IAR: Grade 8 - ELA
By Sara Cowley
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Last updated over 1 year ago
20 Questions
Read the passage from the novel Confetti Girl . Then answer the questions.
from Confetti Girl
by Diana López
1 Mom always had after-school projects waiting for me. "Can you help decorate cookies?” she’d say. Or, “Go outside and pick some flowers.” Or, “Fix my nails, please.” She loved to paint them, but since she wasn’t coordinated with her left hand, her right-hand nails looked like a preschooler’s coloring page.
2 I guess these projects were chores, but they were fun, too. Now when I come home, I’ve got to sweep, fold towels, or scrub the bathroom sink. Dad helps, but sometimes he makes a big mess.
3 Like today. He’s got flour, potato skins, and crumpled napkins on the counter. The pot boils over with brown scum. And I don’t want to talk to him because I’m still mad about the volleyball game, but I have to know what he’s up to.
4 “What are you doing, Dad?”
5 “Making dinner. Thought I’d give you a break.”
6 Except for game nights, dinner’s my responsibility. I cook while Dad cleans—that’s our rule. And even though I don’t cook as well as Mom did, Dad never complains.
7 “What are you going to make?” I ask.
8 “ Carne guisada and papas fritas .”
9 “You need a recipe for that?”
10 “Are you kidding? I need a recipe for peanut butter sandwiches.”
11 How mad can a girl be at a man who makes fun of himself and wears a green frog apron that says KISS THE COOK and tube socks over his hands for potholders?
12 We clear space on the table. Dinner’s served. The beef’s tough and the papas are mushy, but who cares? I pretend it’s delicious because my dad lets me blabber about the Halloween carnival. He laughs out loud when I describe Vanessa’s potato baby and Ms. Cantu’s creative cascarones, so I don’t complain when I notice he served ranch-style beans straight from the can instead of heating them up first.
13 Everything’s great until he asks about my English class.
14 “Any new vocabulary words?” he wants to know.
15 “I guess. Maybe. Super . . . super . . . super something. Can’t remember.”
16 “Was it supersede ?” he asks. “ Supercilious ? Superfluous ?”
17 “I don’t remember, Dad. It could have been super-duper or super-loop for all I care.”
18 He gets sarcasm from his students all the time so he’s good at ignoring it.
19 “Remember that super is a prefix that means ‘above and beyond,’” he says. “So no matter what the word is, you can get its meaning if you take it apart.”
20 “Okay, Dad. I get it. So did I tell you we’re having a book sale for our next fundraiser?”
21 “What else are you doing in English?” he asks. “Reading any novels?”
22 I sigh, bored, but he doesn’t get the hint. He just waits for my answer. “Yes,” I finally say. “I don’t remember the title, but it’s got a rabbit on the cover.”
23 “Is it Watership Down ? It’s got to be Watership Down .”
24 “Yes, that’s it. But I left it in my locker. I guess I can’t do my homework.”
25 “Nonsense. I’ve got a copy somewhere. Let me look.”
26 He leaves the table to scan the bookshelves, and all of the sudden, I care about the tough beef, the mushy potatoes, and the cold beans. Why should I eat when my own father has abandoned his food? Nothing’s more important than his books and vocabulary words. He might say I matter, but when he goes on a scavenger hunt for a book, I realize that I really don’t.
27 I take my plate to the kitchen, grab my half-finished soda, and head to my room. When I walk past him, he’s kneeling to search the lower shelves. He’s got a paper towel and wipes it lovingly over the titles as if polishing a sports car. He doesn’t hear my angry, stomping footsteps. I catch the last part of his sentence.
28 “. . . a classic epic journey,” he says as if he were in class with a bunch of students. I can’t stand it. I just can’t stand it. I’d rather have Vanessa’s crazy mom.
29 Later, just as I write I love Luís for the three-hundredth time, my dad peeks through my bedroom door.
30 “Found my copy of Watership Down ,” he says, handing me a paperback whose spine’s been taped a dozen times. “How far do you have to read tonight?”
31 “The first four chapters,” I say.
32 “That’s a lot. You better get busy.”
33 “Sure, Dad. I’ll start reading right away.”
