Worksheets and No Prep Teaching Resources Reading Comprehension Worksheets Earth Earth's Land

Glaciers Earth

---

Glaciers
Print Glaciers Reading Comprehension


Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 7 to 8
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	6.34

Vocabulary

challenging words:

ablation, showing, accumulation, receded, peninsula, interesting, ordinary, satellite, history, eventually, early, wherever, grease, state, mainly, million

Other Languages
     Spanish: Los glaciares

---

Glaciers By Sharon Fabian

---

¹     When it snows and schools close, we make the most of our time by sledding, building snowmen, and having snowball fights because snow usually doesn't last for long. At least in many places, snow falls and then it soon melts away. But in other places snow falls and stays. And stays. And stays. When it snows in places that are cold enough, the snow packs down into larger and heavier ice crystals, and the air is pushed out. Eventually it turns into glacial ice. Ordinary ice usually looks white, and that is mainly from all of the tiny air bubbles in ice. Very dense glacial ice becomes a beautiful blue.
 
²     Some glacial ice forms on land, and some forms over the ocean. Wherever it forms, glacial ice is constantly changing. At the top edge, new ice is constantly being added. This is called accumulation. At the bottom edge, ice is wearing away. This is called ablation. Glaciers are always changing, but if a glacier is accumulating ice faster than it is losing ice, it is said to be growing.
 
³     Some glaciers extend out into the ocean from the land, forming a huge shelf of ice. Ice that extends out into the ocean like a peninsula is called tongue ice. Ice that floats on the ocean is called sea ice, but there are also different names for sea ice at different stages. Grease ice is an early state that consists of thin sheets of ice crystals floating on the water. Pancake ice consists of thicker, round plates that turn up at the edges and look a little like pancakes. When it has all packed down into one giant sheet, it is called pack ice or sea ice.

Paragraphs 4 to 9:
For the complete story with questions: click here for printable

---

Weekly Reading Books

Create Weekly Reading Books Prepare for an entire week at once!

---

Feedback on Glaciers

Leave your feedback on Glaciers   (use this link if you found an error in the story)

---

Earth

Earth

---

Earth's Land

Earth's Land

---

Science

Science

Careers in Science         Caring for Earth         Clouds         Dinosaurs         Earth's Land         Earth         Earthquakes         Electricity         Energy         Erosion         Food Pyramid         Food Webs and Food Chain         Forces and Motion         Fossils         Health and Nutrition         How Things Work         Landforms         Life Science         Light         Magnets         Matter

Moon         Natural Disasters         Photosynthesis         Plant and Animal Cells         Plants         Rocks and Minerals         Science Process Skills         Scientific Notation         Seasons         Simple Machines         Soil         Solar System         Sound         Space and Stars         Sun         Tsunami         Volcanoes         Water Cycle         Water         Weather

Copyright © 2018 edHelper