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Canadian Theme Unit

The Inuit

The Inuit
Reading Level
     edHelper's suggested reading level:   grades 3 to 5
     Flesch-Kincaid grade level:   4.14

Vocabulary
     challenging words:    caribou, province, arctic, settled, piled, easily, schools, whales, meaning, kayak, upper, rocks, travels, peaceful, longer, seals
     content words:    Inuit Eskimos, Some Inuit, Ice Age, First Nations

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The Inuit
By Mary Lynn Bushong 		  
1     When you think of the arctic, what comes to your mind? Maybe you think of snow, cold, polar bears, and igloos. Perhaps you think of the people who live there: the Inuit.
 
2     Some people call the Inuit Eskimos. That is what some other tribes called them. People used to think it meant "eater of raw meat." Now they think it is an Ojibwa word meaning "to net snowshoes."
 
3     The Inuit have their own language. It is called Inuktitut.
 
4     The Inuit first came to Canada from Alaska. As they moved east, they found some people already living there. Those first people were the Tuniit.
 
5     The Tuniit were taller than the Inuit but easily scared off. Some people think that these big natives had no dogs or boats to help them hunt. They slowly died out. The last Tuniit died from the flu in 1902.
 
6     The Inuit were not a tall people, but they were great hunters. They hunted arctic birds, rabbits, seals, foxes, whales, polar bears, caribou, walruses, and musk oxen. They also ate some kinds of sea weed.
 
7     Many things could make life hard for the Inuit. They could have hunting accidents or die in the winter's freezing cold.
 
8     To survive, the Inuit made coats from caribou skins. The skins were so warm that they had to take them off as soon as they went into their homes.

Paragraphs 9 to 18:
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