Page 11 - SpringBoard_CloseReading_Workshop_Grade7_Flipbook

Close Reading of informational/literary nonfiction Texts (continued)
fugitive: someone who has escaped
incomprehensible: not able to be understood
ACTIvITy 3
Independent Practice
The text passage that follows is from a biography of Harriet Tubman. Born a slave, Harriet Tubman gained her own freedom by escaping to Philadelphia. She then used the Underground Railroad to lead more than 300 others to freedom in Northern states and Canada.
First Reading: First Impressions
Read the following passage silently. Your focus for the first reading is on understanding the meaning of the passage. As you read, practice diffusing by replacing unfamiliar words with synonyms or definitions for the underlined words. Use the definitions and synonyms to the right of the paragraphs to help your understanding.
From Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad
by Ann Petry
There were eleven in this party, including one of her brothers and his wife. It was the largest group that she had ever conducted, but she was determined that more and more slaves should know what freedom was like.
She had to take them all the way to Canada. The Fugitive Slave Law was no longer a great many incomprehensible words written down on the country’s lawbooks. The new law had become a reality. It was Thomas Sims, a boy, picked up on the streets of Boston at night and shipped back to Georgia. It was Jerry and Shadrach, arrested and jailed with no warning.
She had never been in Canada. The route beyond Philadelphia was strange to her. But she could not let the runaways who accompanied her know this. As they walked along, she told them stories of her own first flight; she kept painting vivid word pictures of what it would be like to be free.
But there were so many of them this time. She knew moments of doubt, when she was half afraid and kept looking back over her shoulder, imagining that she heard the sound of pursuit. They would certainly be pursued. Eleven of them. Eleven thousand dollars’ worth of flesh and bone and muscle that belonged to Maryland planters. If they were caught, the eleven runaways would be whipped and sold South, but she—she would probably be hanged.
They tried to sleep during the day but they never could wholly relax into sleep. She could tell by the positions they assumed, by their restless movements. And they walked at night. Their progress was slow. It took them three nights of walking to reach the first
10 SpringBoard® English Language Arts Grade 7
biography
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