Worksheet

Answer Key
Level 2

Circle Games Frank Brennan

Summaries clay. Mrs McFee takes him to work with well-known
potter Grover Jackson, but they have an accident with
Quick Man Tan
another car in a rain storm on the way to his studio.
A Singapore Chinese café owner, Caleb ‘Quick Man Their back wheel is broken, but Emilio makes another
Tan’, constantly ‘entertains’ customers with stories out of ‘special clay’ and drives Mrs McFee and the
of how he was the best Lion Dance performer, and other car driver to safety.
a good fast fighter in his youth. His wife May May
The Trishaw Man
is fed up with him because he doesn’t help enough,
and their unmarried cook son Henry dreams of ‘A’ student Gregory Lim is ashamed of his father only
when the café will be his. One day when heavy being a poor trishaw driver when most of his fellow
rain has filled the café with people a young man students come from rich families or at least have
threatens another customer with a knife. Caleb parents with regular jobs. All this changes when his
kicks the knife from his hand and easily gets him father’s quick thinking helps an Australian girl to reach
to the floor. The man is a wanted criminal. Good hospital in time after a hornet sting. This is reported
newspaper press follows, and the story ends with in the local paper and Gregory is proud of his father,
Caleb teaching the Lion Dance to children, while now that everyone has seen what he did.
his son marries newly employed cook Elizabeth.
Beautiful Thing
The Wheel on the Wall
When student Polly Hopkins takes an unusual silver
While staying at The Old Swan pub in Portsmouth, disc to her university archaeology professor, neither
UK with his wife Candy, retired Texan Earl Cooper of them knows what the strange object is. Selkirk
sees the wheel of HMS Swan on the pub wall. As his calls in two specialist friends of his who question
great-grandfather went to the USA in a ship called Polly and take her DNA. The disc has writing on it
The Swan, Earl decides that he wants the wheel as a which changes before their eyes when placed near a
piece of family history. He convinces, apparently with computer. The DNA pattern it now shows is the same
difficulty, pub owner Tony Thatcher to sell it to him, as Polly’s. The specialists tell Polly she must stay under
for what we understand to be a high price. A month observation. She refuses and snatches the disc, which
later Earl is back home, happy with his wheel, while then emits light and vanishes from her hands. She is
Tony is parking his new classic Jaguar in a garage unable to explain what it was, but thinks that it was
where he has a pile of similar wheels, which were maybe something with a message for her or the world.
made for him by a friend.
Special Clay Before reading
Cleveland schoolboy Emilio Lopez has difficulties 1. It is the head of a lion, as used for the Lion
and so is sent to a special school. There he learns Dance in Chinese New Year celebrations in
to control his anger, largely with the help of drama Singapore. Student’s own answer.
teacher Mrs McFee. He particularly likes her ‘special 2. five short stories
clay’ lessons where students pretend to make anything 3. They are all about round things – things shaped
they want using their hands and imaginary clay. like circles.
Emilio also turns out to be an excellent potter with real

Cambridge English Readers © Cambridge University Press 2009 www.cambridge.org/elt/readers PHOTOCOPIABLE

 Worksheet
Answer Key
Level 2

Circle Games Frank Brennan

Check your reading
Quick Man Tan 3. He could understand everything easily, and he
likes the games they play.
1. a café in Singapore
4. It’s imaginary clay and they can make it into
2. Caleb Tan; his wife May May; his son Henry; the
anything they want.
new cook Elizabeth, who marries Henry
5. He makes animals and people that are just like
3. a T, b T, c F, d T, e F
the real thing, and yet they are also in his own
4. a cook, b having the café to himself, c It did good
style.
business. d Because he didn’t help enough and
6. Because he is a good potter and a good teacher
just told stories.
who likes to have young potters working in his
5. a To give hong bao with money or oranges inside,
studio.
b 4, 2, 6, 1, 3, 7, 5
7. The heavy rain causes the accident, and a car
6. a 1 newspapers, 2 robber, 3 great, 4 money,
runs into the back of Mrs McFee’s car. Both she
b They got Elizabeth to cook for them. Caleb
and the other driver are hurt.
started teaching the Lion Dance. Henry married
8. He uses his ‘special clay’ to make a fourth wheel
Elizabeth.
for Mrs McFee’s car so he can drive for help.
The Wheel on the Wall
The Trishaw Man
1. They live in Texas. They are staying at The
1. a a 13-year-old schoolboy, b Gregory’s father, a
Old Swan pub in Portsmouth, in the south of
trishaw driver, c Gregory’s mother, a fish-shop
England.
worker
2. a Benjamin Cooper, Earl’s great-grandfather,
2. a a kind of taxi, with a driver who rides a
b Ralph Cooper, Earl’s grandfather,
tricycle in front and a seat with a sun umbrella
c Earl Cooper
for two passengers behind,
3. Because it says HMS Swan on it, and Benjamin
b tourists and old people
Cooper sailed to America on a ship called The
3. He doesn’t like it that everyone knows his father
Swan. Earl thinks it’s part of his family history.
is a poor trishaw driver.
4. b, e, a, d, c
4. Singapore
5. another ‘classic’ Jaguar car
5. a T, b F, c F, d F, e T, f T
6. at home in Texas, the wheel from the pub
6. Get to a doctor or hospital quickly.
7. another Jaguar
7. 1 c, 2 a, 3 e, 4 b, 5 d
8. a lot of HMS Swan wheels
8. He felt happy because all the students were
9. It was made by a friend of Tony’s. It wasn’t
reading about his father.
really old.
Beautiful Thing
Special Clay
1. She is a second-year archaeology student at
1. a a 13-year-old boy with problems or
university; she’s from London.
‘difficulties’, b a 63-year-old drama teacher at a
2. It is a round, silver-coloured disc as big as Polly’s
special school, c a well-known potter
hand, like a CD, with strange writing on it.
2. He gets angry when he doesn’t understand things
3. Archaeologist friends of Professor Selkirk’s who
and is violent. He finds it difficult to talk to
come to question Polly.
people and make friends. When he is interested
in something he talks about it too much and
bores people.

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 Worksheet
Answer Key
Level 2

Circle Games Frank Brennan

4. a Professor Selkirk to Polly, b Polly to Professor After reading
Selkirk, c Dr Collins to Polly, d Dr Fellows to
Polly, e Polly to Dr Fellows and Dr Collins 1. a Special Clay, b The Trishaw Man, c The Wheel on
5. It disappears. the Wall, d Beautiful Thing, e Quick Man Tan
6. Nobody knows. She thinks it had a message from 2. a Mrs McFee, b Anita Lim, c Professor Selkirk,
another world. d Henry Tan, e Tony Thatcher
3. a Special Clay/Beautiful Thing, b The Trishaw
Man/Quick Man Tan, c Special Clay/The Trishaw
Man, d The Wheel on the Wall/Beautiful Thing
4–9. Student’s own answers.

Cambridge English Readers © Cambridge University Press 2009 www.cambridge.org/elt/readers PHOTOCOPIABLE