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Similar Themes, Different Cultures is a free printable Grade 4 English worksheet on comparing how two texts treat one theme, aligned to Common Core standard RL.4.9. 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 19 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.

Similar Themes, Different Cultures

RL.4.9

NameDate

Read Text 1 and answer the question under it.

1.Read Text 1 and answer the question under it.

Text 1: 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. Why did King Minos keep Daedalus prisoner?
2.Now read Text 2 and answer these questions about BOTH texts.

Text 2: Arachne

Arachne could weave. Shepherds left their flocks to watch her hands. She was asked once whether the goddess Athene had taught her. "Nobody taught me," she said. "Let Athene weave against me and we shall see who learned from whom." An old woman at the edge of the crowd advised her to take it back. Arachne laughed at her. The old woman straightened up and was Athene. They wove for a day. Athene's cloth showed the gods in glory. Arachne's showed the gods behaving badly, and it was — everyone could see it — the better work. Athene tore it to pieces. Then she touched Arachne's forehead and made her into a spider, so that she could go on weaving for ever and nobody would ever look.

  1. 1. How is Arachne's fate different from Icarus's?
  2. 2. How is Daedalus's ending different from Athene's in the Arachne myth?
  3. 3. How is Icarus like Arachne?

LessonPrint · RL.4.9 · Set 19 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — Similar Themes, Different Cultures

Set 19. Prints on its own sheet.

  1. 1.1. Because he was the finest craftsman in the world.
  2. 2.1. Icarus dies of his own mistake; Arachne is punished by somebody more powerful for being right. 2. Daedalus loses what he loves and stops; Athene has the power and uses it as a punishment. 3. Both push a gift too far without heeding a warning — Icarus climbs, Arachne challenges Athene.

More practice for RL.4.9

Compare how different cultures handle the same theme or story pattern.

Teaching this next? Patterns of Events Across Cultures is the 40-minute plan for it, with the misconceptions to expect.

All Grade 4 worksheets

Last reviewed 2026-09-05. Aligned to RL.4.9 of the Common Core State Standards for English language arts.