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2020 ‫מועד קיץ‬ - 47 - ‫ פרק שני‬- ‫אנגלית‬

Reading Comprehension

This part consists of two passages, each followed by several related questions. For each
question, choose the most appropriate answer based on the text.

Text I (Questions 13-17)

(1) On Thursday, April 4, 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the prominent
African-American civil rights leader, was assassinated. The following day, Jane Elliott,
an elementary school teacher in the small town of Riceville, Iowa, was asked by one of
her eight-year-old pupils why King had been shot. Instead of trying to explain the

(5) complicated subject of prejudice to her all-white class, Elliott decided to show the
children how it feels to experience discrimination, and to help them understand Dr.
King's struggle to achieve equality for African Americans. To do so, she came up with
an impromptu social exercise.

Dividing her class according to eye color, Elliott announced that the blue-eyed
(10) children were inferior to the children with brown or green eyes. To lend this statement

credibility, she fabricated a "scientific" explanation: the chemical melanin is
responsible for both eye color and intelligence. People with brown or green eyes have
more melanin, she said, and are therefore smarter. She proceeded to seat the blue-eyed
students separately and gave them special armbands to wear. At the same time she gave
(15) the brown- and green-eyed students extra privileges and told them not to speak to their
blue-eyed classmates. The brown- and green-eyed students immediately began to
participate more in class, became more outgoing, and started to bully their blue-eyed
classmates. The blue-eyed children lost self-confidence, and even the best students
among them made mistakes in their schoolwork.

(20) On Monday, when the children returned to school after the weekend, Elliott
reversed their roles, telling the blue-eyed students that they were the more intelligent
ones. Although the blue-eyed students now had the upper hand, they were not as cruel
as their brown- and green-eyed classmates had been – perhaps because their experiences
on Friday had made them more empathetic. At the end of the exercise, Elliott told the

(25) children that they had just experienced discrimination; the essays they were
subsequently asked to write showed that they had grasped the point that Elliott was
trying to make.

The story was reported in local, and then national, newspapers. Hundreds of
readers were appalled, arguing that the exercise was psychologically damaging.

(30) Decades later, Elliott's work continues to stir controversy: some people laud its
promotion of tolerance, while others argue that it is manipulative and immoral. Today,
over 50 years later, many teachers still use variations of Elliott's eye-color lesson to help
their students develop tolerance, empathy and compassion for those who are different.

)‫© כל הזכויות שמורות למרכז ארצי לבחינות ולהערכה (ע"ר‬
.‫ בלא אישור בכתב מהמרכז הארצי לבחינות ולהערכה‬- ‫ כולה או חלקים ממנה‬- ‫ או ללמדה‬,‫אין להעתיק או להפיץ בחינה זו או קטעים ממנה בכל צורה ובכל אמצעי‬