De Paul University: Center for Urban Education: Making Progress [Pdf]

"Making Progress" is a one page, fictional, reading passage about students clearing the trash from a vacant lot near the school and planting a garden to beautify the neighborhood and show they care. It is followed by constructed-response questions which require students to provide evidence from the story; it includes sequencing, making inferences, describing character traits, finding the main idea, and summarizing. This passage aligns with Common Core Anchor Reading Standards 1 requiring close reading, textual evidence, main idea, and summarizing.