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End-of-Course (EOC) English II

Last updated 6 months ago
51 questions

The Art of Brazilian Lace

by Laura Morelli

1
The lacemaker’s wrinkled hands are surprisingly agile. This seventy-something lady in Prainha, on the northeastern coast of Brazil, rapidly maneuvers two dozen wooden bobbins, which make a pleasant clicking sound as she works. Seeming to read my mind, she smiles and says that her fingers have worked these bobbins since she was old enough to follow her mother’s directions. Incongruously, her frenetic movements produce a minuscule lace fragment. In fact, a full day’s work yields just a few inches of delicate finery.

2
The extraordinarily laborious craft of bobbin lace (renda de bilros in Portuguese) came to Brazil along with Portuguese colonists who claimed its beautiful northeastern coastline as their own in the seventeenth century. Portugal already counted a rich tradition of lacemaking, and colonists continued the practice in the New World. Mostly the province of women, lacemaking was passed down from mothers to daughters, who learned by watching and repeating their motions. While their European ancestors considered lace a luxurious fashion accessory, in the New World, the craft seemed a natural extension of more mundane trades that were already vital to the seaside culture: the making of baskets, hats, hammocks, and fishing nets. Early colonists made lace to pass the time and supplement their families’ income, making doilies, collars, and tablecloths out of white and colored linen threads.

Lace can be produced either with a needle and thread (needle lace) or by interweaving threads wound on bobbins. Bobbin lace is the predominant type of lace made on Brazil’s northeastern coast. The technique begins with a pillow, almost always homemade, and stuffed with cotton, grass, or even banana leaves. The pillow forms the workspace for the rendeira, or lacemaker, who props it in her lap or places it on a special wooden stand made for that purpose. She then covers the pillow with a lace template on paper or cardboard. A collection of pins—commercial sewing notions or, in a pinch, cactus thorns—holds the design in place on the pillow.

The lacemaker then uses bobbins or spindles, each wound with a single thread, to work the pattern. Today most bobbins are made of wood, though in the past bone was also used, which is why the technique is sometimes referred to as bone lace. As many as 50 bobbins, each holding an individual thread, might be used to work a single pattern. Lacemakers complete the pattern by winding and overlapping the threads from the bobbins to create a distinctive weave. Experienced lacemakers work at a rapid pace that, on the surface, seems effortless. Their wooden bobbins click together as they render circles, stars, rosettes, and more complex motifs like scrolls, animals, leaves, and flowers.

5
Today Brazil’s best lacemakers are concentrated on the country’s northeastern coast, in the states of Ceará and Pará. Fortaleza, Ceará’s capital city, boasts many lace shops, several outdoor markets, and a large craft center selling lace umbrellas, gloves, hats, napkins, and tablecloths, as well as beautiful baby outfits and items befitting a bridal trousseau. However, most of these shops are resellers for artisans working in coastal villages. If you want to see lacemakers in action, take a day trip to the seaside towns of Iguaç̧u or Prainha, both of which boast lacemaking centers where you can watch women and girls making lace. Ask the lacemakers to indicate which patterns are most traditional, as each town is known for its own patterns.

Several factors can influence the price of a lace piece, including the type of thread used (cotton, silk, or other materials), the intricacy of the design, and the size, which is a measure of the time it takes to complete it. As a general rule, you will pay less if you buy directly from the lacemaker or one of the village markets rather than in a Fortaleza lace shop, or if you buy a piece with lace accents, like a tablecloth with a lace border. Any way you slice it, though, prices are downright cheap, considering the laboriousness of this craft. You can pick up small items like napkins for around seven to 15 Brazilian reals (just a few dollars). A full-size lace tablecloth or bedspread that requires months of full-time labor will rarely run more than 800 Brazilian reals (around $500). In Europe or the United States, you would pay many times the price for a handmade item of equal quality.

