Pets, Hunters and Breeds: teacher key

Cats, grade 6 edition, written for 6th grade. A cat purrs when it is happy, but not only then. Learn how cats hunt, how many live in the United States, and how late people began breeding them.

Read the book. Print this page for the key.

Questions and answers

1. When did people begin deliberately breeding cats?
   • Thousands of years ago
   • Before dogs
   • Only in the past few centuries (answer)
2. What do other scientists think about the estimate of birds killed?
   • It is too low
   • It is too high (answer)
   • It is exactly right
3. What does weaned mean?
   • Finished drinking their mother's milk (answer)
   • Learned to hunt
   • Opened their eyes
4. Why is a mother cat's purr thought to matter to her kittens?
   • It may help them feel calm (answer)
   • It teaches them to hunt
   • It tells them to sleep all day
5. At what age can kittens most easily learn to be comfortable with people?
   • Between 2 and 7 weeks (answer)
   • After one year
   • Only after 8 weeks

Words

• purr: soft cat hum
• weaned: done nursing
• rodents: mice and rats
• breeding: choosing parents
• retina: inside the eye