.
5 “I shouldn’t have asked you to come. If they catch us you’ll lose your
apprenticeship.” Gen hesitated. “You stay here. I’ll go alone.”
Duff laughed. “Sure! Think of the trouble you could get into without me!  You
have as much sense as a grey-wing.”  Attracted by the light, grey-wings often burned
themselves to death in oil lamps. “No, I’m coming. But we’ll have to stop this
10 soon, you know.”
“I know.” There was tension in Gen’s voice. A brooding look came over his
angular face.
In two weeks Gen would come of age, with a ceremony sure to bore the life out
of everyone under the age of twenty. He would be named Co-Guardian with his
15 father. After that, Gen’s time would be even less his own. Four servants would
watch his every move and nag him about every appointment. He wouldn’t be able to
see Duff. Official duties would drive a permanent wedge between the friends. Gen
was determined to squeeze the last bit of companionship out of the time remaining to
them. Wandering the air shafts was the best possible way to spend that time.
20 There was something compelling about the endless maze of narrow passages
carrying fresh air from room to room. Even five seasons of furtive1 exploration had
not revealed all their secrets to the boys. Directions became confused in the
darkness. It was impossible to tell what little-used storage chamber or dusty cul-de-
sac2 lay around the next bend. This was far different from their everyday world, in
25 which every corridor had been numbered and known from their earliest years.
“How did you get your father’s servants off your back this time?” Duff asked.
“I told them we needed absolute privacy to study. We weren’t to be disturbed.”
Duff frowned. “I’ve been wondering lately. What if there’s a reason for the air
shafts being off limits?”
30 “There is a reason,” Gen said. “The adults can’t go there!”

1
furtive—secret
2
cul-de-sac—a street that is closed at one end

18
 The tunnels were too narrow a fit for fully grown men. The Guardian’s servants
could not follow Gen in.
Duff chuckled. “All right, turnip-brain. Just promise you’ll turn back in thirty
minims. We can’t afford to be late for Truth Time again! We’re still on report for
35 the last time.”
“I promise. Are you coming or aren’t you?”
“Eat my dust, dirt-worm!”
Gen grinned in the dim light from the grille. “Not that way. I’m tired of that
tunnel. This way!”
40 Duff obligingly turned in the narrow space, twisting his skinny body around.  It
was more difficult to navigate the air tunnels than it used to be. The boys were
getting bigger, their bony elbows and knees outgrowing the small passages before
their curiosity had been exhausted. Still, Gen and Duff were adept at moving
quickly in confined spaces, and they had soon left the more familiar shafts behind.
45 What Gen found in the dark tunnels was an illusion of freedom, not the real
thing. And not just because he had to go back to classes, chores, an endless round
of duties. Senedu was a closed world. The green caverns, where crops were grown
under light-giving lenses, led to the kitchens and the dining chambers. The study
halls led to the artisans’ workshops and the meeting rooms. The sleeping chambers
50 led to the games rooms. All of them led to the Hall of Waters — the enormous
underground lake that furnished their carefully measured drinking water. None of
the corridors led anywhere else. The boys might become disoriented in the air
passages, but they could not really get lost. They had only to loosen a grating and
drop through into a familiar chamber or corridor. Wherever they went, they would
55 be in Senedu, their known world. Because beyond Senedu, there was nothing. The
doors were sealed. There was no way out.
To Gen and Duff, the word Sky was something to be memorized for a test — a
cavern larger than any other. Gen suspected sometimes that it had never existed,
that it was a story the adults liked to tell. The controlled caverns of Senedu — the
60 cool rock against Gen’s hands as he crawled, the dust in his nose, the glimmer of oil
lamps through the gratings as Gen and Duff slipped quietly past — these things were
real and familiar. Too familiar!
The boys squeezed past a rockfall. Sharp corners of stone bit into Gen’s hands.
He welcomed the sensation. The corridors of Senedu had no sharp edges, no litter,
65 no surprises. Even if the Vandals disturbed the order, the destruction they left was
soon mended. Order, Balance, Rules — that was Senedu.

Bev Spencer

Excerpt from Guardian of the Dark. Copyright © 1993 by Bev Spencer. Reprinted by permission of Scholastic Canada.

