Why Leaves Change Color

True facts · 3 questions

Picture: A park on a crisp fall afternoon. A tall maple glows red, and beside it a smaller tree is half green and half yellow. A boy of seven with brown skin and short black curly hair, in an orange sweater and jeans, holds a big leaf up to the sun. His grandma, with brown skin and gray hair in a bun, in a long blue coat, watches from a bench.

1 In summer, most leaves are green. The green helps leaves make food from sunlight.

2 In fall, the days get shorter and cooler. The tree stops making green. As the green fades, yellow and orange show. They were hiding under the green all along! Some trees, like maples, turn red, too.

Written for PlayOwl

Questions

Read the passage. Then fill in the circle next to the best answer.

1What is this passage mostly about?
- how trees grow from seeds
- how leaves make food in summer
- why leaves turn colors in the fall

2Where were the yellow and orange before fall came?
- under the green
- down in the roots of the tree
- high up in the sunlight
3In paragraph 2, the green in the leaves fades. What does "fades" mean?
- gets much brighter
- slowly goes away
- falls to the ground