2025: NY Grade 4 - ELA

Directions: Read this article. Then answer the questions.

Cal and Marie Callender married in 1924. After spending 20 years raising their son Don, Marie decided to start a career in cooking.

Excerpt from Marie Callender: Homemade Pie Maven

by Rebecca Felix

Baking Boom

1 Callender had become a skilled baker and cook while taking care of her family. In the 1940s, she decided to put these skills to work outside the home. Callender took a part-time job at a delicatessen. There, she made salads and hot foods.

[delicatessen = store where you can buy food that is already made, such as a sandwich]

2 Soon, the delicatessen’s owner asked Callender to make pies. She baked the pies at home, using her own recipes. Then she brought the pies to the delicatessen. Customers loved the pies’ light, flaky crusts and fresh fruit or cream fillings. The desserts were soon very popular. . . .

3 The demand for Callender’s pies continued to grow. Soon, she could not keep up on her own. Callender spoke with her son and husband about helping her. The Callenders decided to turn making pies into a family business.

Setting Up Shop

4 Callender also spoke with her boss about how busy she had become baking pies. He supported her decision to quit her job to focus on making pies full time. And he promised to buy pies from her for his restaurant. He even let Callender take the oven from his bakery to use in her new business.

5 With the oven and help from Cal and Don, Callender was ready to get to work. She planned to sell hundreds of pies to local restaurants each week. But making that many pies would require a bigger space than the Callenders’ home kitchen.

6 The Callenders sold the family car. They used the money to fund the business. ey rented a Quonset hut in Long Beach, California. The family also purchased baking equipment and supplies. . . .

[Quonset hut = metal building originally used by the military that can be turned into a kitchen or office]

7 The Callenders’ success continued for the next 16 years. By then, they were baking thousands of pies each week. They made enough profit to buy better equipment. This included a commercial mixer that could mix the ingredients for many pies at once. The family also bought a new truck for delivering the pies to stores.

Directions: Read this article. Then answer questions 1 through 6.

Excerpt from Why Do We Sleep?

by Trudee Romanek

1 Sleep has puzzled people for a long time. Why do we lie down and zone out for hours every night? Isn’t sleep just a giant waste of time? Could we learn to do without it?

2 Now scientists are beginning to answer some of those questions. They’ve discovered that brains and bodies don’t just shut down at night. Quite the contrary! At night, your body repairs itself and grows strong. Your brain is busy making memories and learning. Sleep is so useful that all animals do it. And without it, waking life would be impossible.

All through the Night . . .

3 After lying down, most people take about 20 minutes to fall asleep. In the twilight zone between asleep and awake, your brain begins to drift. It muffles signals from the muscles and senses, ignoring information from the outside world. That can give you the odd sensation of falling. You aren’t really—you’re just falling asleep. . . .

4 As you slip into sleep, your heart slows down and you breathe more slowly. Your eyes shut, and your brain ignores ordinary sounds. That’s why when you’re sound asleep, you don’t hear small noises or other things that might wake you up. The part of the brain that keeps you aware of time passing also switches off, so in the morning it feels like the night takes no time at all.

5 But your brain does not shut down at night. In fact, it gets quite active. It's got important jobs to do.

Sleep, Dream, Repeat

6 You might think sleep is just . . . sleep. But in fact, you do several different kinds of sleeping, cycling through them several times through the night.

7 First is a light sleep. After about half an hour, your brain sinks into a deep sleep. During deep sleep, long, slow waves of electrical impulses move through the brain. These slow waves move all the important things you learned and did today from short-term memory into long-term memory. At the same time, you forget unimportant details like putting on your socks. That frees up space to learn new things tomorrow.

8 After about 20 minutes or so of slow-wave sleep, your sleeping brain shifts gears. It starts to look more awake—though it isn’t. In the next stage of sleep, your muscles go completely slack. Your body doesn’t move at all. But your eyes dart back and forth behind closed eyelids. This motion gives this kind of sleep its name—REM, for “rapid eye movement.”

9 During REM sleep, the brain is making connections. It links new experiences to old memories. It also bundles together actions you’ve been practicing, such as the motions of riding a bike, into a new, single muscle memory: ride bike. All this connecting triggers dreams—which can get pretty weird.

10 You cycle through stages of light, deep, and REM sleep every 90 minutes, over and over, all night long. At the beginning of the night, you do more slow-wave sleeping, while the brain cleans house. Toward morning, you get more REM sleep, as it builds new knowledge. That’s when the most vivid dreams happen.