19
 IX. Examine the cartoon below and answer questions 53 to 55 on page 35.

ZITS

Jerry Scott and Jim Borgman

20
 Grade 9 Achievement Test
English Language Arts
Part B: Questions
Questions Booklet
Description
Part B: Reading of the Grade 9 English
Language Arts Achievement Test has
2 booklets:
• the Questions Booklet, which contains
55 questions
• the Readings Booklet, which contains
9 selections
This test was developed to be
completed in 75 minutes; however, you
may take an additional 30 minutes to
complete the test.
You may write in this booklet if you find
it helpful. Make sure that your answers
are placed on the answer sheet.
2008
21
Instructions
• Be sure that you have a Questions
Booklet and a Readings Booklet.
• You may not use a dictionary, a
thesaurus, or other reference materials.
• Turn to the last page of the Questions
Booklet. Carefully fold and tear out the
machine-scored answer sheet along the
perforation.
• Make sure that the number of the
question on your answer sheet matches
the number of the question you are
answering.
• Read each question carefully, and
choose the correct or best answer.
Example
A word that is used to name a person,
place, or thing is called
A. a verb
B. a noun
C. an adverb
D. an adjective
Answer Sheet
• Use only an HB pencil to mark your
answer.
• If you change an answer, erase your first
mark completely.
• Try to answer every question.
 I.
I. Read the magazine article “Games Animals Play” on pages 13 to 35 of
andyour
answer
Readings
questions Booklet
1 to 9. and answer questions 1 to 9.

1. Context suggests that the phrase “endearing anecdotes” (lines 19 to 20) means

A. informational articles
B. historical legends
C. charming stories
D. tall tales

2. Which of the following animal play behaviours illustrates what researchers consider
as “mock chasing” (line 26)?

A. Monkeys that “play leap-frog” (line 29)

B. Otters that “love king-of-the-hill” (line 30)
C. Young hyenas that “engage in tug-of-war contests” (line 30)
D. Young vampire bats that “play tag” (line 31)

3. In context, the statement “nature is getting the maximum benefit at minimum cost”
(line 52) suggests that animals spend very little time in play that resembles

A. hunting animals of other species

B. battling animals of the same species
C. escaping from becoming prey to animals of other species
D. seeking entertainment among animals of the same species

4. In lines 62 to 65, the writer’s observation that harbour seals “don’t like being
touched” (lines 58 to 59) is reinforced by John Lawson’s recounting of a

A. public event
B. planned activity
C. personal experience
D. scientific experiment

5. In lines 58 to 70, the writer presents examples of how play provides

animals with an opportunity to learn how to

A. live in harmony with animals of other species

B. participate in activities with animals of other species
C. interact appropriately with members of their own species
D. survive without the companionship of members of their own species

Continued

22
1
6. In context, the statement “Such social play is signalled in a variety of ways”
(line 79) provides a

A. figurative comparison
B. practical suggestion
C. specific example
D. logical transition

7. The questions presented in lines 94 to 99 reinforce the idea that scientific research
into the play behaviour of animals involves a degree of

A. conflict
B. urgency
C. uncertainty
D. competition

8. This magazine article conveys the idea that animal play behaviour is similar
to children’s

A. athletic contests
B. educational activities
C. recreational pastimes
D. imaginary adventures

9. Which of the following quotations presents the main idea of the magazine article?

A. “ Full of new interest in ball-whacking turtles, monkeys splashing one

another, and moose chasing windblown leaves, scientists are looking
beyond the endearing anecdotes to more controlled studies of just why
animals play” (lines 18–20)

B. “ Ground-breaking evidence from University of Idaho zoologist John

Byers and others suggests that animals play the hardest when their brain
cells and nervous systems are developing the most rapidly” (lines 42–44)

C. “ Maxeen Biben, a zoologist who studied primate play at the National

Institutes of Health in Washington, D.C., says play for young monkeys is
a way to get experience in social roles ‘without getting killed or injured’ ”
(lines 71–73)

D. “ Indeed, some scientists are reluctant to classify any animal behaviour as

play until they have studied it exhaustively” (lines 90–91)

23
2
 II. Read the poem “The Factory Hour” on pages 46 and 57 of
II. and answer
your Readings
questions
Booklet 10 answer
and to 15. questions 10 to 15.