34 But I don’t. As soon as he leaves, I put the book on my nightstand and use it as a coaster. The condensation from my soda makes a big, wet circle on the cover.
From CONFETTI GIRL by Diana López. Copyright © 2009 by Diana López. By permission of Little, Brown, and Company.
Read the passage from Tortilla Sun. Then answer the questions.
from Tortilla Sun
by Jennifer Cervantes
1 Clang cla-clang, clang clang. The next morning, I found Mom in the kitchen with a chisel and hammer, chipping away at the kitchen counter. Little flecks of white flew through the air like ceramic snow, landing softly on her olive-colored cheeks.
2 I ducked as a piece of tile flew at me. “Hey!”
3 She turned toward me with a look of surprise. “Morning, Izzy. I didn’t see you standing there.”
4 “Wha . . . what are you doing?” I asked.
5 She stepped back and surveyed the half-demolished counter the way someone stands back to study a newly hung photograph. Wiping her cheek with the back of her hand she said, “There was this”—she searched the mess on the floor—”this one broken tile poking out and I thought I should fix it and . . .”
6 I pushed past her to get the broom but she grabbed me by the elbow. A feeling of nervousness swelled inside me.
7 “Izzy, wait. I have something to tell you.”
8 There it was. My heart buckled in my chest. Something was wrong.
9 Mom leaned back against the counter and sucked in a great gulp of air. “It’s strange actually. I wasn’t expecting it, but then at the last minute the funding came through.” She folded her arms across her waist. “I’m going to Costa Rica to finish my research.”
10 Her words buzzed around me like a swarm of confused bees. “When? For how long?”
11 “I’ll be gone for most of the summer. I leave Tuesday.”
12 Mom wouldn’t leave me. We’d go together. Right? “But that’s only three days away.” I stepped away from Mom and the shards of tile.
13 “I don’t have a choice.”
14 “But what am I supposed to do? That’s three whole months.”
15 “Two. I’ll be home at the end of July. And after this I can finally graduate. Our lives will change then.” She reached over and stroked my hair. “For the better.”
16 I rolled those three words around in my mind: for the better.
17 Suddenly last night’s phone call made perfect sense. I inched closer and pushed at the broken tile with my toes.
18 “Are you sending me to Nana’s?” I asked. “In New Mexico?”
19 A flash of surprise crossed Mom’s face. Like she knew I had heard her phone conversation. “She’s so excited to have you and . . .”
20 “What happened to all your talk about you guys not seeing eye to eye?” I asked.
21 “It’s not that we don’t see eye to eye. We just don’t see the world the same way.”
22 “Why can’t I go with you?” I said.
23 “Izzy . . .”
24 “New Mexico is worlds away from California. And what am I going to do for two whole months with someone I haven’t seen since I was six? That was half my life ago. She’s a stranger!” I felt a sudden urge to bolt for the front door and run.
25 Mom rolled her eyes. “Oh, Izzy. She’s hardly a stranger. She’s family. I already have your ticket. You leave Monday.” Mom opened the refrigerator and took out a diet soda, pressing the cold can against her face before opening it.
26 I stared at the mess on the floor. “Why can’t I stay here? Alone.” My voice quivered.
27 Mom took a swig of her soda, then closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she opened them, she spoke slowly and deliberately.
28 “You’re going to New Mexico and that’s final.”
29 I swallowed hard and tried not to cry. “Why do you always get to decide everything? We just unpacked and I—I had plans.”
30 She raised her eyebrows, surprised. “Plans?”
31 Mom was always bugging me to make friends, which I didn’t see the point of, considering we moved every few months. And we moved for all sorts of reasons: closer to the university for her, better school for me, quieter, prettier, bigger, smaller.
32 "I was going to try and find some girls my age here in the complex so I wouldn't have to be the new kid in school again," I said, trying to sound believable.
33 "Honey, you can make friends at your new school in the fall. Besides, this is a wonderful opportunity for you."
34 "Opportunity? For me? Or for you?"
35 I stormed off to my room and threw myself onto my bed. I ached inside. Like the feeling you get watching a lost balloon float far into the sky until it becomes an invisible nothing.
36 I reached for a story card and scribbled:
37 Gypsy was sent to prison for stealing the magic ball. And when she was tossed into the dungeon below the castle she found the word "opportunity" written across the stone wall.
