The following grade 4 short constructed-response question asks students to explain the motivation for a character's actions in a story. See the full text of the grade 4 reading passage.

Student responses were scored according to a three-level scoring guide as "Full comprehension," "Partial or surface comprehension," or "Little or no comprehension." The sample response below is an example of a "Full comprehension" response.

The percentages below indicate how each jurisdiction performed on the question.

See more about this question in the NAEP Questions Tool.

View this question, at score 158, on a map of NAEP reading items.