Reading library
Reading library
60 longer texts, 42,183 words in all. Read one the whole way through, then answer eight questions about it.
About these texts
These texts are ours, written for this module in Canadian spelling. They are for reading and comprehension practice, with multiple-choice, true-or-false, and paragraph-location checks. The library is a growing pilot: reading ability is built by reading a great deal over a long time, and this collection is a start, not a complete programme. Our English has not yet been checked by a second reader.
- FoundationEveryday lifeA first winterAmara arrived in Winnipeg in the second week of October. She had seen snow once before, on a school trip to a mountain, and she had held it in her…513 words4 min read
- FoundationCommunityThe garden on Prince StreetThe lot on Prince Street had been empty for eleven years. A house had stood there once. After it came down, the ground was left with broken brick in…564 words5 min read
- BuildingNatural worldWhy a lake freezes from the topAlmost everything shrinks as it cools. The particles slow down, settle closer together, and the same amount of material takes up less space. Colder…726 words6 min read
- BuildingWorkThe night shiftThe bakery on Dundas Street opens at six. The work begins at eleven the night before.741 words6 min read
- AdvancedNatural worldWhat a river remembersEvery spring, somewhere, a river returns to a field that people have been farming for two generations and behaves as though the field were still part…988 words8 min read
- FoundationTransportThe last busThe number 9 was supposed to leave the hospital stop at 11:42, and it was the last one of the night. Nadia knew this because she had missed it once…536 words4 min read
- FoundationLearningA library cardDear Lucia, You asked in your last message what I do on my days off, and I promised a proper answer instead of a photo of the snow. So here it is. I…516 words4 min read
- FoundationFoodThe Saturday marketIf you are new to town, people will tell you to go to the Saturday market, and they will be right. What they may not tell you is how it works. The…482 words4 min read
- FoundationEnvironmentThe rain barrelMay 12. The city gave out rain barrels at the community hall today, twenty dollars each, and I carried one home on the bus, which made the other…508 words4 min read
- FoundationHomeThe laundry roomThe laundry room in the basement of 410 Elm Street has two washers, two dryers, a folding table, and a cork board by the door. For years the cork…495 words4 min read
- FoundationHealthThe clinic questionThe last time Farhan took his daughter to a walk-in clinic, he came home and realized he had forgotten to ask the only question he really cared…491 words4 min read
- FoundationMobilityThe bicycle bellI bought my bicycle at a garage sale in April for forty dollars. It is heavy and blue, with a basket on the front, and the woman who sold it to me…544 words5 min read
- FoundationSchool lifeThe lunch tableFor the first eleven days at Riverside Secondary, Lena ate her lunch in the stairwell by the music room. It was not a bad place. It was warm, nobody…492 words4 min read
- FoundationArtsThe painted wallIf you have walked into the Eastgate Community Centre since the end of August, you have probably stopped for a moment in the entrance. The long grey…522 words4 min read
- FoundationSafetyThe weather radioGrandpa Emil keeps a weather radio on the shelf above the kitchen sink, next to the jar of old keys. It is a small black box with a long antenna, and…490 words4 min read
- FoundationVolunteeringThe volunteer shift8:45 a.m. I am fifteen minutes early for my first shift at the Northside Food Bank, and the door is locked. Through the glass I can see people moving…554 words5 min read
- FoundationDaily lifeThe bus transferThe downtown transit station at rush hour is not a place for thinking. Buses pull in and out of twelve bays, the screens change every few seconds,…565 words5 min read
- FoundationWorkThe market stallAunt Pat had sold honey at the Riverside Farmers' Market for longer than Jess had been alive, and every summer she said the same thing: one day, when…513 words4 min read
- FoundationCommunityThe neighbourhood mapLast winter, the Cedar Flats residents' group decided to make a map of our neighbourhood for new families. The city already has maps, of course, and…526 words4 min read
- FoundationWeatherThe winter bootsDear Home Help: I moved to Edmonton in September with my two children. The youngest is four and the oldest is nine. Everyone tells me that winter…479 words4 min read
- BuildingEnvironmentRepairing the shorelineFor most of the town's history, the grassy slope at Wren Point Park ran gently down to a narrow beach. Families spread blankets on it, and in winter…748 words6 min read
- BuildingWorkThe quiet officeDear colleagues, six weeks ago we agreed to try something that several of you thought was a little strange for a design studio. From nine until…750 words6 min read
- BuildingCitiesA cooler city blockThe summer Noor Haddad turned fifteen, her grandmother stopped sitting on the front steps. For as long as Noor could remember, Teta had spent the…736 words6 min read
- BuildingHistoryThe museum boxThe box arrived on a Thursday, which was the only afternoon the Riverside Heritage Museum accepted donations. It was a man's boot box, soft at the…758 words6 min read
- BuildingEnergyThe shared solar roofOver the past month, the board of the Maple Row Housing Co-operative has received more questions about the solar proposal than about anything since…729 words6 min read
- BuildingLanguageThe language exchangeSeptember 12. First night of the exchange at the café beside the college. Nineteen people came, which is eleven more than I expected and about nine…735 words6 min read
- BuildingPublic healthThe smoke dayIncident summary for the regional library board, prepared by Anita Deol, supervisor of the Riverbend branch. On Wednesday, the air-quality health…739 words6 min read
- BuildingDesignThe new rampOn the night the Lantern Theatre reopened, the first person up the new ramp was a nine-year-old on a scooter who had not been invited to test it and…710 words6 min read
- BuildingMediaThe local paperA note from the editor. Last spring, a reader named Olena stopped me outside the post office and asked a question I have been thinking about ever…724 words6 min read