38 Staring at the card, I wondered what should happen next. Maybe a daring escape or a sorceress could rescue her. When nothing came to me, I scratched out the word opportunity until it was a big blob of blue ink and tossed the card on the floor.
39 I heard Mom's footsteps coming toward my closed bedroom door. I held my breath, hoping she wouldn't knock.
40 Tap. Tap.
41 Silence.
42 "Izzy?" she spoke quietly.
43 My hands wandered beneath my pillow and gripped the baseball I had hidden there. I squeezed my eyes closed and whispered, “I wish I didn’t have to go. I wish I didn’t have to go.”
44 “I’ve brought your suitcase.” She stood outside my door for what seemed like forever. I pictured her on the other side, arms crossed, head down.
45 “I think you’re going to like the village.” Her voice became a little muffled now, like her mouth was pressed right up against the door. “It’s strange and beautiful at the same time and a perfect place to explore. You just might be surprised what you find there.” She paused for a moment then continued. “Would you please talk to me?”
46 I burrowed my head under the pillow with the baseball. A tiny piece of me felt guilty for stealing it, but it belonged to my dad and that made it special. That made it a part of me.
47 “I’ll just leave the suitcase here for you,” she said. Her bare feet slapped against the tile and carried her away.
From Tortilla Sun, © 2010 by Jennifer Cervantes. Used with permission of Chronicle Books LLC, San Francisco. Visit ChronicleBooks.com.
from Confetti Girl
by Diana López
1 Mom always had after-school projects waiting for me. "Can you help decorate cookies?” she’d say. Or, “Go outside and pick some flowers.” Or, “Fix my nails, please.” She loved to paint them, but since she wasn’t coordinated with her left hand, her right-hand nails looked like a preschooler’s coloring page.
2 I guess these projects were chores, but they were fun, too. Now when I come home, I’ve got to sweep, fold towels, or scrub the bathroom sink. Dad helps, but sometimes he makes a big mess.
3 Like today. He’s got flour, potato skins, and crumpled napkins on the counter. The pot boils over with brown scum. And I don’t want to talk to him because I’m still mad about the volleyball game, but I have to know what he’s up to.
4 “What are you doing, Dad?”
5 “Making dinner. Thought I’d give you a break.”
6 Except for game nights, dinner’s my responsibility. I cook while Dad cleans—that’s our rule. And even though I don’t cook as well as Mom did, Dad never complains.
7 “What are you going to make?” I ask.
8 “ Carne guisada and papas fritas .”
9 “You need a recipe for that?”
10 “Are you kidding? I need a recipe for peanut butter sandwiches.”
11 How mad can a girl be at a man who makes fun of himself and wears a green frog apron that says KISS THE COOK and tube socks over his hands for potholders?
12 We clear space on the table. Dinner’s served. The beef’s tough and the papas are mushy, but who cares? I pretend it’s delicious because my dad lets me blabber about the Halloween carnival. He laughs out loud when I describe Vanessa’s potato baby and Ms. Cantu’s creative cascarones, so I don’t complain when I notice he served ranch-style beans straight from the can instead of heating them up first.
13 Everything’s great until he asks about my English class.
14 “Any new vocabulary words?” he wants to know.
15 “I guess. Maybe. Super . . . super . . . super something. Can’t remember.”
16 “Was it supersede ?” he asks. “ Supercilious ? Superfluous ?”
17 “I don’t remember, Dad. It could have been super-duper or super-loop for all I care.”
18 He gets sarcasm from his students all the time so he’s good at ignoring it.
19 “Remember that super is a prefix that means ‘above and beyond,’” he says. “So no matter what the word is, you can get its meaning if you take it apart.”
20 “Okay, Dad. I get it. So did I tell you we’re having a book sale for our next fundraiser?”
21 “What else are you doing in English?” he asks. “Reading any novels?”
22 I sigh, bored, but he doesn’t get the hint. He just waits for my answer. “Yes,” I finally say. “I don’t remember the title, but it’s got a rabbit on the cover.”
23 “Is it Watership Down ? It’s got to be Watership Down .”
24 “Yes, that’s it. But I left it in my locker. I guess I can’t do my homework.”
