---

Sample It's About Time Worksheet
Reading Comprehension Worksheets

edHelper.com Subscribers:
Build a printable worksheet with the complete story and puzzles
Build a proofreading activity

---

 

It's About Time By Laura G. Smith

---

¹     "Do you know what time it is?" It's a question we either ask or answer nearly every day. We plan to do certain things, meet certain people, or go to certain places at certain times, based on our schedules. Imagine how confusing our days would be if we had no organized way to measure time!
 
²     Before timekeeping and clocks were invented, people used to know approximately what time it was by watching the sun. When the sun is at its highest point in the sky, this is known to be 12 o'clock noon (or midday). Directly above every spot on the earth, an imaginary curved line called the celestial meridian passes through the sky. As the earth rotates on its axis, the sun crosses every celestial meridian once each day. When the sun crosses the celestial meridian above a particular place, the time there is noon. Every place on earth that is east or west of another place has noon at a different time. The time at any particular place is called the local time.
 
³     By the 1700's man had developed accurate clocks and watches that told time to the minute. Each town would set their clocks at noon each day based on the position of the sun. The town clock would be the "official" local time, and the citizens would set their pocket watches and clocks to the same time. Some of the townspeople even earned money by traveling house-to-house adjusting clocks in their customers' homes on a weekly basis. Since each town set its official clock according to the position of the sun at that particular location, travel between cities meant having to change one's pocket watch upon arrival.
 
⁴     As railroads grew to be a more widespread mode of transportation, time became a more important issue. In the early years of the railroads, the schedules were very confusing because each stop was based on a different local time.

Paragraphs 5 to 11:
For the complete story with questions: click here for printable

---

Weekly Reading Books

Create Weekly Reading Books Prepare for an entire week at once!

---

Feedback on It's About Time

Leave your feedback on It's About Time   (use this link if you found an error in the story)

---

More Lessons

Solar System and Planets

---

Science

Science

Careers in Science         Caring for Earth         Clouds         Dinosaurs         Earth's Land         Earth         Earthquakes         Electricity         Energy         Erosion         Food Pyramid         Food Webs and Food Chain         Forces and Motion         Fossils         Health and Nutrition         How Things Work         Landforms         Life Science         Light         Magnets         Matter

Moon         Natural Disasters         Photosynthesis         Plant and Animal Cells         Plants         Rocks and Minerals         Science Process Skills         Scientific Notation         Seasons         Simple Machines         Soil         Solar System         Sound         Space and Stars         Sun         Tsunami         Volcanoes         Water Cycle         Water         Weather

Copyright © 2025 edHelper