Worksheet Grade 6 English Language Arts

Tuckaway's Water Tower: A Grade 6 Text-and-Table Worksheet

A grade 6 ELA worksheet where students combine a short technical passage on water-tower pressure with a data table of neighborhood readings.

Grade: Grade 6
Subject: English Language Arts
Material: Worksheet
Time: 35 min
Prep: No prep
Materials: None

Standards

RST.6-8.7 Common Core ELA

Integrate quantitative or technical information expressed in words in a text with a version of that information expressed visually (e.g., in a flowchart, diagram, model, graph, or table).

How this material aligns: Items 4 through 8 require students to integrate the pressure figures in the passage with the neighborhood readings in the data table to draw and support conclusions.

All materials for RST.6-8.7 →

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This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely, without attribution. Updated 2026-07-23.

Objectives

Students will combine information from a technical passage and a data table to answer questions.
Students will use table values as evidence to explain how water height relates to pressure.

Vocabulary

Water tower: A water tower is a big tank raised high above town that stores drinking water. Its height is what pushes water through the pipes, keeping the pressure steady even when the power goes out.

Also: pressure, psi, distribution

Teacher overview

This worksheet pairs a short technical passage with a data table so students practice pulling information from both and putting it together. The passage explains, in plain words, how a water tower creates pressure and what pressure range utilities aim for. The table gives readings for four neighborhoods in the fictional town of Tuckaway. Real service standards from the passage are drawn from public drinking-water guidance; the neighborhood readings are invented for this worksheet.

Tuckaway's Water Tower: A Grade 6 Text-and-Table Worksheet — Grade 6 English Language Arts

Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Student Worksheet

Read the passage, study the table, then answer the questions. The town of Tuckaway is fictional, and its readings are made up for this worksheet.

How a water tower makes pressure. A water tower holds a large tank of water high above the town. The weight of that water pushes down and creates pressure in the pipes below. The higher the water sits above a home, the more pressure that home gets at its faucets. Utilities try to keep pressure in a comfortable range, usually 40 to 80 psi at the tap. Most states also set a floor: the pressure at a home must never drop below 20 psi, because very low pressure can let dirty water seep into the pipes.

Neighborhood	Feet below the tank's water surface	Pressure (psi)
Hilltop	55	24
Center	95	41
Riverside	150	65
Low Meadow	185	80

According to the passage, what creates the water pressure in a home?
What is the lowest pressure most states allow at a home?
Which neighborhood in the table has the highest pressure, and which has the lowest?
The passage says utilities aim for 40 to 80 psi. Which neighborhoods in the table fall inside that target range?
Hilltop sits the fewest feet below the tank's water surface. Using the passage, explain what that tells you about why its pressure is the lowest in the table.
Does any neighborhood fall below the 20 psi minimum the passage names? Use the table to support your answer.
Low Meadow sits the most feet below the tank's water surface. Explain how the table shows that more height of water above a home leads to more pressure.
Write one sentence that combines a fact from the passage with a number from the table to describe Riverside's water service.

From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.

Answer Key

Answer: The weight of the water held high in the tower pushes down and creates pressure in the pipes below, as the passage explains.
Answer: 20 psi. The passage states pressure at a home must never drop below this floor.
Answer: Low Meadow has the highest pressure at 80 psi, and Hilltop has the lowest at 24 psi, according to the table.
Answer: Center (41 psi), Riverside (65 psi), and Low Meadow (80 psi) fall inside the 40 to 80 psi range; Hilltop at 24 psi does not.
Answer: The passage says the higher the water sits above a home, the more pressure it gets. Hilltop is only 55 feet below the tank's water surface, the least in the table, so it has the least height of water above it and the lowest pressure.
Answer: No. The lowest reading is Hilltop at 24 psi, which is still above the 20 psi minimum, so every neighborhood in the table meets the floor.
Answer: Low Meadow is 185 feet below the tank's water surface, the most in the table, and it also has the highest pressure at 80 psi, which shows that more height of water above a home produces more pressure.
Answer: Answers will vary. A correct sentence joins a passage fact with a table number, such as: "Riverside's 65 psi sits comfortably inside the 40 to 80 psi range utilities aim for."

Differentiation

Support

Shade the target-range rows (40 to 80 psi) in the table before students begin, and provide a labeled sketch of a water tower with an arrow showing that more height means more pressure. Allow items 1 through 3 to be answered with short phrases.

Extension

Ask students to add a fifth neighborhood to the table that would fall just below the 20 psi minimum, choose a "feet below the tank" value that fits the pattern in the table, and write two sentences explaining why that neighborhood would need extra help such as a booster pump.

ELL supports

Pre-teach "pressure," "psi," "water tower," and "distribution" with a simple diagram. Provide a sentence frame for item 8: "Riverside's pressure of ___ psi is inside the ___ psi range the passage describes."