Read this sentence from "In the Country of Grasses."

Its black linear face with spiraling horns creates the illusion of a primitive mask.

What is the subject of the verb creates?

Read the poem "Mussels in April."

In line 7, the phrase “streaked with silver” modifies

The following item should be answered upon reading Anna and the King which was originally reprinted for the English HSA from Literary Cavalcade, January 2000, by permission of Scholastic Inc. This passage has been removed from the mdk12.org website due to copyright restrictions.

Anna and the King is a screenplay about an English woman, Anna Leonowens, who accepts a position to tutor the son of the King of Siam. During her first encounter with the King, he unexpectedly adds to her responsibilities.

Read this line from the screenplay Anna and the King.

Dearest family, I desire you all to be educated in English language, science, and literature.

Which word is used as a modifier in this line?

Read this sentence from the essay “Ghost Crab.”

Once, exploring the night beach, I surprised a small ghost crab in the searching beam of my torch.

In this sentence, which word is used as a modifier?

Read the essay “Bug, Interrupted.” Then answer the following:

Read this sentence from the essay.

Slowly at first, like dancers drifting onto a dance floor, fireflies begin to wink through the tall grass that rings our field.

Which word is the subject of this sentence?

Read the essay “Rough Road Ahead: Do Not Exceed Posted Speed Limit.” Then answer the following:

Read this sentence from the essay.

About forty miles into the pedal, I arrived at the first “town.”

Which word group is NOT used as a modifier in this sentence?

Read the essay “Down with the Forests.” Then answer the following:

Read this sentence from the essay.

The waitress brought a paper placemat and a paper napkin and took my order, and I paged through the paper.

In this sentence, how are the underlined words used?

Read the essay “A Sea Worry.” Then answer the following:

Read this sentence from the essay.

When the wave dug into the sand, it formed a brown tube or a golden one.

In this sentence, the pronoun it refers to

The following item should be answered upon reading the poem “Good Hotdogs” from My Wicked Wicked Ways by Sandra Cisneros, which can be found at most local or school libraries.

“Good Hotdogs” is a poem about the memory of rushing to the store with a close friend to buy hotdogs after school. The speaker provides many sensory details to describe the experience.

Read lines 1 through 8 from the poem.

What word does line 8, “That smelled like steam,” describe?

Read the article “Titanic’s Tempestuous Afterlife.” Then answer the following item.

Read this sentence from the article.

This combination of stress, cold, and structural imperfections may have caused the ship to snap apart like shattering glass.

The subject of the sentence is

Read the story “Winter Hibiscus.” Then answer the following item.

Read this sentence from paragraph 14 of the story.

As if oblivious to the cold, her mother was still out in the vegetable garden, digging up the last of the onions with a rusty trowel.

Which word is used as the subject of the sentence?

Read the poem “The Gift.” Then answer the following item.

Read the following lines from the poem.

And I recall his hands,
two measures of tenderness
he laid against my face,

In these lines, the word measures is used as a

Read the poem “Hope.” Then answer the following item.

Read lines 35 through 43.

And because the rain came
so patient and slow at first,
and built up strength as the earth
remembered how to yield,
instead of washing off,
the water slid in,
into the dying ground
and softened its stubborn pride,
and eased it back toward life.

In line 43, the pronoun it refers to