10. In lines 1 to 7, the poet establishes a sense of the workers’ being

A. hurriedly gathered by an urgent need

B. steadily drawn by a powerful force
C. preoccupied with their thoughts
D. concerned about their families

11. In lines 13 to 19, the portrayal of the atmosphere within the factory is most
strongly enhanced by the poet’s use of

A. imagery
B. hyperbole
C. foreshadowing
D. personification

12. In context, the phrases “first rivets shot home” (line 22) and “the whir / of the hood
line’s drills” (lines 23 to 24) evoke a sense of

A. enduring strength
B. rising momentum
C. restrained movement
D. intense concentration

13. In the poem, the “hooter” (lines 20, 39, and 45) serves to

A. provide a goal for the workers

B. signal a change in daily activity
C. ensure the safety of the workers
D. indicate the completion of a particular task

Continued

24
3
14. In which of the following quotations does the poet use alliteration to reinforce the
busy atmosphere of the factory?

A. “ Noise of the suction vacuum, the cutter, the roar / of dollies trundled in for a
finished hood” (lines 27–28)

B. “ Lunch at sea: sprawled by the hoods in ordinary weather / or outside at the

doors to the parts-yard if fine” (lines 36–37)

C. “ and the constant shuttling of the forklifts / show that the ship still steams”
(lines 38–39)

D. “ under the whir of the half-ton crane, rattle of the impact wrench, / grating of
new hood shells” (lines 43–44)

15. In this poem, the speaker equates the experience of working in the factory with

A. being on a voyage
B. travelling back in time
C. exploring the unknown
D. navigating through traffic

25
4
 III.
III. Read the excerpt from the novel A Dog’s Life on pages 68 to 810ofand answer
your Readings
questions
Booklet 16 answer
and to 24. questions 16 to 24.

16. Boy suggests that “a popular misconception” (line 8) about cats arises from the
difference between

A. thought and action

B. appearance and reality
C. wisdom and experience
D. idealism and practicality

17. The details “moving with infinite menace” (line 23), “frozen with terror” (line 24),
and “a lethal weapon poised to strike” (line 31) serve to

A. establish the sequence of events

B. accelerate the pace of the action
C. enhance the plausibility of the setting
D. dramatize the description of the situation

18. Context suggests that the word “unsavory” (line 36) means

A. outdated
B. awkward
C. unreliable
D. distasteful

19. In which of the following statements does Boy use hyperbole in the depiction
of events?

A. “ The plan was to give the dangling tail a sudden yank and see if our ginger
visitor could break the world record for unassisted flight by getting out of the
garage without touching the ground” (lines 38– 40)

B. “ But much to my irritation, the end was just out of reach, even at full stretch
on my hind legs” (lines 40– 41)

C. “ I was pacing back and forth, mulling over tactics and determined to preserve
the element of surprise, when I felt that I was being watched” (lines 41– 43)

D. “ It’s a knack I have, a kind of extrasensory perception developed during the

old days of living rough and dodging brooms, and it hasn’t failed me yet”
(lines 43– 45)

Continued

26
5
20.
20. The
The cat’s reaction to “the full treatment” (line 51) is one of
20. The cat’s
cat’s reaction
reaction to
to “the
“the full
full treatment”
treatment” (line
(line 51)
51) is
is one
one of
of
A.
A. terror
terror
A.
B. terror
wariness
B.
B. wariness
wariness
C.
C. displeasure
displeasure
C.
D. displeasure
indifference
D.
D. indifference
indifference

21.
21. The
The quotation
quotation “I
“I snarled; II barked; I foamed at the mouth with blood lust”
21. The
(linequotation
52) “I snarled;
containssnarled; I barked;
barked; II foamed
foamed at
at the
the mouth
mouth with
with blood
blood lust”
lust”
(line
(line 52)
52) contains
contains
A.
A. alliteration
alliteration
A.
B. alliteration
symbolism
B.
B. symbolism
symbolism
C.
C. onomatopoeia
onomatopoeia
C.
D. onomatopoeia
personification
D.
D. personification
personification

