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Worksheet Grade 7 English Language Arts

Corvale's Hidden Aquifer: An Explanatory Paragraph Worksheet

A grade 7 ELA worksheet where students turn notes about a fictional town's aquifer into an organized explanatory paragraph using cause-and-effect transitions.

Objectives

  1. Students will organize source notes into an explanatory paragraph with a topic sentence.
  2. Students will use cause-and-effect transitions to connect ideas about groundwater.

Vocabulary

Aquifer
An aquifer is an underground layer of rock, sand, or gravel that holds water in the tiny spaces between its grains. Wells reach down into aquifers to bring water up to the surface.
Recharge
Recharge is water soaking down through the ground to refill an aquifer, the way rain refills an underground sponge. Aquifers stay healthy only if recharge keeps up with pumping.
Groundwater
Groundwater is water that has soaked into the ground and fills the spaces between soil particles and cracks in rock underground. It is a large underground source of fresh water that wells and springs draw from.

Also: well

Teacher overview

The fictional town of Corvale gets its drinking water from an aquifer, which is a layer of rock and sand underground that holds water in its spaces. This worksheet gives students a set of plain notes about that aquifer, then walks them through turning the notes into an explanatory paragraph. The early items sort and paraphrase the notes; the later items build the paragraph with a topic sentence and cause-and-effect transitions. The goal is informative structure, so students practice explaining how the aquifer works rather than arguing an opinion.

Corvale's Hidden Aquifer: An Explanatory Paragraph Worksheet — Grade 7 English Language Arts
Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Student Worksheet

Use the notes to answer the questions. Items 5 through 8 build toward one explanatory paragraph.

Notes about Corvale's water. Corvale sits above an aquifer. An aquifer is a layer of sand, gravel, and rock underground. Water fills the tiny spaces between the grains. The town pumps this groundwater up through wells and sends it to homes. Rain and snowmelt soak down through the soil and refill the aquifer. This refilling is called recharge. When more water is pumped out than soaks back in, the water level in the aquifer drops. Paving over open ground blocks recharge, because rain runs off the pavement instead of soaking in. Corvale keeps some fields and parks unpaved so rain can still reach the aquifer.

  1. In your own words, what is an aquifer?
  2. Where does the water in an aquifer sit? Use the notes.
  3. What does "recharge" mean in the notes? Explain it simply.
  4. According to the notes, how does paving over open ground affect recharge?
  5. Write a topic sentence for a paragraph that explains how Corvale's aquifer supplies and refills the town's water.
  6. List, in order, the three main ideas your paragraph will explain: how the aquifer holds water, how the town uses it, and how it refills.
  7. Choose two cause-and-effect transitions you will use, such as "because," "as a result," or "when." Write the phrase where each will go.
  8. Write an explanatory paragraph of five to seven sentences. Explain how the aquifer holds water, how Corvale pumps and uses it, and how recharge refills it. Use your topic sentence and at least two cause-and-effect transitions.

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

Answer Key
  1. Answer: An aquifer is an underground layer of sand, gravel, and rock that holds water in the spaces between its grains. Accept any wording that captures underground rock or sand holding water.
  2. Answer: In the tiny spaces between the grains of sand, gravel, and rock. The notes state this directly.
  3. Answer: Recharge is when rain and snowmelt soak down through the soil and refill the aquifer. Students should paraphrase the refilling idea.
  4. Answer: Paving blocks recharge, because rain runs off the pavement instead of soaking into the ground. The notes tie pavement to lost recharge.
  5. Answer: Answers will vary. A strong topic sentence names the subject and previews the explanation, such as: "Corvale's underground aquifer both supplies the town's water and slowly refills itself."
  6. Answer: The three ideas, in order: the aquifer holds water in spaces between grains; the town pumps it up through wells for homes; rain and snowmelt recharge it. Order may vary if logical.
  7. Answer: Answers will vary. Accept any two correct cause-and-effect transitions placed where they connect ideas, such as "because" before the pavement effect or "when" before the water-level drop.
  8. Answer: Answers will vary. A proficient paragraph opens with a topic sentence, explains all three ideas in a logical order, uses at least two cause-and-effect transitions correctly, and stays focused on explaining rather than arguing.

Differentiation

Support

Provide the paragraph as a cloze frame with the topic sentence written and blanks for the three ideas and two transitions. Students fill the blanks using the notes, then read the finished paragraph aloud to check that it flows.

Extension

Ask students to add one more sentence explaining why Corvale chooses to keep some land unpaved, connecting that choice back to recharge with a cause-and-effect transition.

ELL supports

Pre-teach "aquifer," "recharge," and "groundwater" with a simple cross-section picture of rain soaking down to an underground layer. Provide a transition word bank and let students draft with shorter sentences before combining them.