In addition to getting a good deal on a fine piece of handmade lace, the main reward of trekking to this remote part of Brazil is the chance to see this traditional trade in action. Whether watching lacemakers at work in the market, at a lace center, or in the shade of their own doorways, it’s a pleasure to witness the production of such delicate finery, inch by inch.
Required
1

Which central idea develops over the course of the text?

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What is the meaning of the word frenetic in paragraph 1?

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How is paragraph 1 significant to the author's claims?

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What is the meaning of laborious based on the sentences below from paragraphs 1 and 2?
“Incongruously, her frenetic movements produce a minuscule lace fragment. In fact, a full day’s work yields just a few inches of delicate finery."
“The extraordinarily laborious craft of bobbin lace (renda di bilros in Portuguese) came to Brazil along with Portuguese colonists who claimed its beautiful northeastern coastline as their own in the seventeenth century.”

Required
1

How was the art of lacemaking in the New World viewed differently than it was viewed in Europe in the seventeenth century?

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How does the author advance her purpose in the sentences below from paragraph 5?
“If you want to see lacemakers in action, take a day trip to the seaside towns of Iguape or Prainha, both of which boast lacemaking centers where you can watch women and girls making lace. Ask the lacemakers to indicate which patterns are most traditional, as each town is known for its own patterns.”

Required
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How does the art of making lace represent Brazilian cultural heritage?

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Which statement from the text supports the author's claim that making lace is laborious?

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How does the author order events to develop her points?

The City Planners

by Margaret Atwood

Cruising these residential Sunday streets in dry August sunlight: what offends us is the sanities:
5 the houses in pedantic1 rows, the planted sanitary trees, assert levelness of surface like a rebuke to the dent in our car door. No shouting here, or
10 shatter of glass; nothing more abrupt than the rational whine of a power mower cutting a straight swath in the discouraged grass.
But though the driveways neatly sidestep hysteria
15 by being even, the roofs all display the same slant of avoidance to the hot sky, certain things: the smell of spilled oil a faint sickness lingering in the garages,
20 a splash of paint on brick surprising as a bruise, a plastic hose poised in a vicious coil; even the too-fixed stare of the wide windows
give momentary access to the landscape behind or under
25 the future cracks in the plaster

when the houses, capsized, will slide obliquely into the clay seas, gradual as glaciers that right now nobody notices.

That is where the City Planners
30 with the insane faces of political conspirators
are scattered over unsurveyed
territories, concealed from each other,
each in his own private blizzard;

guessing directions, they sketch
35 transitory² lines rigid as wooden borders
on a wall in the white vanishing air

tracing the panic of suburb
order in a bland madness of snows.


1pedantic: unimaginative
²transitory: temporary, lasting only a short time
Required
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How does the poet’s use of the words sanities, levelness, and rational affect the tone of the poem?

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What does the phrase “rational whine” mean in line 11?

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What is the purpose of the figurative language in lines 11–12?

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Which phrase provides a contrast to the uniformity of the neighborhood?

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How does the poem’s structure reveal conflicts between the ideals of the speaker and those of the City Planners?

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How does the poet’s use of personification affect the poem?

Adapted from “How a Muzhik1 Fed Two Officials”

by Mikhail Saltykov
translated by Thomas Seltzer

Once upon a time there were two Officials. They were both empty-headed, and so they found themselves one day suddenly transported to an uninhabited isle.

2
They had passed their whole life in a Government Department, where records were kept; had been born there, bred there, grown old there, and consequently hadn’t the least understanding for anything outside of the Department; and the only words they knew were: “With assurances of the highest esteem, I am your humble servant.”

But the Department was abolished, and as the services of the two Officials were no longer needed, they were given their freedom. So the retired Officials migrated to Podyacheskaya Street in St. Petersburg. Each had his own home, his own cook, and his pension.

4
Waking up on the uninhabited isle, they found themselves lying on the beach. At first, of course, they couldn’t understand what had happened to them, and they spoke as if nothing extraordinary had taken place.

