WorksheetsThere Will Come Soft Rains test
Total questions: 23
Worksheet time: 12mins
How does the reader learn where and when “There Will Come Soft Rains” takes place?
An electronic device states the time, date, and location at the beginning of the story.
The date and location are burned into the side of the house.
here is a newspaper on the kitchen table that shows the date and location of the story.
The reader must figure it out using a variety of clues throughout the story.
Where are the human beings in “There Will Come Soft Rains”?*
Burned into the side of the house.
There are no humans left.
They are being held prisoner in the basement of an automated house
in space.
which details show what has happened to the owners of the house in "There Will Come Soft Rains"
The stove prepares a breakfast that goes uneaten
Mrs. McClellan likes to listen to poetry in the evenings.
The house keeps itself clean and protects itself from harm.
The shapes of four people are burned into the side of the house
How does the automated house “die” in “There Will Come Soft Rains”?
it is blown up in a nuclear blast
The electronic mice tear it down.
It catches on fire and is unable to put the fire out
The owners move away, and the house stops functioning.
At the beginning of “There Will Come Soft Rains,” the stove prepares eight pieces of toast, eight eggs, sixteen slices of bacon, two coffees, and two glasses of milk. What can you conclude is most likely to be true about the McClellan family, based on this information and other details?
The family is having guests over for breakfast.
Two of the family members are allergic to milk.
The stove usually burns the toast and undercooks the eggs.
There are four family members, and two of them are children.
What is the most likely meaning of the word "attending" as it is used in this sentence?
The man stayed at his daughter’s bedside while she had the flu, attending to her by giving her water and wiping her brow when she woke throughout the night.
Taking charge of
making believe that
helping or caring for
listening for
If a writer "manipulated" words to create an advertisement, what did the writer do?
treated words badly
used words skillfully
persuaded people to like her
corrected a mistake
Which of the following situations is most likely to make a person feel "tremulous"?
Performing a solo while experiencing stage fright.
learning that an exam has been moved to a later date.
getting a good grade on a research paper.
Hearing one's favorite song on the radio
Part A: In “There Will Come Soft Rains,” what are the parents doing at the time of the tragedy?
They are downstairs in the basement.
They are outside working in the garden.
They are sitting together in the nursery.
They are playing bridge at the card table
Part B: What passage from the story supports the answer to Part A?
Here the silhouette in paint of a man mowing a lawn. Here, as in a photograph, a woman bent to pick flowers.
In the cellar, the incinerator glowed suddenly and a whirl of sparks leaped up the chimney.
Bridge tables sprouted from patio walls. Playing cards fluttered onto pads in a shower of pips.
voice spoke from the study ceiling: “Mrs. McClellan, which poem would you like this evening?"
Part C: What is surprising about what happens to the dog in “There Will Come Soft Rains”?
The robot mice are trained to recognize the dog but do not help it.
The house tries to provide medical aid to the dog but it refuses help.
The dog gets sick even though it has no outward symptoms of illness.
The hungry dog cannot get food even though the house can still cook.
Part D: What detail from the story supports the answer to Part C?*
dog whined, shivering, on the front porch. The front door recognized the dog voice and opened
The dog, once huge and fleshy, but now gone to bone and covered withsores, moved in and through the house, tracking mud.
[The] dog sniffed the air and scratched the kitchen door. Behind the door,the stove was making pancakes which filled the house with a rich baked odor and the scent of maple syrup. The dog frothed at the mouth, lying at the door sniffing...
[The dog] ran wildly in circles, biting at its tail, spun in a frenzy, and died.
Read the following passage from “There Will Come Soft Rains.”
"The house was an altar with ten thousand attendants, big, small, servicing, attending, in choirs. But the gods had gone away, and the ritual of the religion continued senselessly, uselessly."
Which answer choice gives the most important reason the author chose to make this comparison?
To show that the house works without a purpose now that the people it served are gone.
To show that the house continues to function exactly as it did when people lived 100 years ago.
To show that the house has destroyed the people instead of serving them.
To show that the house was once a popular and well-attended church
What conflict, or struggle, is presented in the following scene from “There Will Come Soft Rains”?
“Fire!” screamed a voice. The house lights flashed, water pumps shot water from the ceilings. But the solvent spread on the linoleum, licking, eating, under the kitchen door, while the voices took it up in chorus: “Fire, fire, fire!” … The house gave ground as the fire in ten billion angry sparks moved with flaming ease from room to room and then up the stairs.
The conflict the house feels about whether or not to save itself from fire.
The conflict between nature, the fire, and the human-made solvent.
The conflict between the panicked house and the furious fire
The conflict the fire feels about destroying the house
What does Personification mean?*
A person
People who are given attributes of other people.
A dog that walks
Non human objects or animals that have human attributes.
Which sentence from “There Will Come Soft Rains” is an example of personification?
The garden sprinklers whirled up in golden founts, filling the soft morning air with scatterings of brightness.
The dog ran upstairs, hysterically yelping to each door, at last realizing, as the house realized, that only silence was here.
At four o’clock the tables folded like great butterflies back through the paneled walls
The wind blew. A falling tree bough crashed through the kitchen window
Part A: In “There Will Come Soft Rains,” the house starts out cheerful and efficient and changes as the story progresses. Which description best explainshow the house is personified during the fire?
It becomes uncaring and stops trying to work.
It becomes frantic and works at an insane pace.
It becomes more cheerful and denies any problem.
It becomes detached and works even more efficiently.
Part B: What detail from the story best supports the answer to Part A?
[T]he stove could be seen making breakfast at a psychopathic rate, ten dozen eggs, six loaves of toast, twenty dozen bacon strips, which, eaten by fire, started the stove working again, hysterically hissing!
The fire burst the house and let it slam flat down, puffing out skirts of smoke
spark and smoke.
by fire, started the stove working again, nonchalantly hissing!
Read the following passage from “There Will Come Soft Rains.”
"The house shuddered, oak bone on bone, its bared skeleton cringing from the heat, its wire, its nerves revealed as if a surgeon had torn the skin off to let the red veins and capillaries quiver in the scalded air."
How does the personification in this passage most likely affect the reader?
It disturbs the reader by using the language of human anatomy to describe the house’s death.
It makes them say "Oh, that's Personification."
It gives the reader a sense of familiarity
You don't know and you are willing to lose points by selecting this option.
What is Parallelism?
Repetition of words, phrases, clauses, or sentences that have the same grammatical structure or the same meaning.
Repetition of rhymes and patterns
Two words, parked side by side.
The same grammar, repeated.
What type of parallel element can be found in the following sentence? The house’s exterior resembled a nineteenth-century farmhouse, with majestic black columns, a wooden porch swing, and a large black door.
Repeated Adverbial phrases
Rpeated Verb phrases
Repeated Verbs
Repeated Adjectival phrases
What words in this passage are an example of parallel adverbs?
Nearly everything about the house is automated, including robot maids, electric toothbrushes, and self-making beds. And yet, its owners seem perpetually busy and move through their lives hurriedly, frantically.
Is; seem
Robot; electric
Automated; house
Hurriedly; frantically
Which sentence correctly uses parallel verb phrases? *
An electronic maid had cooked dinner, had cleaned the dishes, and then was put away for the night by the house’s owner
The dust was swept up by the electronic vacuum, and the floors were cleaned by an automated mop.
Suspiciously by an automated mop
Tiny lawn mowers have been circling the lawn, and each blade of grass is carefully clipped.
