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 Advanced Comprehension Skills: Cloze Passages Book 1

Contents
Introduction v

Heroes & Villains

UNIT 1 The portrayal of heroes and villains 1
UNIT 2 Nick Kyrgios: hero or villain? 4
UNIT 3 Aboriginal heroes 7
UNIT 4 Terry Fox 10
UNIT 5 The heroic work of charity 13

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UNIT 6 Charles Ponzi: the world’s biggest crook? 16
UNIT 7 Edna Adan and Catherine Hamlin: women fighting for women’s health 19
UNIT 8 The crime of the century 22
UNIT 9 The bandit queen 25
UNIT 10 Nelson Mandela

Animalia

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UNIT 11 The impact of the COVID pandemic on wildlife
UNIT 12 The art of deception
UNIT 13 The amazing Argentine ant
UNIT 14 Why fish are colourful
UNIT 15 Living on the edge
UNIT 16 Bees good, wasps bad?
UNIT 17 They live where?
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UNIT 18 Australian dinosaurs 52
UNIT 19 From billions to zero 55
UNIT 20 The keystone species of the Arctic 58

History
UNIT 21 Deathly practices 61
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UNIT 22 The king buried in a car park 64

UNIT 23 The grand Inca empire 67
UNIT 24 Asia’s great conquerors 70
UNIT 25 The warrior state 73
UNIT 26 Money money money 76
UNIT 27 Celebrate the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge! 79
UNIT 28 Start your engine! 82
UNIT 29 A 10-storey skyscraper 85
UNIT 30 Lights, camera, action! 88

Answers 93
Image credits 124

© Five Senses Education Pty Ltd and Tysan Allen & Janelle Ho
 Advanced Comprehension Skills: Cloze Passages Book 1

Introduction
In this reading comprehension book, students read a non-fiction text in which
numbered gaps indicate where full sentences have been removed. These sentences
have been added to a randomised list, displayed after the text. In this list of deleted
sentences, there is a ‘distractor’ sentence left over which is not used in any of the gaps.

A number of reading comprehension skills are required in this activity:

„„ summarising the main idea of paragraphs within the text
„„ identifying the text organisation structure, both in terms of the overall text

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structure, as well as the paragraphs within a text
„„ understanding vocabulary, including jargon
„„ disregarding non-essential information
„„ using context clues to support inferences
„„ understanding grammatical structures

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„„ skimming and scanning to find key information.

A guide to approaching the questions

1. Skim
Skim the text to understand the overall topic of the text and how it is structured.
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2. Main idea
Summarise the main idea of each paragraph. Annotating the main idea in the margin
can be a useful way to sort through information and connect to the sentences that
are closely related.

3. Context clues
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Once students have narrowed a gap down to the sentences connected to the main
idea, they should carefully use context clues to select the best fit. Students should not
just focus on the paragraph itself, but also read backwards and forwards carefully—
there are clues in the passage both before and after the gap.

4. Elimination
It is a good idea to cross out the sentence option, once students have chosen which
best fits the gap.

The skills covered in this chapter will help students implement these steps.

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Advanced Comprehension Skills: Cloze Passages Book 1

Text structure
Text structure refers to how the ideas in a non-fiction text are organised.
Understanding these patterns of organisation will help students see how ideas
develop throughout the text. It is important to note that the organisational structure
may change throughout a text, and it can even change within a paragraph.

In a cloze passage activity, actively looking for the text organisation structure can
help students predict what has been deleted by:
„„ summarising the main idea of a text or paragraph accurately

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„„ understanding how ideas are developed throughout a text
„„ accurately identifying context clues or key words that fit the pattern of organ-
isation
„„ looking for grammatical features such as pronouns and connectives that will
help determine the correct answer.

1. Chronological
2. Spatial
3. Procedural
4. Cause and effect
5. Compare and contrast
6. Problem and solution.
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The main patterns of organisation are:
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1. Chronological
A chronological pattern focusses on the ‘when’. Texts organised chronologically
follow a timeline of events. Often biographical and historical themed texts are
organised in this manner.

Look out for: Specific dates.

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Example: Ash Barty was born in 1996 in Queensland, Australia. She first started
playing tennis at the age of four. Even as a young child, she showed great talent, and
even started playing against male adults by the time she was 12 years old. In 2011,
at the age of 15, Barty won the junior Wimbledon title, announcing her potential
to the world stage. After a hiatus in 2015, Barty returned to the professional tour
with a bang in 2016. After steadily working her way up the rankings, Barty has won
two Grand Slam singles titles. She lifted the Roland Garros trophy in 2017, won
Wimbledon in 2021, and has become a stalwart at the top of the rankings, reaching
the coveted number one spot.

vi © Five Senses Education Pty Ltd and Tysan Allen & Janelle Ho
 Advanced Comprehension Skills: Cloze Passages Book 1

ANIMALIA UNIT 11
„„ Six sentences have been removed from the following text. Seven sentences marked A – G are provided.
Choose the one that fits correctly into each of the six gaps marked 1– 6. There will be one sentence left over.