5
“What a peculiar dream I had last night, your Excellency,” said the one Official. “It seemed to me as if I were on an uninhabited isle.”

6
Scarcely had he uttered the words, when he jumped to his feet. The other Official also jumped up.

7
“My goodness, what does this mean! Where are we?” they cried out in astonishment.

8
They touched each other to make sure that they were no longer dreaming, and finally convinced themselves of the sad reality.

9
Before them stretched the ocean, and behind them was a little spot of earth, beyond which the ocean stretched again. They began to cry—the first time since their Department had been shut down.

They looked at each other, and each noticed that the other was clad in nothing but his night shirt with his badge hanging around his neck.

“We really should be having our coffee now,” observed the one Official. Then he bethought himself again of the strange situation he was in and a second time fell to weeping.

“What are we going to do now?” he sobbed. “Even supposing we were to draw up a report, what good would that do?”

“You know what, your Excellency,” replied the other Official, “you go to the east and I will go to the west. Toward evening we will come back here again and, perhaps, we shall have found something.”

They started to ascertain which was the east and which was the west. They recalled that the head of their Department had once said to them, “If you want to know where the east is, then turn your face to the north, and the east will be on your right.” But when they tried to find out which was the north, they turned to the right and to the left and looked around on all sides. Having spent their whole life in the Department of Records, their efforts were all in vain.

“To my mind, your Excellency, the best thing to do would be for you to go to the right and me to go to the left,” said one Official, who had served not only in the Department of Records, but had also been teacher of handwriting in the School for Reserves, and so was a little bit cleverer.

16
So said, so done. The one Official went to the right. He came upon trees, bearing all sorts of fruits. Gladly would he have plucked an apple, but they all hung so high that he would have been obliged to climb up. He tried to climb up in vain. All he succeeded in doing was tearing his night shirt. Then he struck upon a brook. It was swarming with fish.

17
“Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we had all this fish in Podyacheskaya Street!” he thought, and his mouth watered. Then he entered woods and found partridges,2 grouse,3 and hares.4

18
“My goodness, what an abundance of food!” he cried. His hunger was going up tremendously.

19
But he had to return to the appointed spot with empty hands. He found the other Official waiting for him.

20
“Well, Your Excellency, how went it? Did you find anything?”

21
“Nothing but an old number of the Moscow Gazette, not another thing.”

The Officials lay down to sleep again, but their empty stomachs gave them no rest. They were partly robbed of their sleep by the thought of who was now enjoying their pension, and partly by the recollection of the fruit, fishes, partridges, grouse, and hares that had been seen during the day while searching the island.

23
“The human pabulum in its original form flies, swims, and grows on trees. Who would have thought it your Excellency?” said the one Official.

24
“To be sure,” rejoined the other Official. “I, too, must admit that I had imagined that our breakfast rolls came into the world just as they appear on the table.”

“From which it is to be deduced that if we want to eat a pheasant, we must catch it first, kill it, pull its feathers, and roast it. But how’s that to be done?”

"Yes, how's that to be done?" repeated the other Official.

They turned silent and tried again to fall asleep, but their hunger scared sleep away. Before their eyes swarmed flocks of pheasants and ducks, herds of porklings, and they were all so juicy, done so tenderly, and garnished so deliciously with olives, capers, and pickles.

"I believe I could devour my own boots now," said the one Official.

"Gloves are not bad either, especially if they have been made quite smooth," said the other Official.

The two Officials stared at each other fixedly. In their glances gleamed an evil-boding fire, their teeth chattered and a dull groaning issued from their chests. Slowly they crept upon each other and suddenly they burst into a fearful frenzy. There was yelling and arguing. ... However, the fight brought them both back to their senses.

"Oh help us!" they cried at the same time. "We certainly don't mean to beat each other up. How could we have come to such a pass as this? What evil genius is making sport of us?"

"We must, by all means, entertain each other to pass the time away," said the one Official.

