WILD CHILDREN Reading test Grade 6

WILD CHILDREN Most children know of at least two book characters of children who grew up with animals, and not with their parents or other people. The first character is Rudyard Kipling’s Mowgli from The Jungle Book. Mowgli grew up with wolves in the Indian jungle where he lived, and he communicated with other animals. The second example is Tarzan, created by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Tarzan lived in the jungle after his parents had a tragic accident. He survived by imitating other animals, especially monkeys.Still, what if these fictional characters were real, not from books? Imagine real children of your age who grew up in the wilderness, far from cities, their parents, and other people.Some scientists have worked with children who spent their childhood in the wilderness. They call them feral or wild children. These children lived with animals when they were young and did what animals did. One such example is the monkey boy, John Ssebunya, who lived with vervet monkeys in Uganda.A woman discovered him accidentally in 1991 and took him back to the village, where he slowly learned to behave like humans. He now speaks the human language and sings in a children’s choir, but he is still able to communicate with monkeys.Scientists like examples of feral children because they are interested in how we learn to do everything we do, for example, eat, move, and communicate with others. Scientists have found out that most feral children who lived with animals in the wilderness had to learn to speak a human language, sometimes with difficulty. They usually walked and ate food like animals. Scientists also want to see if they can teach wild children to behave as other humans do. 1 Read the text carefully. Choose true or false . Rudyard Kipling’s book is called Mowgli. True False The author of Tarzan is Edgar Rice Burroughs. True False Feral children are children who lived with their parents when they were young. True False John Ssebunya is an example of a feral child. True False Most feral children survived in the wilderness because they did what animals did. True False Scientists are very interested in feral children. True False 2 Choose the correct answer. There are _ book characters of children who grew up with animals. just two many Feral children are wild children who lived with _ when they were young. animals people Rudyard Kipling is _. a book. a writer. Tarzan grew up in the jungle with _. animals. his parents. John Ssebunya _ to communicate like other people. learnt never learnt Scientists who study feral children want to know how _ learn. animals people 3 Find the words in the text that have a similar meaning. 1 a type of monkey vervet2 somebody from imagination or a book, not real fictional3 do as others do imitate4 a group of people singing together choir 4 Complete the text with the words given. (1) Scientists are interested in how we learn to speak. They study (2) feral children who grew up among animals. It is interesting to see how these children (3) communicate without speaking. These children can learn human language, but with (4) difficulty.