Skip to the content
Peabody TeachFor teachers and grown-ups

Wedge Writing on Sumerian Clay Tablets

4th grade nonfiction passage about early writing: 172 words, six questions, an answer key and vocabulary.

4th grade nonfiction early writing 172 words

Wedge Writing on Sumerian Clay Tablets

About five thousand years ago, people in the land of Sumer began to write. Sumer was in Mesopotamia, between two rivers. There was no paper there, but there was plenty of soft clay along the riverbanks.

A scribe, or professional writer, shaped a piece of wet clay into a small flat tablet. Then he took a reed, which is a tall grass with a hollow stem, and cut the end so it was sharp and slanted. He pressed it into the clay again and again. Each press left a small mark shaped like a wedge. Put together, the wedges made signs. Today we call this kind of writing cuneiform, a word that means wedge-shaped.

At first, scribes used tablets to keep track of things, such as bags of grain or flocks of sheep. Later, people also wrote letters, laws and stories on clay.

Clay tablets dried hard in the sun. Because of that, many of them survived for thousands of years, and people today can still read what the scribes wrote.

Questions

  1. Where was Sumer? in the text

  2. What material did Sumerian scribes write on? in the text

  3. What tool did a scribe press into the clay? in the text

  4. What does the word cuneiform mean? in the text

  5. What did scribes first use tablets for? in the text

  6. Why do we still have so many clay tablets today? think about it

Words to know

scribe
a person whose job was to write and keep records
tablet
a small flat piece of clay used for writing
reed
a tall grass with a hollow stem that grows near water
wedge
a shape that is thick at one end and thin at the other
Share

One passage, three levels

The same topic and facts written three ways, so a mixed class can read and talk about one text. Each group’s sheet shows only a shape; the key says which is which.

● Easier · 141 words · Flesch-Kincaid grade 3.1

About five thousand years ago, people in Sumer began to write. Sumer was in Mesopotamia, between two rivers. There was no paper there. But there was a lot of soft clay by the rivers.

A scribe, a person who writes for a job, shaped wet clay into a small flat tablet. He cut the end of a reed, a tall grass with a hollow stem, so it was sharp and slanted. He pressed it into the clay again and again. Each press made a small wedge. Wedges together made signs. We call this writing cuneiform. That word means wedge-shaped.

At first, scribes used tablets to count things, like bags of grain or sheep. Later, people wrote letters, laws and stories on clay.

Tablets dried hard in the sun. Many lasted for thousands of years. We can still read them today.

▲ This passage · 172 words · Flesch-Kincaid grade 4.9

About five thousand years ago, people in the land of Sumer began to write. Sumer was in Mesopotamia, between two rivers. There was no paper there, but there was plenty of soft clay along the riverbanks.

A scribe, or professional writer, shaped a piece of wet clay into a small flat tablet. Then he took a reed, which is a tall grass with a hollow stem, and cut the end so it was sharp and slanted. He pressed it into the clay again and again. Each press left a small mark shaped like a wedge. Put together, the wedges made signs. Today we call this kind of writing cuneiform, a word that means wedge-shaped.

At first, scribes used tablets to keep track of things, such as bags of grain or flocks of sheep. Later, people also wrote letters, laws and stories on clay.

Clay tablets dried hard in the sun. Because of that, many of them survived for thousands of years, and people today can still read what the scribes wrote.

■ Harder · 169 words · Flesch-Kincaid grade 8

Roughly five thousand years ago, the people of Sumer developed a system of writing. Sumer lay in Mesopotamia, the region between two great rivers. Paper did not exist there, but the riverbanks offered an abundant supply of soft clay.

A scribe, meaning a professional writer, molded a lump of wet clay into a small, flat tablet. He then trimmed the end of a reed, a tall grass with a hollow stem, until it was sharp and slanted. By pressing the reed into the clay repeatedly, he left behind small wedge-shaped marks, and combinations of these wedges formed signs. Today this style of writing is called cuneiform, a word meaning wedge-shaped.

Initially, scribes used tablets to keep track of goods, such as sacks of grain or flocks of sheep. As time passed, people also recorded letters, laws and stories on clay.

Because the tablets hardened in the sun, a great many of them survived for thousands of years, and modern scholars can still read what the scribes wrote.

Download as one PDF

How to use it

  1. Press Read it big (or B) to put the text on the projector, or Full screen (F) to fill the whole screen.
  2. Ask the questions one at a time and use Show answer when the class has decided. A shows or hides every answer.
  3. Print student copy for the class, or Print with answers for yourself.

Ideas for class

  • Before reading, put scribe, tablet, reed and wedge on the board with their meanings from the Words to know section and have students predict what the text will be about.
  • Read it aloud once while students follow along, then have them reread it alone or with a partner. At a calm 100 words a minute it takes about 2 minutes to read aloud.
  • Use the Read it big button (or B) to put the text on the projector, and Show answer on one question at a time so the class commits to an answer first.
  • Question 6 asks the reader to infer. Ask students to point to the words in the passage that led them to their answer.
  • Ask students to write one question the passage did not answer, then look for the answer in a book or on a classroom screen.
  • Print the student copy for independent work and keep the answer-key copy for yourself.

Related

Questions

What reading level is "Wedge Writing on Sumerian Clay Tablets"?

It was written for 4th grade. It has 172 words and works out to a Flesch-Kincaid grade level of about 4.9. That is a formula's estimate from sentence length and syllables, and it is not a Lexile or a guided reading level, so check it against your students.

What do the questions ask?

There are six. 5 ask for something the text says directly and 1 ask the reader to work something out from clues. Each has an answer in the key, and the answers are written as a teacher would accept them, not as the only possible wording.

How long does it take to read?

About 2 minutes read aloud at 100 words a minute. For a one-minute fluency check, paste it into the fluency timer and use the word count.

Can I print it?

Yes. Print student copy gives the passage, the questions with lines to write on, and the word meanings. Print with answers gives the same page with the answers filled in. Both are made in your browser.

Is this passage from a published book?

No. It was written for Peabody Teach, so there is no book to buy and no login to read it.

Nothing you do here is sent to us. No sign-in, no ads.