"You begin," said the other.

"Can you explain why it is that the sun first rises and then sets? Why isn't it the reverse?"

"Aren't you a funny, man, your Excellency? You get up first, then you go to your office and work there, and at night you lie down to sleep."

"But why can't one assume the opposite, that is, that one goes to bed, sees all sorts of dream figures, and then gets up?"

"Well, yes, certainly. But when I was still an Official, I always thought this way: Now it is dawn, then it will be day, then will come supper, and finally will come the time to go to bed.'"

The word "supper" recalled that incident in the day's doings, and the thought of it made both Officials melancholy, so that the conversation came to a halt.

"A doctor once told me that human beings can sustain themselves for a long time on their own juices," the one Official began again.

“What does that mean?”

“It is quite simple. You see, one’s own juices generate other juices, and these in their turn still other juices, and so it goes on until finally all the juices are consumed.”

“And then what happens?”

“Then food has to be taken into the system again.”

“Darn it!”

45
No matter what topic the Officials chose, the conversation invariably reverted to the subject of eating; which only increased their appetite more and more. So they decided to give up talking altogether, and, recollecting the Moscow Gazette that the one of them had found, they picked it up and began to read eagerly.


1Muzhik: a Russian peasant, a country person
2partridges: short-tailed birds with mainly brown plumage, native to Eurasia
3grouse: medium to large birds with a plump body and feathered legs
4hares: fast-running, long-eared mammals that resemble large rabbits with long hind legs
Required
1

Which quote from the text supports the development of the theme?

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Why does the author include the quote “With assurances of the highest esteem, I am your humble servant” in paragraph 2?

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Based on paragraphs 4–9, what causes the Officials to realize the events are not a dream?

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What can be inferred from the fact that both Officials returned “with empty hands” in paragraphs 16–21?

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What does pabulum mean in the sentences below from paragraphs 23 and 24?
"The human pabulum in its original form flies, swims, and grows on trees. Who would have thought it your Excellency?" said the one Official.
"To be sure," rejoined the other Official. "I, too, must admit that I had imagined that our breakfast rolls came into the world just as they appear on the table."

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What can be inferred from the last sentence of paragraph 45 in the text?

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How does referring to the men as "Officials" and "Your Excellency" develop the theme of the text?

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How does the text reflect the author’s cultural experience?

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In what way does the interaction between the two Officials develop the theme of the text?

This text was published in 2011.

Excerpt from "On Thomas Edison Bulb Anniversary, Lighting Breakthrough"

by Marianne Lavelle

Timed to mark the 131st anniversary of the invention of the lightbulb by Thomas Edison-General Electric (GE) on October 21, 2010 unveiled an illumination breakthrough: a high-efficiency LED bulb* that employs jet-engine technology to keep cool.

But while the company founded by Edison was announcing this highly technical development, its rivals were aiming at a lighting achievement by the end of 2010 that would be far more tangible to consumers-a high-efficiency LED bulb, bright enough for reading, that can be screwed into an ordinary home lamp socket.

Both Osram Sylvania and Philips had LED bulbs designed to replace the popular 60-watt incandescent bulb on store shelves at the end of 2010. GE had a 40-watt LED bulb on the market by the end of 2010, with its 60-watt entry to the market available by the end of 2011.

GE says its thermal management breakthrough is key for removing an obstacle to wider LED use. Because LEDs produce light through the movement of electrons through semiconductor material, they are sensitive to heat. "LEDs are basically chips you can use in your computer, and are temperature-sensitive," says GE engineer Mehmet Arik, who led the cooling technology project. "The cooler you run them, the more efficiency you get."GE said it has adapted airflow technology used in its aviation and energy businesses to achieve a low-cost solution in a small enough package to work in LED lighting.