22.
22. The phrase
The phrase “the
phrase “the management”
“the management” (lines
management” (lines 19
(lines 19 and
19 and 86)
and 84)
86) refers to
refers to
to
22. The
22. 86) refers
A.
A. aaa society
society that
that protects
protects animals
animals in
in need
need
A.
B. society
the peoplethat
whoprotects
own animals
the in
residence need
B. the
B. the people
people who own
wholive the
owninthe residence
residence
C.
C. other
other cats
cats that
that live in the
the area
area
C.
D. other
other cats
dogs that
thatlive
livein the
nearbyarea
D. other dogs that live nearby
D. other dogs that live nearby

23.
23. The
The opinion
opinion that
that “The cornered opponent with nowhere to go is not to be trusted”
23. The opinion
(lines 72 to thatis“The
73) “The cornered
cornered
supported by
opponent
opponent
the
with
with nowhere
description nowhere
of the cat
to
toingo
go is
is not
lines not to
to be
be trusted”
trusted”
(lines 72 to 73) is supported by the description of the cat in lines
(lines 72 to 73) is supported by the description of the cat in lines
A.
A.
A. 61
61 to 64
A.
B. 61 to
to 64
64
B.
B. 66
66 to
to 67
67
B.
C. 66
81 to 67
82
C.
C. 79
81 to
to 80
82
C.
D. 81
88 to
to 82
90
D.
D. 86
88 88
D. 88 to
to 90
90

24.
24. Throughout this excerpt, the writer’s main purpose is to
24. Throughout
Throughout this
this excerpt,
excerpt, the writer’s main
the writer’s main purpose
purpose is
is to
to
A.
A. present
present the
the reader
reader with
with information
information about
about dogs
dogs and
and cats
cats
A.
B. present
persuade the reader
the with
reader to information
have empathy about
for dogsand
dogs andcats
cats
B.
B. persuade
persuade the
the reader
reader to
to have
have empathy
empathy for
for dogs
dogs and
and cats
cats
C.
C. inform
inform the
the reader
reader of
of the
the challenges
challenges of
of owning
owning aa dog
dog
C.
D. inform the
entertain reader of
the reader the challenges
with the of
antics of a dog a dog
owning
D.
D. entertain
entertain the
the reader
reader with
with the
the antics
antics of
of aa dog
dog

66
276
 IV.
IV. Read the excerpt from the novel The White Mountains on page 911ofand answer
your
questions Booklet
Readings 25 to 27.and answer questions 25 to 27.

25. Which of the following quotations contains a metaphor?

A. “ a hard life at the journey’s end” (line 2)

B. “ minds and bodies must be kept taut and trim for the tasks” (lines 3–4)
C. “ a place that looks over a river of ice” (lines 11–12)
D. “ the pinhead specks of cattle” (line 17)

26. The narrator does not envy the valley people their comfortable lifestyle
because they

A. live in fear
B. lack freedom
C. are preparing for war
D. have a low standard of living

27. This excerpt mainly focuses on

A. plot
B. setting
C. conflict
D. characterization

28
7
 V. Read the magazine article “Of Ducks, Trucks and Bucks” on pages 10
V. 12 to 12
14 of
and answer
your questions
Readings Booklet28 to 35.
and answer questions 28 to 35.

28. Details in lines 1 to 5 reveal that the writer values

A. living in a city
B. material comforts
C. intellectual pursuits
D. interacting with nature

29. As the writer begins his new life as a homesteader (lines 10 to 17), he lacks

A. practical training
B. enthusiasm
C. cheap land
D. ideas

30. The quotation “the car promptly died. It was a sign. As were the eleven days
and nights of rain” (lines 24 to 25) reveals that the writer most likely viewed this
situation as

A. an indication of future events

B. a reflection of past events
C. a simple coincidence
D. a pleasant surprise

31. Context suggests that the word “pastoral” (line 36) means

A. modern
B. small
C. clean
D. rural

Continued

29
8
32. In which of the following statements does the writer establish that he has achieved
a sense of balance in his life?

