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Open Up - Grade 4 - ELA - Module 4 - End of Unit 1 Assessment

By Formative Library
Last updated almost 3 years ago
5 Questions
Directions: Read the text and answer the questions that follow:

On the Front Lines of Justice

When I grew up, the South was segregated. Very much so. Your parents had taught you that you had a place. You knew that much. In the city you had the signs. You have to stay here, you have to drink out of this fountain, you can’t eat at this counter. I thought segregation was horrible.

On the regular buses there were signs on the side saying “Colored” with an arrow this way and “White” with an arrow this way. The motorman could adjust the signs. He could direct people to sit where he wanted them to.

March 2, 1955, I got on the bus in front of the Dexter Avenue Church. I went to the middle. No white people were on the bus at that time. Then the bus began to fill up. White people got on and began to stare at me. The bus motorman asked me to get up. A white lady was sitting across the aisle from me, and it was against the law for you to sit in the same aisle with a white person.

The bus driver looked back through the rearview mirror and again told me to get up. I didn’t. I knew he was talking to me. He said, “Hey, get up!” I didn’t say anything. When I didn’t get up, he didn’t move the bus. He said before he’d drive on, I’d have to get up. People were saying, “Why don’t you get up? Why don’t you get up?” One girl said, “She knows she has to get up.” Then another girl said, “She doesn’t have to. Only one thing you have to do is stay black and die.”

The white people were complaining. The driver stopped the bus and said, “This can’t go on.” Then he got up and said, “I’m going to call the cops.”

I remained there, and [a] traffic patrolman said, “Aren’t you going to get up?”

I said, “No. I do not have to get up. I paid my fare, so I do not have to get up. It’s my constitutional right to sit here just as much as that lady. It’s my constitutional right!” The words just came into my mind.

From Scholastic Scope, January 2003. Copyright © 2003 by Scholastic Inc. Reprinted by permission of Scholastic Inc.
1.

Use the strategies on the Close Readers Do These Things anchor chart to complete this glossary:

L.4.4.a
L.4.4.c
RI.4.6
RI.4.4
L.4.4.b
RI.4.1
2.

Is this a firsthand or secondhand account? (RI.4.6)

RI.4.6
3.

How do you know? (RI.4.6)

RI.4.6
4.

Refer to the “The Girl Who Acted before Rosa Parks” secondhand account that you read in the previous lesson to answer the following questions.

How are the two accounts similar? (RI.4.6)


RI.4.6
5.

Refer to the “The Girl Who Acted before Rosa Parks” secondhand account that you read in the previous lesson to answer the following questions.

How are the two accounts different?


RI.4.6
Source: Open Up Resouces (Download for free at openupresources.org.)