GE said it was able to demonstrate the technology at work in a 1,500-lumen prototype-a bulb that stays cool while producing as much light as a 100-watt halogen bulb while using one-third of the energy. GE announced the development at a lighting symposium at the company's research laboratories in upstate New York at an event to highlight the Edison lightbulb anniversary. To mark "Lighting Appreciation Day," GE encouraged consumers to post photos or videos of their favorite lighting to the social networking site, Twitter, using the hashtag #weheartlighting.

But it was too early for GE's development to be employed in the first generation of LED home bulbs that the company put on store shelves at the end of 2010, or in the 60-watt bulbs it will market in 2011, the company said.

Replicating the Warmth of Thomas Edison's Invention

7
It hasn’t been easy to design an energy-efficient lighting appliance that consumers embrace as warmly as the gadget that Thomas Edison first fashioned 131 years ago in a Menlo Park, New Jersey, laboratory with carbonized thread from his wife’s sewing kit.

8
Edison’s technology so transformed the candlelit world that his lightbulb has stood for years as the iconic image of a new idea. And it’s a shape that 21st-century consumers are reluctant to leave behind, even though Edison’s incandescent lightbulb wastes energy by literally giving off more heat than light.

“We think consumers want a lightbulb that looks like a lightbulb,” says Stephanie Anderson, director of communications at Osram Sylvania, of Danvers, Massachusetts, part of Germany’s Siemens AG. Osram Sylvania already has had an LED bulb designed as a replacement for the 40-watt incandescent in Lowe’s stores for several months.

The twisty look of the main energy-saving home bulb now on the market, the compact-fluorescent (CFL), is seen by the lighting industry as one of a series of stumbling blocks that has prevented the product from gaining deep acceptance.

A U.S. government survey in 2009 found that only 11 percent of household sockets have CFLs. Even though CFLs easily save consumers money through lower utility bills, because they use 75 percent less energy than incandescent bulbs and last five years instead of a few months, consumers have numerous issues with the new bulbs: their color, premature burnout, the expense of dimmable CFLs, and the need to take extra care disposing of them because they contain a small amount of mercury.

Lighting experts tout long-lasting, ultra-low-energy light-emitting diodes (LEDs)—first seen as indicator lights on appliances—as the remedy for virtually all of these issues. LEDs are common in thousands of applications, from traffic lights to jumbo television screens to intense flashlights. Years of research have produced ever-brighter and ever-whiter LEDs, with lighting manufacturers now prepared to offer products they say are good enough for the living room lamp.

13
“Sixty watts is the holy grail of the LED replacement game,” says Anderson. “We are absolutely in a race to be the first to deliver America’s most popular lightbulb.”

*LED bulb: an energy-efficient lightbulb that lasts longer than traditional incandescent and fluorescent bulbs
Required
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Which detail states where the central idea of the text emerges?

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What does the word fashioned mean in paragraph 7?

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Which statement from the text supports the author’s claim in paragraph 7?

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What can be inferred from the sentence below in paragraph 8?
“Edison’s technology so transformed the candlelit world that his lightbulb has stood for years as the iconic image of a new idea.”

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What is the effect of the metaphor in paragraph 13?
‘Sixty watts is the holy grail of the LED replacement game.’

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What detail from the text supports the author’s claim that General Electric’s high-efficiency LED bulb is an illumination breakthrough?

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For what purpose did the author include information about Edison’s “candlelit world” crafted “with carbonized thread from his wife’s sewing kit”?

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How did the author make the connection between Edison’s lightbulb and the high-efficiency lighting choices available today?

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Explain the importance of lightbulb shape for future bulb development. Use one example from the text and include how the textual evidence supports your answer.

Adapted from "The Cloak"

by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol

1
It would be difficult to find another man who lived so entirely for his duties. It is not enough to say that Alex labored with zeal: no, he labored with love. In his copying, he found a varied and agreeable employment. Enjoyment was written on his face: some letters were even favorites with him; and when he encountered these, he smiled, winked, and worked with his lips, till it seemed as though each letter might be read in his face, as his pen traced it. If his pay had been in proportion to his zeal, he would, perhaps, to his great surprise, have been made even a councilor of state.1 But he worked, as his companions, the wits, put it, like a horse in a mill.