25 “Nonsense. I’ve got a copy somewhere. Let me look.”
26 He leaves the table to scan the bookshelves, and all of the sudden, I care about the tough beef, the mushy potatoes, and the cold beans. Why should I eat when my own father has abandoned his food? Nothing’s more important than his books and vocabulary words. He might say I matter, but when he goes on a scavenger hunt for a book, I realize that I really don’t.
27 I take my plate to the kitchen, grab my half-finished soda, and head to my room. When I walk past him, he’s kneeling to search the lower shelves. He’s got a paper towel and wipes it lovingly over the titles as if polishing a sports car. He doesn’t hear my angry, stomping footsteps. I catch the last part of his sentence.
28 “. . . a classic epic journey,” he says as if he were in class with a bunch of students. I can’t stand it. I just can’t stand it. I’d rather have Vanessa’s crazy mom.
29 Later, just as I write I love Luís for the three-hundredth time, my dad peeks through my bedroom door.
30 “Found my copy of Watership Down ,” he says, handing me a paperback whose spine’s been taped a dozen times. “How far do you have to read tonight?”
31 “The first four chapters,” I say.
32 “That’s a lot. You better get busy.”
33 “Sure, Dad. I’ll start reading right away.”
34 But I don’t. As soon as he leaves, I put the book on my nightstand and use it as a coaster. The condensation from my soda makes a big, wet circle on the cover.
From CONFETTI GIRL by Diana López. Copyright © 2009 by Diana López. By permission of Little, Brown, and Company.
Read the passage from “Emerald Ash Borer.” Then answer the questions.
from “Emerald Ash Borer”
by Department of Energy and Environmental Protection
1 The emerald ash borer is a small, green beetle that belongs to a large family of beetles known as the buprestids, or metallic wood boring beetles. The description is apt, as many of the adult buprestids are indeed glossy, appearing as if their wing covers are made of polished metal. The emerald ash borer, with its green, iridescent wing covers, fits right in. Adult EABs are between 0.3 to 0.55 inches in length—small by most standards but large compared to other buprestids—and relatively slender.
2 During its life cycle, EAB undergoes a complete metamorphosis. It starts as an egg, becomes a larva (alternatively called a grub), and then changes to become a pupa and then an adult. The life cycle of an EAB takes either 1 or 2 years to complete. Adults begin emerging from within ash trees around the middle of June, with emergence continuing for about 5 weeks. The female starts laying her eggs on the bark of ash trees about 2 weeks after emergence. After 7 to 10 days, the eggs hatch and the larvae move into the bark, to begin feeding on the phloem (inner bark) and cambium of the tree. Throughout each of its successive instars (larval growth stages), the larva continues to feed within this same part of the tree. The larval stage may last for nearly two years. Before becoming an adult, the insect overwinters as a pre-pupal larva. It then pupates in the spring and emerges as an adult during the summer.
3 EAB feeds strictly on ash trees. The larvae feed on the phloem and cambium, while the adults feed on leaves. In Connecticut, there are three species of ash trees—the white ash ( Fraxinus americana ), the green or red ash ( F. pennsylvanica ) and the black ash ( F. nigra ). Despite its common name, mountain ash ( Sorbus spp.) is not a true ash and does not attract the EAB.
4 Two other buprestids are well-known to those in Connecticut who are concerned about trees. The bronze birch borer is a pest of ornamental birch trees. The two-lined chestnut borer often attacks stressed oak trees, including oaks in the forest.
Why is EAB a Problem?
5 EAB is an insect that is not native to North America. It was first found in 2002 in the vicinity of Detroit, MI, and Windsor, ON. It had arrived sometime within the several years previous, presumably on woody packaging materials. It is now known to be found in 12 states. It is considered to be established in several of the upper Midwest states where it was first found. Movement of ash, in particular ash nursery stock and ash wood in the form of firewood, logs and wood packaging materials, has been cited as a likely means by which EAB has been assisted in its spread. More recently, strict regulations have been initiated to prevent the movement of these materials from infested areas.
from Emerald Ash Borer by Department of Energy and Environmental Protection—Public Domain
Read the article “Elephants Can Lend a Helping Trunk.” Then answer the questions.