A. “ Now money earned meant time spent away from family as well as from the
lagging house construction” (lines 73−74)

B. “ I began to look closer at ways to work at home: both to generate income and
to produce what I would otherwise buy” (lines 74−75)

C. “ Short of pure self-sufficiency, I’ve found instead a place in a fabric of

interdependence” (lines 76−77)

D. “ It seems neither possible nor desirable to produce every food, every tool
here — either on the homestead, or in the nearby community” (lines 77−78)

33. The writer’s contention that “Sometimes the tradeoffs are inefficient, sometimes
unexpected” (line 86) is illustrated in examples of his experiences with

A. building rock walls and constructing a planter

B. ordering ducks and purchasing a donkey
C. controlling slugs and repairing trucks
D. growing vegetables and selling garlic

34. Throughout this magazine article, the writer describes his search for

A. personal contentment
B. intellectual challenges
C. human companionship
D. memorable adventures

35. This article could best be described as

A. fictional
B. historical
C. instructional
D. autobiographical

30
9
 VI. Read the poem “Dana Moran” on page 13 of your Readings Booklet and
VI. answer questions
Read the 36 to Moran”
poem “Dana 39. on page 15 and answer questions 36 to 39.

36. The poet’s use of parallel structure in lines 5, 6, and 7 reinforces the speaker’s
perception of

A. the insensitivity of the employer

B. the monotony of the tasks performed
C. having to fulfill unreasonable expectations
D. needing to resolve overwhelming emotions

37. The repetition of the word “who” in lines 8, 9, and 10 best serves to

A. add emphasis
B. enhance imagery
C. create alliteration
D. exaggerate details

38. The poet’s use of the word “register” (line 6 and line 15) involves

A. a play on words
B. a figurative comparison
C. an exaggerated meaning
D. an exclamatory expression

39. The speaker’s tone throughout the poem is best described as

A. remorseful
B. exhausted
C. anxious
D. angry

10
31
 VII.
VII. Read the essay “I Wish for a Little Street Music” on pages 14
16 and 15
17 of
andyour
Readings Booklet 40
answer questions andtoanswer
44. questions 40 to 44.

40. The writer’s use of figurative language to reinforce the depiction of the declining
beauty of Broadway is evident in the words

A. “ crowded” (line 9) and “fenced-in” (line 9)

B. “ executed” (line 10) and “dying” (line 10)
C. “ big” (line 10) and “shambles” (line 11)
D. “ cheap” (line 12) and “few” (line 12)

41. The statement “At that moment I wished very much for a little street music”
(lines 27 to 28) conveys the writer’s belief that music

A. is a tradition on Broadway
B. is of high quality on Broadway
C. would provide a contrast to the atmosphere on Broadway
D. would keep the crowds moving along smoothly on Broadway

42. The words “gesticulating” (line 47), “chattering” (line 48), “smiling” (line 52), and
“waving” (line 55) most strongly evoke a sense of the son’s

A. determination
B. enthusiasm
C. innocence
D. sincerity

43. In this essay, the writer expresses the concern that people in big cities

A. lead hectic lives

B. lack joy in their lives
C. treat one another unkindly
D. live in crowded surroundings

44. Considering the entire essay, the concluding statement in lines 66 to 68 suggests
that the writer has

A. undertaken a personal challenge

B. gained a sense of self-confidence
C. undergone a change in perspective
D. recalled a long-forgotten experience

11
32
 VIII.
VIII. Read the excerpt from the novel Guardian of the Dark on pages 16
18 and 17
19 of
and
your Readings
answer Booklet
questions and answer questions 45 to 52.
45 to 52.

45. Details in lines 1 to 6 establish an atmosphere that is mainly one of

A. dreariness
B. tranquility
C. foreboding
D. contentment

46. Which of the following quotations best reveals that Gen will not have any privacy
once he becomes Co-Guardian with his father?

