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In this sentence, what word class is "patiently"?
She waited patiently because the bus was late again.
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In this sentence, what word class is "harbour"?
Harry grabbed his coat and ran towards the harbour.
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Which words complete this sentence correctly?
The swallows ___ south before the frosts arrive.
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Which words complete this sentence correctly?
Each of the girls ___ her own locker.
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Which sentence uses apostrophes correctly?
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Which is the correct way to write the bicycle belonging to the boy?
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Which sentence uses commas correctly?
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Which sentence uses commas correctly?
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Which sentence punctuates the speech correctly?
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Which punctuation belongs where the gap is?
My cousin ___ who has never been camping ___ brought a suitcase.
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Which relative pronoun completes this sentence?
The woman ___ found my wallet handed it in at the station.
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Which group of words is the subordinate clause in this sentence?
Since the bridge closed, the village has been much quieter.
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Which sentence says the same thing as "The lifeboat crew rescued two walkers." in the passive voice?
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Which sentence says the same thing as "A power cut interrupted the assembly." in the passive voice?
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Which word completes this sentence in formal English?
If the tide ___ lower, we could walk across.
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Which word or phrase is the most formal way of saying "go up"?
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Which is the correct noun made from "act"?
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Which is the correct adjective made from "care"?
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Which word correctly completes this sentence?
He ___ the ball further than anyone else.
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Which word correctly completes this sentence?
He ___ his packed lunch from home.
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Story 330 words
The Tide Clock
Nana's tide clock hung by the back door, and Marnie had never once seen it wrong.
It was a plain thing, a brass ring around a painted dial, and instead of hours it showed the sea: HIGH at the top, LOW at the bottom, and the long slow climb between them. Nana tapped it every morning on her way out to the shed, the way other people check the weather.
"Six hours and twelve minutes up," she would say. "Six hours and twelve minutes down. The sea doesn't hurry and it doesn't wait."
That Tuesday the dial read two hours past low, and Marnie went out onto the saltmarsh with a bucket and no particular plan. The creeks were empty, brown-walled and deep, and the mud held the prints of her wellingtons behind her like a trail of full stops. Far out, the sea was a thin silver line that did not seem to be doing anything at all.
She found a whole crab shell, a china handle, and the sole of a shoe. She crossed one creek, then another. She did not look back, because there was nothing behind her but the marsh, and the marsh did not change.
It was the sound that stopped her. Not a wave — the marsh had no waves — but a low busy trickling, everywhere at once, like a tap left running in another room.
Marnie turned round.
The creek she had crossed ten minutes ago was no longer a ditch of mud. It was a brown river, filling from the bottom, running fast and quietly inland. Beyond it lay the second creek, and beyond that the sea wall, and above the sea wall the roof of the shed, very small.
She thought of the dial by the back door, and of Nana's finger tapping it, and she understood for the first time that the clock had not been telling her the time. It had been telling her how long she had.
The remaining questions are about this passage.
How long does the tide take to go from low to high, according to Nana?
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What does Marnie find on the marsh?
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Why does Marnie not look back as she crosses the creeks?
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The mud held her prints "like a trail of full stops". What does this comparison suggest about the prints?
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Why does the writer describe the sound of the tide as "a tap left running in another room"?
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What has happened to the first creek by the time Marnie turns round?
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The passage ends: "It had been telling her how long she had." What effect does this last sentence have?
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Which sentence best sums up the passage as a whole?