Name: ________________________

Thursday 30th April, 2020 Class: ________________________

Date: ________________________

Time:

Marks: 10 marks

The answers have been included at the bottom to check

Comments: your work when you have finished. Please read the text
and complete the questions first.

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1

The Truth About

Little Miss Muffet
Little Miss Muffet is a well known nursery
rhyme. You may well have heard it before.
There are a number of different versions of
the rhyme but this one is the most popular.

Little Miss Muffet

Sat on a tuffet*,
Eating her curds and whey**,
There came a big spider,
Who sat down beside her
And frightened Miss Muffet away.

*What is a tuffet?
Miss Muffet may have been sitting on a small grassy mound – a tuft of soft grass. Another
possible meaning of a tuffet is a 'three-legged stool'. In some versions of the rhyme, Miss
Muffet is sitting on a cushion or a buffet – a word for stool from the north of England.
**What are curds and whey?
In the process of making cheese, milk is mixed with a substance called rennet. The result
of this is that the milk turns into curds, which are solid like lumps in cottage cheese, and
whey which is a watery liquid.

Who was Miss Muffet?

Miss Muffet was a real person! Her name was Patience Muffet and she was the daughter of a Dr.
Thomas Muffet who lived between 1553 and 1604. Although almost every child in Britain has
heard of Little Miss Muffet, the history books tell us much more about her father than they do
about Patience herself. As well as being a medical doctor, Dr. Muffet was fascinated by the world
of insects and spiders, a subject that people had not studied much up to that time. He wrote two
books:

The Silkwormes and their Flies;

The Theater of Insects and Lesser Living Creatures.

He admired silk worms so much that he was inspired to write the first of these two books in
verse.

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 Why did Miss Muffet run away?
In those days it was thought that spiders could help
cure illness. Some people used to wear a spider in a
nutshell when that had a high temperature and others
believed that swallowing a spider wrapped in a ball of
butter could help them get better. It is thought that Dr.
Muffet was interested in finding out whether spiders
could be used to cure the common cold. It is said that
he used to treat his daughter with spiders when she
was ill.

21. Complete the table about Dr. Muffet.

Name Dr. Thomas Muffet

Year of birth

Occupation/job

Books published 1. The Silkwormes and their Flies

2. The Theater of Insects and

Lesser Living Creatures

Year of death

Name of child
2 marks
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2. When Dr. Muffet wrote his book in 1599, it was described in the following way:

The Silkwormes and their Flies. Lively described in verse by T. M. (Moufet) countrie farmar,
apprentice in physicke...

What is it about the language used that tells you this description was written a long time ago?

___________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________
1 mark

3. How do the cartoon jokes make the reader think differently about the information?

___________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________
2 marks

4. Some of the sentences begin with phrases such as the following:

It is probably truer to say ...

It is thought ...

(a) What do such phrases tell you about (b) Find one more phrase that expressed
the information in these sentences the same idea as the phrases in bold
above.

_____________________________ _____________________________

_____________________________ _____________________________

_____________________________ _____________________________

2 marks

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5. Look at the section called Why did Miss Muffet run away?

Using the information in that paragraph, imagine what Dr. Muffet is saying to Patience, as he is
putting the spoon to her mouth.

2 marks

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6. The Truth About Little Miss Muffet is a collection of short texts written for different purposes.

Which three of the following can be found?

Texts written to:

inform

give instructions

complain

amuse

give an explanation

persuade

1 mark

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Mark schemes

21. Award 1 mark for three correct answers.

Award 2 marks for four correct answers.

Name

Year of birth 1553 (do not accept 1553-1604)

Occupation / job Doctor (accept contrie farmar / apprentice in physicke)

Books published

Year of death 1604

Name of child Patience (do not accept (little) Miss Muffet)

up to 2 marks

2. Award 1 mark for answers that refer to instances of outdated spelling or use of language, eg:

• reference to: silkwormes, countrie, farmar, physicke;

• the spelling is wrong / old-fashioned;

• reference to: lively described, physicke;

• it is not standard English, as we speak it now.

Do not accept close rewordings of the question, eg:

• the language is different from today’s.

1 mark

3. Award 1 mark for answers which refer simply to the comic effect, eg:

• they make you laugh / they are funny;

• they make it more fun to read.

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 Award 2 marks for answers that indicate that different parts of the text affect readers in different
ways / alter the way the reader reacts to the text, eg:

• they make you think it’s not serious / not true;

• the jokes make you see the funny side of the information;

• makes it harder to believe but much more fun to read;

• shows you a different side to Miss Muffet and her father;

• reading about eating spiders might be horrible, but jokes make it less scary.

Do not accept:

• they make it more interesting.

up to 2 marks

4. (a) Award 1 mark for answers referring to the uncertain / speculative nature of the content, eg:

• that they are not facts;

• that they are not quite sure about it;

• that it could just all be rubbish.

1 mark

(b) Award 1 mark for any of the following:

• it was thought;

• it is said;

• no one can be sure;

• perhaps;

• others believed.
1 mark

5. Award 1 mark for answers which suggest that the cure will make Patience better, eg:

• Spiders are good for you;

• You won’t get better unless you take it;

• A spider a day keeps the doctor away!

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 Award 2 marks for answers that reveal fuller use of the specified paragraph, eg:

• If you prefer, Patience, I can wrap it in a ball of butter for you to swallow;

• Here you go Patience, a teaspoon of spider-flavoured butter will make you a lot better;

• It didn’t work in the nutshell, so you’ll just have to swallow it, I’m afraid;

• I’ve been working on this remedy for years, now Patience, please take the required dose;

• Eat up! This may be my breakthrough;

• Be brave. It’s all for the good of modern medicine;

• Nonsense Patience, I concocted this cure especially to treat you when you’re unwell.

Do not accept captions which are not derived from the specified paragraph, eg:

• It won’t taste as bad as you think;

• Two spoonfuls, it says on the bottle;

• Open wide!

• Oh darling, get this down your throat.

up to 2 marks

6. Award 1 mark for all three boxes correctly ticked.

Texts written to:

inform

give instructions

complain

amuse

give an explanation

persuade

1 mark

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