A. “ After that, Gen’s time would be even less his own” (line 15)

B. “ Four servants would watch his every move and nag him about every
appointment” (lines 15–16)

C. “ He wouldn’t be able to see Duff” (lines 16–17)

D. “ Official duties would drive a permanent wedge between the friends”

(line 17)

47. Details in lines 20 to 25 reveal that Duff and Gen consider “their everyday world”
(line 24) to be

A. orderly and predictable

B. intriguing and unusual
C. bewildering and dull
D. busy and exciting

48. Gen’s reaction to being called “turnip-brain” (line 33) and “dirt-worm” (line 37) by
Duff reflects the

A. closeness of their friendship

B. impulsiveness of their actions
C. distinctness of their personalities
D. competitiveness of their relationship

Continued

12
33
49. In lines 47 to 56, Senedu is described as a world that is

A. endlessly vast
B. densely populated
C. highly open-ended
D. completely self-contained

50. The statement “To Gen and Duff, the word Sky was something to be memorized for
a test” (line 57) most clearly reveals the

A. ineffectiveness of their study strategies

B. inadequacy of their formal education
C. limits of their personal experience
D. hardships of their daily lives

51. In lines 59 to 62, Gen’s familiarity with the “controlled caverns of Senedu”
(line 59) is reinforced through the writer’s use of

A. imagery
B. metaphor
C. hyperbole
D. personification

52. Crawling in the air shafts provides Duff and Gen with an opportunity to

A. explore the underground caverns of Senedu

B. travel outside the boundaries of Senedu
C. receive the admiration of their friends
D. seek adventure in their lives

13
34
 IX. Examine the cartoon “Zits” on page 18 of your Readings Booklet and answer
IX. questions 53 to
Examine the 55. “Zits” on page 20 and answer questions 53 to 55.
cartoon

53. The humour of the father’s statements in frames 3, 4, and 5 stems from his use of

A. hyperbole
B. personification
C. contrasting images
D. literal comparisons

54. This cartoon focuses on the issue of

A. parental authority
B. individual identity
C. emotional security
D. personal responsibility

55. The message in the cartoon is enhanced mainly because the

A. content is serious
B. illustrations are amusing
C. audience may see truth in the situation
D. audience realizes the situation rarely occurs

14
35
 Part B: Reading—2008 Test Blueprint and Item Descriptions

The following blueprint shows the reporting categories and language functions by which
questions were classified on the 2008 Grade 9 English Language Arts Achievement Test.

Question Distribution by
Language Function Number and
Question Distribution by
Proportion of
Reporting Category Narrative /
Informational Questions
Poetic
Identifying and Interpreting Ideas and
2
Details
28 10 23
17 Questions
29 12 26
Students construct meaning by
30 13 46
interpreting ideas and details pertaining (31% of Part B:
32 16 48
to setting/atmosphere/context, character/ Reading Total)
33 20 50
narrator/speaker (actions, motives,
41
values), conflict, and events.
Interpreting Text Organization

Students identify and analyze literary

genres. Students identify and analyze the 4 11 11 Questions
36
text creator’s choice of form, tone, point 6 14
37
of view, organizational structure, style, 35 17 (20% of Part B:
51
diction, rhetorical techniques (e.g. 42 21 Reading Total)
repetition, parallelism), text features (e.g.
alliteration, imagery, foreshadowing,
suspense), and conventions.
Associating Meaning

Students use contextual clues to 1 15 11 Questions

25
determine the denotative and connotative 3 18
38
meaning of words, phrases, and figurative 31 19 (20% of Part B:
53
language (e.g. simile, metaphor, 40 22 Reading Total)
hyperbole, personification, irony,
symbolism).
5
Synthesizing Ideas
7 24
49 16 Questions
8 27
Students draw conclusions and make 52
9 39
generalizations by integrating information 54 (29% of Part B:
34 45
in order to identify the tone, purpose, 55 Reading Total)
43 47
theme, main idea, or mood of a passage.
44
22 Questions 33 Questions Part B: Reading
Total
Number and Proportion of Questions
(40% of Part B: (60% of Part B: 55 Questions
Reading Total) Reading Total) (100%)

36
The table below provides information about each question: the keyed response, the
difficulty of the item (the percentage of students who answered the question correctly),
the reporting category, the language function, and the item description.

