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DURING READING
GUIDED PRACTICE Have students discuss how they would use the strategy to answer the following question.
What does the museum do with the artifacts it cannot display?
INDEPENDENT PRACTICE After students answer the following test question, discuss the process they used to find information.
Dr. Feinman states that artifacts can get damaged. What is one cause of damage to artifacts?
Use the Strategy
  1. Read the test question and make sure you understand what it is asking.
  2. Scan the selection for an interview question that relates to the information being asked in the test question.
  3. Read the interviewee's response. Look for details in the response that will help you answer the test question.
USE QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS Explain that students may be asked to read interviews and answer questions about them on standardized tests. They can use the question-and-answer format to find information quickly and answer the test questions correctly. Provide the following strategy.
TEST PRACTICE
Strategies
for Nonfiction
Main Idea
This selection is mostly about how the museum chooses what to display and how it takes care of its objects.
CONNECT TEXT TO TEXT
Reading Across Texts
Discuss the kinds of things Prudy collected in her museum and the kinds of things Dr. Feinman collects in his museum. Write their ideas on the board for students to organize into a chart.
Writing Across Texts Help students set up a chart. Some charts they can use include a Venn diagram (Graphic Organizer 17) or a three-column chart
(Graphic Organizer 26).
Tapa bark cloth from Papua New Guinea
DR. F: Yes. Some objects are just
too easily damaged. Some can be
harmed by getting too hot or
too cold. Others may be harmed
by bright light or by air that is too
moist or too dry. Moths or other
insects can ruin cloth items
and baskets.
LK: Are there any objects that you
would like to display but can’t?
DR. F: Our permanent displays all
have certain themes. If an object fits
in with that theme, we try to put it
on display.
LK: With so many interesting and
unusual objects, how do you
decide which to put on display?
Mask from Cameroon
DR. F: We have a full-time staff to
care for our collection. They make
sure the objects are stored properly.
The Field Museum is building an
underground collections center.
This center will allow the museum
to store objects safely. Caring for
the collection is like caring for one’s
health. It is better to avoid problems
than to look for a cure after big
problems arise.
LK: Sounds like a real problem.
How do you protect these objects?
Mask from Cameroon
Mask from Cameroon
Tapa bark cloth from Papua New Guinea
Mask from Cameroon
Mask from Cameroon
Tapa bark cloth from
Papua New Guinea

Woven basket of the
Wappo Indians
    Reading Across Texts
How are Prudy’s Museum and the
Field Museum of Natural History
alike? How are they different?

Writing Across Texts Make
a chart in which you show how
the two museums are alike
and different.
Woven basket of the Wappo Indians
Woven basket of the Wappo Indians
Mask from Cameroon
Woven basket of the Wappo Indians
Woven basket of the Wappo Indians
Main Idea
What is this selection mostly about?
 
   
Close  
ELL
Test Practice Direct students' attention to one page of the interview. Show them how they can identify the interviewer's questions by the bold text. Explain that the questions work like a title—they tell what the answer will be about. Read the Guided Practice question aloud. Go through the selection with students, stopping at each of the interviewer's questions and asking if that question asks about information asked in the practice question. When they successfully identify the correct interview question, have them read the answer and point out details that help them answer the question. Then have them write a short response to the question.