What is Ms. Carter's talk mostly about?
Basic Understanding of Spoken English · TELPAS Grades 4–5 listening. The correct answer, and the reasoning behind it.
Reporting category 2: understand the main points and important details of spoken stories and informational passages, about everyday life and school subjects.
Listen to the teacher talk about the moon. Then answer the questions.
Why the Moon Changes Shape
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Ms. Carter: Have you ever noticed that the moon looks different from night to night? Sometimes it is a big, round circle. Other times it is a thin curve, like a fingernail. But the moon itself never changes shape. It is always a round ball.
Ms. Carter: The moon does not make its own light. The light we see is sunlight bouncing off the moon. The sun always lights up the half of the moon that faces it.
Ms. Carter: The moon travels around the Earth, and each trip takes about a month. As it moves, we see different amounts of its bright half. When we can see all of the bright half, we call it a full moon.
Ms. Carter: Starting tonight, I'd like each of you to look for the moon before bed and draw what you see in your science journal. If you cannot find it, write that down, too. In a month, you will have your own record of how the moon changes.
The question
Choose the best answer.
What is Ms. Carter's talk mostly about?
- how people first traveled to the moon
- why the moon seems to change shapeCorrect answer
- why the sun is brighter than the moon
- how to keep a science journal
Why “why the moon seems to change shape” is correct
This asks for the main idea of an informational talk. Most of what the teacher says explains why the moon looks different from night to night, even though its shape never really changes. The journal assignment is a detail at the end, and students who remember only the last thing they heard often choose it.
Why the other answers are wrong
- how people first traveled to the moon — Travel to the moon is never mentioned.
- why the sun is brighter than the moon — The sun is mentioned only as the source of the moon's light.
- how to keep a science journal — The journal is the homework at the end, not the main topic.
Practice more of this
More listening practice for Grades 4–5, or see the TELPAS practice test for 4th and 5th grade.
This is an independent study resource. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to the Texas Education Agency or the official TELPAS program. All questions here are original practice material written to match the published test design.