2
Moreover, it is impossible to say that no attention was paid to him. One director being a kindly man, and desirous of rewarding him for his long service, ordered him to be given something more important than mere copying. So he was ordered to make a report of an already concluded affair to another department: the duty consisting simply in changing the heading and altering a few words from the first to the third person. This caused him so much toil that he broke into a perspiration, rubbed his forehead, and finally said, "No, give me rather something to copy." After that they let him copy on forever.

3
Outside this copying, it appeared that nothing existed for him. He gave no thought to his clothes: his uniform was not green, but a sort of rusty-meal color. The collar was low, so that his neck, in spite of the fact that it was not long, seemed inordinately so as it emerged from it, like the necks of those plaster cats which wag their heads, and are carried about upon the heads of scores of image sellers. And something was always sticking to his uniform, either a bit of hay or some trifle. Moreover, he had a peculiar knack, as he walked along the street, of arriving beneath a window just as all sorts of rubbish were being flung out of it: hence he always bore about on his hat scraps of melon rinds and other such articles. Never once in his life did he give heed to what was going on every day in the street; while it is well-known that the younger officials watch everything and train the range of their glances until they can see when anyone's trouser straps come undone on the opposite sidewalk, which always brings a malicious smile to their faces. But Alex saw in all things the clean, even strokes of his written lines; and only when a horse thrust his nose, from some unknown quarter, over his shoulder, and sent a whole gust of wind down his neck from his nostrils, did he observe that he was not in the middle of a page, but in the middle of the street.

4
On reaching home, he sat down at once at the table, supped his cabbage soup up quickly, and swallowed a bit of beef with onions, never noticing their taste, and gulping down everything and anything else which appeared before him at the moment. His stomach filled, he rose from the table, and copied papers which he had brought home. If there happened to be none, he took copies for himself, for his own gratification, especially if the document was noteworthy, not on account of its style, but of its being addressed to some distinguished person.

5
Thus flowed on the peaceful life of the man, who, with a salary of four hundred rubles,2 understood how to be content with his lot; and thus it would have continued to flow on, perhaps, to extreme old age, were it not that there are various ills strewn along the path of life for title councilors as well as for private, actual, court, and every other species of councilor, even for those who never give any advice or take any themselves.

1councilor of state: a government official
2rubles: monetary coins of Russia and the Soviet Union
Required
1

How does the sentence below from paragraph 1 shape the theme of the text?
“Enjoyment was written on his face: some letters were even favorites with him; and when he encountered these, he smiled, winked, and worked with his lips, till it seemed as though each letter might be read in his face, as his pen traced it.”

Required
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What is the effect of the simile “like a horse in a mill” in paragraph 1?

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How does Alex’s interaction with the director in paragraph 2 advance the plot?

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What can be inferred from the sentence below in paragraph 3?
“But Alex saw in all things the clean, even strokes of his written lines; and only when a horse thrust his nose, from some unknown quarter, over his shoulder, and sent a whole gust of wind down his neck from his nostrils, did he observe that he was not in the middle of a page, but in the middle of the street.”

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What impact does the author's use of the word lot have in paragraph 5?

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What is being implied in paragraph 5?

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How does the author create suspense in paragraph 5?

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Which detail from the text emphasizes the idea that Alex’s occupation is his favorite activity?

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Analyze how Alex’s actions in paragraphs 3 and 4 develop the theme of the text. Use at least one example from the text to support your answer. Explain how the textual evidence supports your answer.

This excerpt was posted on the Defenders of Wildlife website in 2011.

Excerpt from "Sprawl Threatens Wildlife and Habitat"


1
More than one-third of the known species in the United States are considered in danger of extinction (Stein et al. 2000). The main threat to these species, and biodiversity in general, is habitat loss and fragmentation. While habitat can be consumed and altered in numerous ways, poorly planned development and unmanaged growth, or sprawl, is one of the major contributors. In a recent California study, sprawl was found to be the leading cause of species imperilment (National Wildlife Federation 2001).

