Come to Discussions Prepared Practice Test

In Mrs. Chen’s 5th grade current events discussion, students were assigned to read a short news article about a school starting a composting program and to write down one statistic or number from the article. The discussion question is: “What are the benefits and challenges of composting at school?” During the discussion, Elena says, “The article said the cafeteria throws away about 40 pounds of food scraps each day,” and she points to the sentence she highlighted. Marcus says, “Composting is good for plants,” but doesn’t mention anything from the article. Sam asks, “What is composting?” which was explained in the first section of the article. Nia agrees with Elena but can’t add any details. Why was Elena able to contribute meaningfully to the discussion?

In Mr. Reynolds’s 5th grade class, students were assigned to read chapter 4 of the class novel (pages 45–58) and write one question on a sticky note. Today’s discussion topic is: “What does the main character learn in chapter 4?” During the discussion, Amina flips to page 52 and reads aloud, “I realized I didn’t have to do everything alone,” and then explains how that shows the character is learning to ask for help. Theo says, “The character learns something important,” but cannot describe what happened in the chapter. Brianna shares her sticky note question: “Why did the character apologize to her brother on page 56?” Which behavior best shows a student came to the discussion prepared?