Elephants Can Lend a Helping Trunk
by Virginia Morell
1 Elephants know when they need a helping hand—or rather, trunk. That’s the conclusion of a new study that tested the cooperative skills of Asian elephants ( Elephas maximus ) in Thailand and showed that the pachyderms understand that they will fail at a task without a partner’s assistance. The ability to recognize that you sometimes need a little help from your friends is a sign of higher social cognition, psychologists say, and is rarely found in other species. Elephants now join an elite club of social cooperators: chimpanzees, hyenas, rooks, and humans.
2 To test the elephants’ cooperation skills, a team of scientists modified a classic experiment first administered to chimpanzees in the 1930s, which requires two animals work together to earn a treat. If they don’t cooperate, neither gets the reward. For the elephants, the researchers used a sliding table with a single rope threaded around it. Two bowls of corn were attached to the table, but the elephants could reach them only by pulling two ends of the rope simultaneously. Working with mahout—Asian elephant trainers—trained elephants at the Thai Elephant Conservation Center in Lampang, the researchers first taught individual animals to pull the rope with their trunks. The 12 elephants were then divided into six pairs, and each pair was released to walk to their waiting ropes. If one animal pulled the rope before the other, the rope would slip out, leaving the table—and treats—in place. “That taught them to pull together,” says Joshua Plotnik, a postdoc in experimental psychology at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom and the lead author of the study, which appears online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences .
3 To find out if the elephants understood that they needed one another’s assistance, the researchers upped the challenge by releasing the elephants at different times. Thus, one elephant would arrive at the table before the other and would have to wait for a partner to show up before pulling the rope. “They learned to do this faster than the chimpanzees,” says Plotnik. “They would stand there holding their end of the rope, just waiting.” In another experiment, the partner’s rope was placed out of reach. “When the partner couldn’t do anything, the other one would just give up,” Plotnik says. That shows the elephants understood why the partner was needed, he adds.
4 “These are clever experiments,” says Karen McComb, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Sussex in the United Kingdom who studies social cognition in wild elephants. The findings are consistent with observations in nature, she says. For instance, in East Africa biologists have seen elephants work together to lift a fallen companion with their tusks. “It’s particularly striking that the elephants were able to inhibit pulling” longer than chimpanzees do, says comparative psychologist Nicola Clayton of the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. She and her team showed that rooks, too, could pass a similar dual-rope exam, although they failed to wait. The study “adds to the growing body of evidence that elephants show some impressive cognitive abilities.”
“Elephants Can Lend a Helping Trunk” by Virginia Morell, from Science , March 2011 issue. Copyright © 2011 by American Association for the Advancement of Science. Reprinted by permission of AAAS.
Read the passage from a study on elephants. Then answer the questions.
from “Elephants Know When They Need a Helping Trunk in a Cooperative Task”
by Joshua M. Plotnik
General Setup of the Experimental Apparatus.
1 The table apparatus was comprised of two pieces of plywood painted and bolted to a rectangular PVC pipe frame 3.3 m wide and 1.2 m deep. The table was placed 4 m beyond two trees, and three wooden planks set in the ground ensured smooth movement of the table. A 7-m-wide volleyball net was strung between the two trees, anchored by two strong, taut wire ropes, forming a transparent but impassable barrier between the elephants and the table. In training trials, a single piece of rope, ≈6 m in length, was clipped to the front of the table and fed through a metal ring set in the ground beneath the net. Elephants could approach this rope and pull, drawing the table toward them. A wooden post embedded in the ground (replete with rubber shock absorber made from old tires) served as a stopper that prevented the table from advancing past the net. To keep the table centered as it was pulled in, a ≈2.5-cm-thick wire rope—running perpendicular to the volleyball net—was strung from the buried table stopper, through the central PVC pipe of the table's frame, and then fixed to a tree on the central axis beyond the table. This rigid guide cable prevented any skewing of the table and thus eliminated incongruities in food availability. Two red food bowls were attached to wooden boards, 50 cm in length, one on each side of the table; as the table reached the stop point, the two bowls became available to the elephant just under the net. In test trials, a single piece of 16.5-m-long, 1-cm-thick hemp rope was threaded through guides and around the back and two sides of the PVC frame so that the loose ends appeared out of two openings on either side of the front of the table. Each side's rope end was then threaded through a metal ring set in the ground underneath the net, leaving 1.6 m of rope available to each elephant upon approach.