Dream Yourself Smart

11 Why do we dream? Scientists aren’t completely sure, but they have some ideas.

12 Dreams might be a side-effect of memory making. While you sleep, your brain sorts through everything that happened during the day. It tries to link new experiences to old memories that are similar in some way. As it connects things, the “story-making” part of your brain turns them into a story, and you get a dream. . . .

13 When it’s sorting through the day’s memories, your brain pays special attention to anything that made you feel extra happy or scared or excited. In dreams, the brain can try out solutions to problems that are bothering you. Finding even a weird dream solution can make you feel more in control the next day.

14 Dreams can even help you learn. In one test, volunteers learned how to play a new game. That night, some of them were awakened whenever they entered REM sleep. The others were awakened the same number of times, but only during non-REM sleep. The next day, the people who got their REM sleep did much better at the game. The players who started out being worst at the game had the most dreams about it—and they improved the most.

15 So if you want to do well on that test, don’t stay up all night studying. Instead, get a good night’s sleep. That’s when your brain learns best.

STAGES OF SLEEP

Directions:
Read this story. Then answer the questions.

“Salvador’s Wallet”

by Mari LaFore

1   It was spring break for Dustin and a good day for an adventure. The railroad tracks looked endless so he decided to follow them. The sky was Easter egg blue. The fluffy clouds reminded Dustin of his favorite frosting, vanilla. The shiny, golden sun bounced happily in the sky.

2   “What is that in the grass?” he wondered. Was it a gigantic rock, or maybe a big, brown, sleeping turtle? He bent down to investigate!

3   “A wallet!” he exclaimed as he picked it up and peeked inside. It was full of all kinds of stuff! And a tiny photo of twin boys.

4   “Somebody lost this, I’ll bet! Mom will know what to do!” Off Dustin ran to their apartment.

5   “Well, let’s just look inside and see who owns this wallet,” Dustin’s mom, Marisa, said cheerfully. They emptied it onto their kitchen table and searched for a clue. There it was, a note written in crayon!

6   “We love you, Dad!—Carlos and Hugo.”

7   “This must be a wonderful man. His boys love him very much,” remarked Dustin’s mom.

8   “Look, mom, this picture must be of them and they look like they are my age. I wonder if they live around here,” Dustin said aloud as his excitement grew. Then they saw another clue, a driver’s license and now they knew the owner of that old, brown wallet was named Salvador!

9   “This card says their address is far away in a different city,” said his mom sadly. Now what would they do?

10 Finally they found the best clue of all; a phone number on the back of Salvador’s shiny, silver credit card.

11 “I will contact Salvador for you with the good news,” said the kind lady who answered the phone.

12 The very next day Dustin’s doorbell rang and when Dustin and Marisa answered the door, there stood a smiling man who introduced himself as Salvador!

13 “Thank you, Dustin. You are a fine young man,” he said as he shook Dustin’s hand, “I rode the train to my job here in your city and my wallet fell out of my pocket. I thought I would never see it again! My sons will be happy to meet you. We are coming here to spend the day at Rocket Land tomorrow, and I would like you and your mom to come with us if you can.”

14 “That will be just fine,” smiled Dustin’s proud mother.

15 “Yeah, that sounds great! I can’t wait to meet Carlos and Hugo,” grinned Dustin as he said good-bye to Salvador.

16 “You did the right thing, sweetheart,” his mom said softly as he ran into the kitchen just in time to see her putting the last bit of his favorite vanilla frosting on a big, chocolate cake and reaching out to give him a “proud mom” hug.

17 “Thanks mom! This has been the best adventure ever!”

18 The very next day Dustin and his mom heard their doorbell chiming loudly.

19 Dustin peeked through his living room window and there stood four smiling people and one tiny, excited Chihuahua dog.

20 “I’ll get it,” exclaimed Dustin as he ran and opened their front door.

21 “Hello, my friend,” Salvador said to Dustin, “I would like you to meet my wife, Emerita, and my sons, Carlos and Hugo, and our dog, Chica. She’s also excited to go to Rocket Land. We take her with us every year.” Chica yipped loudly and jumped into the air when she heard her name.

22 “Please come in,” said Dustin’s mom. “We are ready to leave and I have packed us all snacks to eat on the way there. Now, what should I put in for Chica?”