Diff. Reporting Language

Question Key Item Description
% Category Function
Associating Determine the meaning of a phrase by using
1 C 43.2 Informational
Meaning contextual clues in a magazine article.
Recognize from details the meaning of a
Ideas and
2 D 78.8 Informational phrase in a magazine article that describes
Details
animal behaviour.
Use contextual clues to determine the
Associating
3 D 51.2 Informational meaning of a statement in a magazine article
Meaning
that describes animal behaviour.
Text Identify how a writer’s observation is
4 C 77.5 Informational
Organization reinforced in a magazine article.
Integrate information in two paragraphs of a
Synthesizing
5 C 74.6 Informational magazine article in order to draw a
Ideas
generalization from examples presented.
Identify the rhetorical function of a
Text
6 D 35.7 Informational statement used by a writer in a magazine
Organization
article.
Determine the idea that questions in a
Synthesizing
7 C 69.1 Informational magazine article reinforce reading scientific
Ideas
research into behaviour of animals.
Integrate information in a magazine article
Synthesizing
8 C 65.2 Informational to determine a similarity between the
Ideas
behaviour of animals and that of children.
Integrate information to identify a quotation
Synthesizing
9 A 74.3 Informational that presents the main idea of a magazine
Ideas
article.
Infer from details what the poet establishes
Ideas and Narrative /
10 B 60.3 about factory workers in the opening lines
Details Poetic
of a poem.
Identify the literary technique that most
Text Narrative /
11 A 73.6 strongly enhances the description of the
Organization Poetic
atmosphere of a factory in a poem.
Ideas and Narrative / Determine what context suggests phrases in
12 B 66.5
Details Poetic a poem evoke about work in a factory.
Ideas and Narrative / Identify what a detail in a poem serves to
13 B 70.9
Details Poetic suggest regarding work in a factory.
Recognize a quotation from a poem in
Text Narrative /
14 C 58.0 which the poet uses alliteration to reinforce
Organization Poetic
the busy atmosphere of a factory.
Determine the central metaphor used to
Associating Narrative /
15 A 78.7 describe working in a factory that is
Meaning Poetic
developed throughout a poem.
Infer from details what the speaker in an
Ideas and Narrative /
16 B 68.3 excerpt from a novel suggests about the
Details Poetic
character of cats.

37
 Diff. Reporting Language
Question Key Item Description
% Category Function
Recognize the rhetorical effect of key
Text Narrative /
17 D 77.0 phrases used to describe a situation in an
Organization Poetic
excerpt from a novel.
Determine from context the meaning of a
Associating Narrative /
18 D 74.3 word used by the narrator to describe a cat
Meaning Poetic
in an excerpt from a novel.
Identify a quotation in which the narrator in
Associating Narrative /
19 A 67.3 an excerpt from a novel uses hyperbole in
Meaning Poetic
the depiction of events.
Infer from details in an excerpt from a novel
Ideas and Narrative /
20 D 42.2 what is suggested about a cat’s reaction to
Details Poetic
events described.
Text Narrative / Recognize the literary technique employed
21 C 42.0
Organization Poetic in a quotation from an excerpt from a novel.
Infer from context the meaning of a phrase
Associating Narrative /
22 B 83.6 used by the narrator in an excerpt from a
Meaning Poetic
novel.
Identify the details used to describe a cat in
Ideas and Narrative /
23 C 63.1 an excerpt from a novel that support the
Details Poetic
opinion presented by the narrator.
Integrate information in an excerpt from a
Synthesizing Narrative /
24 D 82.1 novel to draw a conclusion regarding the
Ideas Poetic
writer’s main purpose.
Associating Narrative / Recognize the use of a metaphor in a
25 D 49.3
Meaning Poetic quotation from an excerpt from a novel.
Infer from details in an excerpt from a novel
Ideas and Narrative /
26 B 61.9 the narrator’s attitude toward a group of
Details Poetic
people.
Integrate information to identify the literary
Synthesizing Narrative /
27 B 58.6 element that constitutes the main focus of an
Ideas Poetic
excerpt from a novel.
Identify what the opening lines of a
Ideas and
28 D 63.1 Informational magazine article suggest about the writer’s
Details
values.
Determine from details in a magazine article
Ideas and
29 A 67.1 Informational what the writer suggests he lacks in his new
Details
life as a homesteader.
Recognize what a quotation in a magazine
Ideas and
30 A 68.3 Informational article reveals about the writer’s perspective
Details
on a given situation.
Determine from context the meaning of a
Associating
31 D 43.7 Informational word used by the writer in a magazine
Meaning
article to describe a location.
Identify a statement in which the writer of a
Ideas and
32 C 47.1 Informational magazine article establishes that he has
Details
achieved a sense of balance in his life.
Recognize examples of the writer’s
Ideas and
33 B 67.1 Informational experiences that illustrate a contention
Details
presented in a magazine article.