2 To demarcate the test area, from each of the two central trees was strung a single, flagged green rope ≈1.5 m above the ground and reaching back 10 m behind the net to the release point. During testing and control trials, a third flagged rope was strung down the center of the test area, dividing it into two equally wide lanes (3.5 m); thus, each elephant was released into a single lane and had access only to a single rope end. These two lanes are similar to the separation between subjects in some previous studies (6), but not others, in which subjects were allowed to move around (e.g., refs. 5, 7, and 11). Because of the sheer size of the elephants and their regular, free-contact interaction with the experimenters and mahouts between trials, these lanes were necessary for safety reasons, whereas they did not prevent the elephants from reaching over to their partner or their partner's food bowl. The lanes did not seem to compromise the elephant's ability to learn the experimental task contingencies.
3 All data were coded from two video cameras. A Panasonic PV-GS500 miniDV camera was fixed to a metal mount on a 7-m-long bamboo ladder, which was hoisted on pulleys between the two trees to a height ≈8 m above the ground. This camera's view was monitored on the ground via closed-circuit television. A second camera, a Canon HV20, was placed on a tripod beyond the table, providing a heads-on view of the elephants.
Procedure
4 In training trials, a mahout would walk with his elephant to the single available rope end and train his animal to pick up and pull the rope by using vocal commands. Rope-pulling strategies were ultimately at the discretion of the elephant, but all elephants had earlier, as part of the facility's routine, been trained to pull chains. In testing trials, the two mahouts stood at the release point with their elephants and restrained them by touching the ear or front leg. When signaled by the experimenters—who were positioned 10 m to the side and back from the setup—elephants were released down their respective lanes. Upon release, mahouts turned away from the elephants and remained silent to minimize chances for cuing, and in position behind the elephants for safety. Trials began when the mahouts gave release commands—they released their hold on the elephant and gave a single word, “go” command once so that it was up to the elephant whether to proceed—and ended when the rope became unthreaded from the drawer, or when all of the food had been eaten (at which point a simple “stop” command was given by the experimenters and the elephants were recalled). During simultaneous and delayed release trials, each of the two food bowls on the table contained two halves of a full ear of corn, a highly desirable but rarely used food reward at the elephant facility. During the final tolerance condition, two trials each of the following were randomized over six trials: ( i ) each bowl was baited as in test trials, with two half-ears of corn, ( ii ) one (or the other) bowl was baited with six half-ears of corn. In between all trials, mahouts gave elephants pieces of banana and sugarcane to ensure they remained relaxed. Commands were never given during trials, and mahouts were cued to release their elephants with a hand signal that was not visible to the subjects. The interval between trials was 30 s, and elephant pairs never received >30 trials a day. Testing occurred between January and May 2009. Depending on prior obligations at the facility, elephants were tested in the early morning or early afternoon and were often hosed down with water on exceptionally hot days.
5 Success rate per day of delayed release testing in previously trained (\leq{25}\space{s}) and untrained (26\leq\space{s}\space\leq{45}) delay intervals. Elephants were given 10 trials of each type per day randomized across the session.
From “Elephants Know When They Need a Helping Trunk in a Cooperative Task” by Joshua M. Plotnik. From Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, February 3, 2011, edition. Copyright © 2011 by Joshua M. Plotnik. Reprinted by permission of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
from “Elephants Know When They Need a Helping Trunk in a Cooperative Task”
by Joshua M. Plotnik
General Setup of the Experimental Apparatus.