23 “Don’t worry, we have plenty of doggie snacks for her in our van,” laughed Salvador.

24 “I baked cochinos and churros, and biscochitos for us too,” said Emerita. “They are delicious cookies and they are loved by everyone in our country.”

25 “I want to sit in the back seat with Hugo and Carlos,” said Dustin as he grabbed his jacket. Emerita and Marisa nodded their approval and the group climbed into the blue van headed for Rocket Land.

26 “Salvador’s wallet sure seems to be a magic friend maker,” smiled Marisa as they happily drove away.

Directions
Read this story. Then answer the questions.

Rosa’s parents are planning a big birthday celebration for her older sister, Susana. Rosa has disagreements with her family members as they prepare for the party.

Excerpt from Did You Hear About Rosa?

by Hannah Jones

1   I rode my bike up into the hills behind our house. The day was getting hot, and my T-shirt stuck to my back as I churned hard on the pedals. The sun was turning the Sangre de Cristo Mountains a rosy gold color.

2   My throat dried up, my leg muscles ached with fatigue, and my lungs felt like they were about to burst. Even so, I enjoyed making the steep but quick (ten-minute) climb to Miss Sabines’ house. I was heading to a place that had always given me comfort for my troubles.

3   Miss Sabines is 70 years old, but to me she seems like a sister, an hermana. She has long silver hair in a braid down her back. All the other older women I know have either short hair or chin-length hair, but Miss Sabines has never cut hers. She enjoys braiding my hair, for she says its long, thick, wavy strands remind her of her own. My face is like hers, too. We both have round, chubby cheeks and big eyes like brown buttons. Now that Miss Sabines is older, her eyes have a ring of bluish white around the brown part, but they’re shaped just like mine.

4   Miss Sabines and I have more in common than just our looks. We’re both smart, but we also daydream too much. It’s a big contrast from my sister Susana, who is very practical and hardly ever daydreams.

5 Speaking of daydreams, I often fantasize about living in a house like Miss Sabines’. My family’s house is bigger and fancier than Miss Sabines’, but I’d trade a mansion for her little casa any day. It has a big garden, with beautiful desert plants and herbs growing everywhere, and a courtyard that has tiles painted bright colors, with sculptures, pinwheels, wind chimes, and lawn ornaments scattered throughout. There’s a cat, who sleeps under a lemon tree in the corner of the garden, along with a parrot, Tío, meaning “Uncle,” who sits on a perch by the kitchen door.

6 When I got to Miss Sabines’ house, I took off my bike helmet and threw my bike down on the sandy strip outside her gate. I rattled her courtyard fence and called, “Are you there?”

7 “Rosita, is that you? What a nice surprise! Hold on a moment; I’m in the garden.” The pleasant voice came floating across the courtyard walls, putting me instantly at ease. In a moment, Miss Sabines appeared at her rickety, rusty front gate. She had on a straw hat to shade her face, but as she approached, she took it off and grinned. I helped her unhook the tricky latch on the gate and immediately gave her a big hug.

8 “My, what did I do to deserve this?” Miss Sabines laughed, pulling away from the hug. She peered intently into my eyes. “You look troubled. What do you have to tell me?” she asked. . . .

9 I expected Miss Sabines to feel sorry for me and understand my problems, but instead she laughed. The laugh started in her belly, echoed in her chest, and came out her mouth like a low, happy rumble. At first I was confused; I thought maybe she hadn’t understood me, but then she explained.

10 “Ah, pequeño pájaro,” she said. “Little bird, you remind me so much of myself?” . . .

11 We passed the rest of the afternoon puttering around the house. Miss Sabines showed me some of her new plantings, we played with her pets, and I leafed through a collection of photographs by Ansel Adams, whom Miss Sabines calls a “poet of Southwestern landscapes.” All of a sudden (or so it seemed), the June sun sank below the garden wall.

12 “Oh, no!” I gasped, looking at my watch. It read 5:55 P.M. “We’re having a party tonight, and I’ve been gone for hours!”

13 “Well, then, you’d better get home, muchacha!” Miss Sabines said.

[muchacha = Spanish word for girl]

14 I latched the gate, put on my bike helmet, and got on my bike. “Thank you for the talk, Miss Sabines!” I waved. “You’ll always be my hermana across time!”

15 Miss Sabines waved back. “I’m always available for advice,” she called out as I sped off down the hill.