What did Hana plan to do with the result from trial three?
Listen to a Classroom Conversation · ELPAC Grades 9–10 listening. The correct answer, and the reasoning behind it.
A multiple-turn conversation between two speakers, followed by three questions.
Listen to the conversation between Mr. Cole and Hana about her lab report. Then answer the questions.
The Result That Did Not Fit
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Mr. Cole: Hana, I looked at your yeast data. Four of your five trials at forty degrees are close together, and then trial three is almost double the others. What happened there?
Hana: I am not sure. I was going to leave it off the graph so the pattern looks cleaner.
Mr. Cole: I would not do that. If you remove a result just because it does not match, a reader has no way of knowing whether the pattern is real or whether you only kept the results that fit it.
Hana: So I keep it in, even though it is probably a mistake?
Mr. Cole: You keep it in your data table, and you say what you think caused it. Did anything about that trial go differently?
Hana: Actually, yes. I opened a new packet of yeast for trial three. The other four all came from the same packet.
Mr. Cole: That is a real explanation, and it is worth a sentence in your report. Then run two more trials with the new packet tomorrow at lunch. If those come out high too, you have not found a mistake. You have found out something about the yeast.
The question
Choose the best answer.
What did Hana plan to do with the result from trial three?
- Run trial three again with the old packet of yeast.
- Leave it off her graph so the pattern looks cleaner.Correct answer
- Ask a classmate to check her measurements.
- Report it as the most important finding of her experiment.
Why “Leave it off her graph so the pattern looks cleaner.” is correct
This is a stated-detail question from early in the conversation. Hana says it directly in her first turn, and Mr. Cole's objection in the next line only makes sense as a response to that plan. Students who miss her line can still work it out from his reply: 'If you remove a result just because it does not match'.
Why the other answers are wrong
- Run trial three again with the old packet of yeast. — Mr. Cole suggests more trials with the new packet, not repeating trial three with the old one, and that is his idea rather than her plan.
- Ask a classmate to check her measurements. — No classmate is mentioned in the conversation.
- Report it as the most important finding of her experiment. — She thought the result was probably a mistake, so she was not treating it as a finding.
Practice more of this
More listening practice for Grades 9–10, or see the ELPAC practice test for grades 9–10. For other grades, see free ELPAC practice tests by grade.
This is an independent study resource. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to the California Department of Education or the official ELPAC program. All questions here are original practice material written to match the published task formats.