1 The table apparatus was comprised of two pieces of plywood painted and bolted to a rectangular PVC pipe frame 3.3 m wide and 1.2 m deep. The table was placed 4 m beyond two trees, and three wooden planks set in the ground ensured smooth movement of the table. A 7-m-wide volleyball net was strung between the two trees, anchored by two strong, taut wire ropes, forming a transparent but impassable barrier between the elephants and the table. In training trials, a single piece of rope, ≈6 m in length, was clipped to the front of the table and fed through a metal ring set in the ground beneath the net. Elephants could approach this rope and pull, drawing the table toward them. A wooden post embedded in the ground (replete with rubber shock absorber made from old tires) served as a stopper that prevented the table from advancing past the net. To keep the table centered as it was pulled in, a ≈2.5-cm-thick wire rope—running perpendicular to the volleyball net—was strung from the buried table stopper, through the central PVC pipe of the table's frame, and then fixed to a tree on the central axis beyond the table. This rigid guide cable prevented any skewing of the table and thus eliminated incongruities in food availability. Two red food bowls were attached to wooden boards, 50 cm in length, one on each side of the table; as the table reached the stop point, the two bowls became available to the elephant just under the net. In test trials, a single piece of 16.5-m-long, 1-cm-thick hemp rope was threaded through guides and around the back and two sides of the PVC frame so that the loose ends appeared out of two openings on either side of the front of the table. Each side's rope end was then threaded through a metal ring set in the ground underneath the net, leaving 1.6 m of rope available to each elephant upon approach.
2 To demarcate the test area, from each of the two central trees was strung a single, flagged green rope ≈1.5 m above the ground and reaching back 10 m behind the net to the release point. During testing and control trials, a third flagged rope was strung down the center of the test area, dividing it into two equally wide lanes (3.5 m); thus, each elephant was released into a single lane and had access only to a single rope end. These two lanes are similar to the separation between subjects in some previous studies (6), but not others, in which subjects were allowed to move around (e.g., refs. 5, 7, and 11). Because of the sheer size of the elephants and their regular, free-contact interaction with the experimenters and mahouts between trials, these lanes were necessary for safety reasons, whereas they did not prevent the elephants from reaching over to their partner or their partner's food bowl. The lanes did not seem to compromise the elephant's ability to learn the experimental task contingencies.
3 All data were coded from two video cameras. A Panasonic PV-GS500 miniDV camera was fixed to a metal mount on a 7-m-long bamboo ladder, which was hoisted on pulleys between the two trees to a height ≈8 m above the ground. This camera's view was monitored on the ground via closed-circuit television. A second camera, a Canon HV20, was placed on a tripod beyond the table, providing a heads-on view of the elephants.
Procedure
4 In training trials, a mahout would walk with his elephant to the single available rope end and train his animal to pick up and pull the rope by using vocal commands. Rope-pulling strategies were ultimately at the discretion of the elephant, but all elephants had earlier, as part of the facility's routine, been trained to pull chains. In testing trials, the two mahouts stood at the release point with their elephants and restrained them by touching the ear or front leg. When signaled by the experimenters—who were positioned 10 m to the side and back from the setup—elephants were released down their respective lanes. Upon release, mahouts turned away from the elephants and remained silent to minimize chances for cuing, and in position behind the elephants for safety. Trials began when the mahouts gave release commands—they released their hold on the elephant and gave a single word, “go” command once so that it was up to the elephant whether to proceed—and ended when the rope became unthreaded from the drawer, or when all of the food had been eaten (at which point a simple “stop” command was given by the experimenters and the elephants were recalled). During simultaneous and delayed release trials, each of the two food bowls on the table contained two halves of a full ear of corn, a highly desirable but rarely used food reward at the elephant facility. During the final tolerance condition, two trials each of the following were randomized over six trials: ( i ) each bowl was baited as in test trials, with two half-ears of corn, ( ii ) one (or the other) bowl was baited with six half-ears of corn. In between all trials, mahouts gave elephants pieces of banana and sugarcane to ensure they remained relaxed. Commands were never given during trials, and mahouts were cued to release their elephants with a hand signal that was not visible to the subjects. The interval between trials was 30 s, and elephant pairs never received >30 trials a day. Testing occurred between January and May 2009. Depending on prior obligations at the facility, elephants were tested in the early morning or early afternoon and were often hosed down with water on exceptionally hot days.
5 Success rate per day of delayed release testing in previously trained (\leq{25}\space{s}) and untrained (26\leq\space{s}\space\leq{45}) delay intervals. Elephants were given 10 trials of each type per day randomized across the session.
From “Elephants Know When They Need a Helping Trunk in a Cooperative Task” by Joshua M. Plotnik. From Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, February 3, 2011, edition. Copyright © 2011 by Joshua M. Plotnik. Reprinted by permission of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.