38
 Diff. Reporting Language
Question Key Item Description
% Category Function
Draw a conclusion regarding the main idea
Synthesizing
34 A 75.6 Informational developed by the writer throughout a
Ideas
magazine article.
Text Identify the literary genre best used to
35 D 76.8 Informational
Organization describe a magazine article.
Recognize how a rhetorical technique in
Text Narrative / three lines of a poem reinforces the
36 B 70.1
Organization Poetic speaker’s perception of his or her
circumstances.
Text Narrative / Determine the effect of the poet’s repetition
37 A 66.8
Organization Poetic of a word in a poem.
Associated Narrative / Recognize the figure of speech employed in
38 A 44.9
Meaning Poetic the writer’s word choice in a poem.
Synthesizing Narrative / Recognize the tone of the speaker in a
39 A 61.0
Ideas Poetic poem.
Identify the words used by the writer of an
Associating
40 B 52.9 Informational essay to figuratively reinforce the depiction
Meaning
of Broadway’s declining beauty.
Determine what a statement in an essay
Ideas and
41 C 67.8 Informational reveals about the writer’s perception of
Details
Broadway.
Recognize how the diction used by the
Text
42 B 74.2 Informational writer in an essay evokes a sense of the
Organization
character of an individual described.
Draw a conclusion regarding the main
Synthesizing
43 B 52.8 Informational concern expressed by the writer throughout
Ideas
an essay.
Consider the essay as a whole to form a
Synthesizing
44 C 70.4 Informational generalization about what the concluding
Ideas
statement reveals about the writer.
Form a generalization from details in two
Synthesizing Narrative /
45 C 43.9 paragraphs of an excerpt from a novel about
Ideas Poetic
the atmosphere created by the writer.
Identify a quotation that best reveals a
Ideas and Narrative /
46 B 69.7 feature of a character’s circumstances in an
Details Poetic
excerpt from a novel.
Generalize from information in a paragraph
Synthesizing Narrative /
47 A 57.8 how characters in an excerpt from a novel
Ideas Poetic
perceive their environment.
Interpret what details in specified phrases
Ideas and Narrative /
48 A 60.7 from an excerpt from a novel suggest about
Details Poetic
the relationship between two characters.
Examine the imagery in a descriptive
Synthesizing Narrative /
49 D 67.9 passage in an excerpt from a novel to make
Ideas Poetic
a generalization about the setting.
Determine what details in a statement in an
Ideas and Narrative /
50 C 64.9 excerpt from a novel reveal about the
Details Poetic
circumstances of two characters’ lives.

39
 Diff. Reporting Language
Question Key Item Description
% Category Function
Analyze how the writer’s use of a literary
Text Narrative /
51 A 66.7 technique reinforces characterization in an
Organization Poetic
excerpt from a novel.
Integrate information in an excerpt from a
Synthesizing Narrative /
52 D 60.1 novel to make a generalization about the
Ideas Poetic
main idea underlying events presented.
Recognize the figure of speech used to
Associating Narrative /
53 A 50.0 enhance the humour of a character’s
Meaning Poetic
statements in three frames of a cartoon.
Synthesizing Narrative / Draw a conclusion regarding the main issue
54 D 84.3
Ideas Poetic upon which a cartoon focuses.
Synthesizing Narrative / Form a generalization regarding how the
55 C 73.3
Ideas Poetic message in a cartoon is enhanced.

40