- BuildingConsumptionThe repair caféKai had not wanted to come. His aunt Rosalind had woken him at nine on a Saturday, put a broken toaster in his arms, and told him they were going to…774 words6 min read
- BuildingTransportThe evening trainAbout two hundred people filled the gymnasium at Cedar Hollow Secondary School on Tuesday night for the first public meeting on the regional transit…733 words6 min read
- AdvancedHousingThe housing corridorWhen the city's planning department unveiled its proposal for the Dunmore Avenue corridor last autumn, the reaction divided almost perfectly along…970 words8 min read
- AdvancedClimateThe coastal choiceTo the residents of Port Aubrey. In two weeks, council will vote on the coastal adaptation plan that has occupied most of our meetings, and many of…923 words8 min read
- AdvancedTechnologyThe hiring screenEighteen months ago, the human resources division of a provincial ministry began using an automated system to screen applications for entry-level…934 words8 min read
- AdvancedWaterThe river agreementIn the dry summer of 2021, the Kettle River fell to its lowest level in more than sixty years of recorded measurements. For the three communities…933 words8 min read
- AdvancedCultureThe migration archiveMuseums that tell the story of immigration have traditionally favoured a particular shape: a difficult departure, a hazardous journey, a hesitant…941 words8 min read
- FoundationSportBorrowed skatesTomas moved to Saskatoon with his parents when he was twelve. The first thing he noticed about his new school was not the building or the teachers.…506 words4 min read
- FoundationPetsThe dog on the front stepOn a wet Sunday morning in Halifax, Noor opened her front door to get the newspaper and found a dog sitting on the step. It was a medium-sized brown…536 words4 min read
- FoundationMoneyThe first paychequeWhen Priya turned sixteen, she got a summer job at a garden centre on the edge of Moncton. She watered plants, carried bags of soil to customers'…461 words4 min read
- FoundationNeighboursThe third-floor potluckWhen the elevator in Mei's apartment building in Edmonton broke for the third time in one month, the residents of the third floor met in the hallway…509 words4 min read
- FoundationOutdoorsThe canoe and the windEvery August, Daniel's family rented a small cabin beside a lake in northern Ontario. The cabin had no television and a weak phone signal, and his…503 words4 min read
- FoundationFamilyCalls across the oceanWhen Lola moved from the Philippines to live with her son's family in Brampton, she brought two suitcases, a rice cooker, and a small address book…520 words4 min read
- BuildingEducationWho calls a snow dayAt four-thirty on a January morning, while most of the city is still asleep, a small group of people in a school district office in Ottawa are…755 words6 min read
- BuildingFarmingThe sugar bush in MarchFor most of the year, the maple trees on Hélène's land in eastern Quebec look like any other forest. For about six weeks in early spring, they become…732 words6 min read
- BuildingShoppingBuying a used carWhen Karim started a job at a warehouse on the edge of Regina, he quickly learned that the bus did not run early enough for his six o'clock shift.…742 words6 min read
- BuildingTravelThe morning ferryEvery weekday at seven-forty in the morning, a car ferry leaves a small terminal on an island off the coast of British Columbia and crosses to the…746 words6 min read
- BuildingTenancyWhen the heat goes offOn a Tuesday night in January, Aliyah noticed that the radiators in her Montreal apartment were cold. She assumed the building's heating system would…757 words6 min read
- BuildingBroadcastingLate-night community radioAt eleven o'clock every Thursday night, in a small studio above a hardware store in Thunder Bay, a retired train conductor named Albert turns on a…762 words6 min read
- BuildingCareersThe interpreter in the roomWhen Samira arrives at a hospital in Calgary for a morning shift, she does not know which patients she will meet or what news they will receive. She…750 words6 min read
- BuildingScienceWhy the sky turns greenOn a clear night in late winter, the sky above Yellowknife sometimes begins to move. A pale band appears in the north, grows brighter, and suddenly…736 words6 min read
- BuildingLeisureSaving the curling clubIn a small town in southern Manitoba, the curling club is one of the few buildings that is busy every winter evening. It has four sheets of ice, a…733 words6 min read
- BuildingFinanceThe free tax clinicEvery March and April, the basement of a public library in Surrey, British Columbia, fills with folding tables, laptops, and people holding envelopes…783 words7 min read
- AdvancedInfrastructureRoads on thawing groundAcross much of northern Canada, the ground beneath roads, airstrips, and buildings has been frozen continuously for thousands of years. This…969 words8 min read
- AdvancedEconomicsThe four-day week trialWhen a mid-sized software company in Halifax announced that its employees would work four days a week for the same salary, the reaction was divided.…958 words8 min read
- AdvancedEcologySmall shells, large costsFew organisms have reshaped North American waterways as dramatically as two small freshwater mussels, the zebra mussel and the closely related quagga…937 words8 min read
- AdvancedImmigrationThe credential gapWhen Farid arrived in Canada, he brought fourteen years of experience as a civil engineer, a master's degree, and a portfolio of bridges and highway…955 words8 min read
- AdvancedHealth systemsThe emergency room that closes at nightOn a Saturday evening last summer, the only emergency department in a small town in rural Ontario closed its doors at six o'clock and did not reopen…950 words8 min read
- AdvancedWildlifeCoyotes in the cityResidents of Canadian cities are increasingly likely to encounter an animal that, a century ago, was rarely seen east of the prairies: the coyote.…941 words8 min read
- AdvancedEducation policyThe case for later school startsIn many Canadian high schools, the first bell rings before eight-thirty in the morning, and in some districts, buses begin collecting students before…939 words8 min read
- AdvancedBilingualismThe language that stays at homeIn many Canadian households, a familiar pattern unfolds over the course of a single generation. Parents who immigrated as adults speak their first…921 words8 min read