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Reading a Grade 4 Story is a free printable Grade 4 English worksheet on reading a whole Grade 4 text and answering across it, aligned to Common Core standard RL.4.10. It prints 2 questions with an answer key on its own sheet of paper, in 25 versions that each ask different questions, so no two pupils in the class work from the same page. Print it from the browser or download it as a PDF — no account, no email.

Set 17 of 25 · the same problems every time you open this link.

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Set 1 has all 25 in a single PDF. All 25 sets ask different questions.

Reading a Grade 4 Story

RL.4.10

NameDate

Read the text, then answer the questions.

1.Read the text, then answer the questions.

Daedalus and Icarus

Daedalus was the finest craftsman in the world, and King Minos kept him prisoner because of it. He and his son Icarus were shut in a tower above the sea. Daedalus watched the gulls for a summer. Then he gathered feathers, laid them in rows from short to long, and bound them with wax and thread into two pairs of wings. "Fly in the middle," he told Icarus. "Too low and the sea spray soaks the feathers. Too high and the sun softens the wax." They rose from the tower together. For a while Icarus followed exactly. Then the boy found that he could climb. He forgot the tower, the sea, the warning. He went up, and up, until the wax ran and the feathers came away one at a time and the sky let go of him. Daedalus flew on alone. He never made anything again.

  1. 1. What do Daedalus's actions after the fall tell you about him?
  2. 2. What were the wings made from?
  3. 3. Summarise this myth.
  4. 4. Describe Icarus in depth, using specific details from the text.
2.Read the text, then answer the questions.

The Water Came Up (told by Nell)

I was the one who said it was nothing. The river had been over the path before. Twice that winter. Both times it went down by morning, so when Dad started moving the boxes upstairs I told him he was making a fuss. I went to bed. At two o'clock I woke because my slippers were floating. Everything after that is in pieces. Dad on the stairs with the cat. Water the colour of tea. The sound the fridge made when it went over. We sat on the landing until it got light. Nobody said anything about the boxes. That was worse than if they had.

  1. 1. How many times had the river been over the path that winter?
  2. 2. What does Dad's behaviour tell you about him?
  3. 3. Summarise this story.
  4. 4. Determine a theme of this story and support it from the text.

LessonPrint · RL.4.10 · Set 17 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — Reading a Grade 4 Story

Set 17. Prints on its own sheet.

  1. 1.1. "He never made anything again" — his skill was what cost him his son, and he gave it up. 2. Feathers laid in rows from short to long, bound with wax and thread. 3. Imprisoned by Minos, Daedalus built wings of feather and wax, warned Icarus to fly in the middle, and lost him when the boy flew too high. 4. He begins obedient — "Icarus followed exactly" — then, discovering he can climb, forgets the tower, the sea and the warning.
  2. 2.1. Twice. 2. He judged it right and acted early, moving boxes upstairs before it flooded, and afterwards said nothing about it. 3. Nell told her father the rising river was nothing, woke at two to find the house flooded, and sat on the landing till dawn with nobody mentioning it. 4. Being wrong is worse when nobody blames you — "That was worse than if they had."

More practice for RL.4.10

Read and understand Grade 4-5 stories, plays and poems by the year's end.

Teaching this next? Reading Grade 4 Literature is the 40-minute plan for it, with the misconceptions to expect.

All Grade 4 worksheets

Last reviewed 2026-09-05. Aligned to RL.4.10 of the Common Core State Standards for English language arts.