What Frightful Proved: teacher key

The Fastest Animals, grade 8 edition, written for 8th grade. A trained falcon dropped from a plane in 1999 set a famous speed. Did it count?

Read the book. Print this page for the key.

Questions and answers

How did Frightful's team measure the dive?
- A radar gun on the ground
- An altimeter chip measured how far she dived over time (answer)
- A stopwatch on a cliff
Why did some ornithologists doubt the 242 mph dives?
- The falcon was too small
- The chip broke
- The falcon began from a higher altitude than usual (answer)
What do tubercles inside a peregrine's nose do?
- Slow the air so it can keep breathing (answer)
- Help it see
- Warm its blood
Why might a bat's 100 mph ground speed be misleading?
- Bats cannot fly
- The study used no bats
- Wind and gravity could have affected it (answer)
What does the word altitude mean here?
- Weight
- Height above sea level (answer)
- Speed