ISBN-13: 978-0-547-02008-2ISBN-10: 0-547-02008-2

1031878

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN

3.2.10

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN

Online Leveled Books

Level: L

DRA: 24

Genre:Biography

Strategy:Summarize

Skill:Main Ideas and Details

Word Count: 467

PHOTOGRAPHY CREDITS: Cover Library of Congress. 1 Library of Congress. 2 (both) Library of Congress. 3 (t) www.fi rstinfl ight.com. (r) © Getty Images. 4 www.fi rstinfl ight.com. 5 (t) Library of Congress. (r) © Getty Images. 6 (l) © 1997 PhotoDisc, Inc. All rights reserved. Images provided by © 1997 Cybermedia. (t) © Stockbyte. (b) © Shutterstock. 7 (t) Library of Congress. (r) © Getty Images. 8 Library of Congress. 9 © Getty Images. (b) Library of Congress. 10 (t) Library of Congress. (r) © Getty Images.

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by Rob Arego

2

Little Orville and WilburIt was 1878. Orville and

Wilbur Wright’s father had just returned from a trip. He brought his young sons a toy helicopter. Rubber bands made it fly.

The Wright Brothers lived in Dayton, Ohio.

Orville

Wilbur

3

That toy started Wilbur and Orville thinking about how things fly. They didn’t know then that someday they would make an invention that would change the world—the first airplane.

This sketch by Orville shows the toy helicopter his father gave him and his brother.

Orville

toy helicopter

rubber band

4

The Brothers Grow UpWhen Wilbur and Orville

Wright grew up, they worked as book printers. Later, they owned a shop to fix and make bicycles. But they always wanted to fly.

In the 1890s, lots of people began riding bicycles.

5

The Dream of FlyingAt that time, people were doing

experiments with flying machines. Some people worked on gliders. Gliders were like airplanes without engines. They flew on the wind. Other people worked on flying machines with engines. But no one had made a flying machine that could take off, turn, and come back down.

A glider flies on the windwithout an engine.

glider

6

The Wright Brothers discovered that bird wings changed shapein flight.

The Wright Brothers started to study bird wings. They saw how the wings worked when birds flew and turned. The brothers tried making wings that would work in the same way.

7

The Wright Brothers worked on a glider that flew like a kite. At first, the gliders couldn’t fly very far. The brothers made models of different kinds of wings. They used a fan to blow wind over these small model wings.

The Wright Brothers did many experiments with gliders.

glider

8

Ready for Take OffThe Wright Brothers were now

ready to build an engine to make a glider fly. The engine had to be light but strong. The engine spun the propeller that blew air over the glider’s wings to make it fly.

The Wright Brothers made their own engine.

engine

9

It was now time to test the flying glider. A few men helped the Wright Brothers roll their flying machine to its starting place. Orville lay down on the lower wing. He waited for the signal to take off.

The Wright Brothers made their own engine.

The Wright Brothers added their engine to a glider.

10

First Flight!The flying machine moved down

the starting track and into the air. It stayed in the air for only 12 seconds.

But it was the first time a flying machine with an engine carried a person in the air. Soon, people would fly all over the world!

All this was thanks to the genius of the Wright Brothers.

The Wright Brothers’ first flight was only 120 feet.

11

RespondingTARGET SKILL   Main Ideas and Details   

Copy the chart below.  Write one more detail from the biography about the Wright Brothers that supports the main idea. 

Text to World  Was the Wright Brothers’ invention important?  Write a paragraph that tells what you think.  Start with a sentence that tells the main idea.

Write About It

Main IdeaThe Wright Brothers studied bird wings.

Detail The Wright Brothers saw how bird wings worked.

Detail?

12

electricexperimentgadgetgenius

inventionlaboratoryoccasionalsignal

TARGET VOCABULARY

TARGET SKILL   Main Idea and Details  Tell important ideas and details about a topic.

TARGET STRATEGY   Summarize  Tell the important parts of the text in your own words. 

GENRE  A biography tells about events in a person’s life, written by another person.

ISBN-13: 978-0-547-02008-2ISBN-10: 0-547-02008-2

1031878

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN

3.2.10

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN

Online Leveled Books

Level: L

DRA: 24

Genre:Biography

Strategy:Summarize

Skill:Main Ideas and Details

Word Count: 467