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The impact of the COVID
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pandemic on wildlife
I n 2020, the COVID-19 virus spread infection, illness and death at speed.
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Governments ordered their people to stay home, sometimes for weeks on end.
Seemingly, in the blink of an eye, nearly all the world came to a standstill. 1. ____
The term ‘The Great Pause’ was used in the media to describe this slowdown of human
movement and economic activity. However, a group of researchers wanted a more
scientific term to refer to this point in history. In an article in the journal Nature Ecology
& Evolution, they introduced the term ‘anthropause’, a neologism ‘to refer specifically to
a considerable global slowing of modern human activities, notably travel’.

2. ____ With the drastic fall in noise and air pollution and fewer people in parks and
reserves, how would wildlife respond? There were many accounts of wild animals out
on city streets during lockdown. An elephant sealion was found on a street in a Chilean
seaside town and helped back to the water. Wild mountain goats wandered through the
empty streets of Llandudno in Wales and wild boar did the same in Barcelona.

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Advanced Comprehension Skills: Cloze Passages Book 1

While these sightings were fun for humans, there was good news for wildlife that
might have a longer-term impact. The number of wildlife deaths caused by vehicles
declined dramatically. 3. ____ For example, in ‘normal times’, many baby green
turtles die because after hatching, they wander towards the lights on the beach
rather than towards the moon over the sea. With less outdoor dining during the
anthropause, more turtles headed in the right direction, thus increasing their
survival rate. 4. ____ This increases the genetic diversity of the groups which
immediately improves their chances of survival.

While the natural assumption is that the ‘disappearance’ of humans can only be
good news for wildlife, this isn’t actually true. 5. ____ In Lopburi, Thailand, the

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monkeys ate the food that the tourists fed them. With no tourists, gangs of monkeys
numbering in the hundreds brawled as they foraged for a reduced food supply.
Similarly, in Nara, Japan, deer in the park who were fed rice crackers by tourists
wandered down the streets of neighbouring towns looking for food.

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6. ____ As a result, poachers have had more freedom for their nefarious activities
while conservation organisations have had trouble raising funds to continue their
work. Many conservation projects had to be cancelled or postponed. On Gough Island
in the South Atlantic, for instance, a program to eradicate invasive mice which were
eating 2 million seabird chicks alive annually was paused. The consequences of this
temporary halt could be devastating.

An outcome of our need to protect ourselves and each other during the pandemic was
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an increase in the number of disposable masks, gloves, gowns and other protective
gear. While these products are necessary to prevent deaths among the human
population, researchers are concerned that their indiscriminate disposal is harming
the animal population. A perch that swam into a glove and died was officially
recognised as the first Dutch victim of COVID waste. Moreover, because animals have
never seen this debris before and they usually use smell and taste to investigate new
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foods, animals have been reported eating masks and gloves. Unfortunately, given
that the number of disposable protective equipment is not going to lessen for a while,
the aftermath could take many years to play out.

The impact of COVID on wildlife will take a long time to research and document.
For now, we can hope that the positive outweigh the bad and crucially, change our
personal behaviour to reduce the negative repercussions we cause.

32 © Five Senses Education Pty Ltd and Tysan Allen & Janelle Ho
 Advanced Comprehension Skills: Cloze Passages Book 1

EXERCISEANIMALIA UNIT 11
„„ Choose the sentences A – G to match the gaps marked 1– 6 in The impact of the COVID pandemic on
wildlife and fill in your answers in the table below. There will be one sentence left over.

A. Some species were adversely affected because their

wellbeing is so closely connected to human activity.

B. Another detrimental impact of the anthropause has been

the inability of regulators and researchers to monitor

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endangered and threatened species in their natural habitats.

C. Scientists wanted to study the consequences of the

pandemic on wildlife.

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D. More significantly, for many species, breeding rates
improved and infant mortality rates declined.

E. There were no vehicles on the roads, no people on city

streets, no planes in the sky.

F. Because of the financial strain caused by the closure of zoos,

many conservation organisations are concerned about the
welfare of animals in captivity.
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G. Another interesting development was that in some places
where highways had cut an animal’s original habitat in half,
the reduced traffic flow enabled the separated groups to
mingle and sometimes rejoin.
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Fill in your answers:

1 2 3 4 5 6

© Five Senses Education Pty Ltd and Tysan Allen & Janelle Ho 33