Sprawl, especially through the building of impervious* surfaces and roads, destroys and fragments habitat and disrupts ecological processes. Invasive species thrive and pollution increases in these disturbed environments, causing numerous additional problems for species and their habitat.

3
Sprawl has been devouring land and habitat at an alarming pace. The rate of sprawl in the United States almost quadrupled between 1954 and 1997 and doubled between 1992 and 1997. About 3 million acres (roughly the size of Connecticut) of mainly forestland, pastureland, rangeland, and cropland are converted to urbanized landscapes annually (U.S. Department of Agriculture 1997).

4
The rate of development in the United States doubled in the last decade with some 3 million acres of farmland, forestland, and wildlife habitat now converted annually—an area the size of Connecticut (Environmental Protection Agency 2001). Currently, the rate of land consumption outpaces population growth. For example, Chicago suburbs experienced a 46% increase in land consumption during the last decade while only increasing population by 4 percent (Benfield et al. 1999). And once converted, these urbanized landscapes no longer provide the same options for wildlife, thus displacing or eliminating many species, especially those that depend upon large blocks of forest, shrubland, or grassland.

Habitat Loss

5
Studies show that habitat loss is the leading threat to endangered and extremely rare species. In a study of 1,207 rare U.S. species that suffer from habitat loss, 35 percent are threatened by commercial development and 38% by agricultural development (Wilcove et al. 2000). Since most agricultural development occurred years ago, commercial development is now the most immediate threat.

Habitat loss concerns:

6
Lowland habitat. In the United States, the most biologically diverse areas occur in low-elevation bottomlands, the same places where most major cities are located. Unfortunately, biodiversity has been much better protected at the high elevations than the lower elevations (Scott et al. 2001). Habitat loss in the lowlands has severed connections between populations, creating isolated habitat islands for species that would otherwise move through valleys (Shafer 1990, Saunders et al. 1991). In addition, road mortality and human-species conflicts occur when developed areas block the paths of animals looking to disperse, migrate, and locate suitable habitat.

7
Wetlands. Many species depend upon wetland habitat to support some stage in their life cycle. At the same time, human demand to develop these areas is high. More than 50 percent of the wetlands in the U.S. have been drained and filled (Environmental Protection Agency 2001).

8
Agricultural lands. Farms, if managed properly, can provide wildlife habitat for some species, but many populations of species historically associated with native prairie or forests that are now converted to agriculture have declined dramatically. In fact, grassland birds are considered the most threatened group of birds in the United States because of habitat loss (U.S. Geological Survey 1998).

At the beginning of the twentieth century the most significant form of habitat loss was logging and farmland conversion. Although more of the U.S. landscape has been converted to agriculture than to development, today habitat lost to development is the more pressing problem. Currently, not much new farmland is being created.




*impervious: not permitting penetration or passage; impenetrable
Required
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Where does the central idea first emerge in the text?

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How does the use of words like danger, threat, and imperilment in paragraph 1 affect the meaning of the text?

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How does the description of sprawl as “devouring land and habitat at an alarming pace” in paragraph 3 affect the meaning of the text?

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How do the details in paragraph 4 develop the author’s claims about sprawl?

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Based on paragraph 5, what can be inferred about the connection between clearing land and wildlife habitat?

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How do the paragraphs in the section “Habitat loss concerns” refine the author’s claim about habitat loss?

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How does the author connect the ideas concerning sprawl and threatened wildlife?

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How does the author use rhetoric to advance the point of view that urban sprawl is one of the main causes of wildlife extinction in the United States?

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Analyze how the information in paragraphs 6-8 refines the claims the author makes in the first paragraph. Provide one example from the text and explain how the textual evidence supports your answer.