Skip to content
LessonPrint

A Speaker's Claims and Support is a free printable Grade 5 English worksheet on summarising claims and explaining what supports each, aligned to Common Core standard SL.5.3. 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 15 of 25 · the same problems every time you open this link.

Next setLesson plan

One paper per pupil

12345678910111213141516171819202122232425

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

A Speaker's Claims and Support

SL.5.3

NameDate

Read the text, then answer the questions.

1.Read the text, then answer the questions.

The Mill: The Local Paper, June 1980

Whately's Mill closed on Friday with the loss of 214 jobs, the largest single closure in the town since the war. The mill had run since 1868. At its height it employed more than 600. Mr Whately declined to say when he had known the closure was certain. The Chamber of Commerce has called for a public inquiry; the union has called the closure "predictable for two years". The council says a retraining fund will open in September. Four other textile mills within twenty miles have closed since 1975. Nobody the paper spoke to expected the site to be used for textiles again.

  1. 1. What is this report's purpose, and how does it differ from the accounts?
  2. 2. Quote accurately the union's description of the closure.
  3. 3. Two organisations react. Identify which reason belongs to which.
2.Read the text, then answer the questions.

Why the Thames Froze

Between 1309 and 1814 the Thames froze hard enough to walk on at least twenty-four times. Since 1814 it has not once. The usual explanation is that the climate has warmed. That is part of it, and not most of it. Old London Bridge had nineteen arches on wide stone piers. The piers took up so much of the channel that the bridge acted as a weir, slowing the water upstream almost to a standstill. Still water freezes; moving water does not. The river was also shallower and wider then, spreading over land that has since been embanked. Shallow water loses heat faster. Old London Bridge was demolished in 1831. The embankments were built between 1862 and 1874. The river that flows through London now is narrower, deeper and faster than the one that froze — and it would not freeze in a colder winter than any of those.

  1. 1. The text gives three reasons for the freezes. Identify them and say which is treated as least important.
  2. 2. Quote accurately the sentence that qualifies the usual explanation.
  3. 3. What is the author's purpose, and how do you know?

LessonPrint · SL.5.3 · Set 15 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — A Speaker's Claims and Support

Set 15. Prints on its own sheet.

  1. 1.1. To record what happened and who said what — it reports the dispute rather than taking a side. 2. "predictable for two years". 3. The Chamber of Commerce wants an inquiry; the union claims the closure was predictable for two years.
  2. 2.1. The bridge as a weir, the shallow wide channel, and a colder climate — the climate is called "part of it, and not most of it". 2. "That is part of it, and not most of it." 3. To correct a common explanation — the second paragraph names it and downgrades it before giving the real causes.

More practice for SL.5.3

Summarise a speaker's claims and say what supports each one.

Teaching this next? Summarising a Speaker's Argument is the 40-minute plan for it, with the misconceptions to expect.

All Grade 5 worksheets

Last reviewed 2026-09-05. Aligned to SL.5.3 of the Common Core State Standards for English language arts.