Vocabulary Cloze Exercises: The Tragedy of The Titanic

Cloze Exercises 1 Cloze Exercises 2 Cloze Exercises 3 Cloze Exercises 4 Cloze Exercises 5 Cloze Exercises 6

These cloze exercises which require students to fill in the blanks with appropriate words will give valuable practice in vocabulary to middle school students.

Cloze Exercises 2: The Tragedy of The Titanic

On the first night of the Titanic’s first voyage, the sea was calm. Many of the passengers (1) ………. asleep in their cabins, but in the first-class part of the ship, wealthy gentlemen were still drinking and playing cards, or sitting in comfortable chairs in the smoking room. Other men and women (2) …….. evening dress were walking along the top decks looking up at the stars. It was easy for these people in their fine clothes to believe that they were (3) ………. the safest ship ever built. It did not really seem like a ship at all; it looked more like a high-end luxury hotel.

Truly, it was (4) ……… a hotel on water. There was every luxury you could imagine on board. The rich first-class passengers slept in large cabins (5) ………… thick carpets, beautiful furniture and exquisite pictures on the walls. There were also small rooms (6) ………… their servants. The smoking room was so large that it reminded the gentlemen of their clubs in London. Certainly, for these wealthy passengers, the Titanic was the finest (7) ………… in the world. And as everyone knew, she could never sink. The men that built her (8) …………. promised that nothing could sink that ship. How wrong they were!

Radio messages received that morning had warned the captain (9) ……….. icebergs. Twenty minutes before midnight, Frederick Fleet, standing at the look-out point high above the ship, suddenly saw something in the sea ahead (10) ……………them. It seemed to increase in size minute by minute. Fleet shouted ‘Iceberg!’ and rang the warning bell three (11) ………..…. For a few seconds, it looked as if nothing could stop the Titanic from crashing into the iceberg. It stood (12) …………. three hundred feet above the water. Then the bow of the ship slowly began to swing away, (13) …………. it was too late. Although the ship appeared to miss the iceberg, it struck the knife-sharp ice concealed beneath (14) …………. water. The ice tore a hole 300 feet along one side of the ship.

Down in the boiler room number 6, two members of the crew were talking (15) ……………. the warning bell sounded. Suddenly, the whole side of the ship seemed to break (16) ………….. The freezing sea poured in uninvited, and the two men ran for their lives. Up on top, pieces of ice broke off from the floating mountain on to the deck, as the Titanic went past. A few first-class passengers, out for a last walk (17) …………. bed in their expensive fur coats, laughed and started making snowballs. They didn’t for a moment imagine that they were (18) ………… danger. They did not notice that the ship’s engines had stopped. But the captain of the ship, Edward J. Smith, rushed (19) ……….. of his cabin next to the bridge and asked the First Officer what was happening.

The first officer told the captain that they had hit (20) ……… iceberg. But neither of them knew whether there was any serious damage. Meanwhile, some of the watertight compartments were filling with (21) …………... The captain had his staff send distress signals to other ships nearby, but they were not near enough to help the Titanic. Soon, lifeboats were launched with women and children in (22) ………. But the 20 lifeboats that the ship had were not enough for all the passengers. Only 705 passengers could be rescued (23) ……….. the lifeboats. Most of the people on the lifeboats were first- and second-class passengers. Most of the third-class passengers were not lucky enough to get a place on the lifeboats.

As the ship sank, the rest of the passengers fell into the icy waters which was lethally (24) …………. There were very few survivors from those who were thrown (25) ………… the water. They were finally rescued by a shop named RMS Carpathia, which had steamed through the night (26) ……….. maximum speed dodging many ice bergs on the way, to help the Titanic.

As news of the tragedy (27) …………. the general public, there was outrage and shock. Many issues were (28) ……………: Were there enough lifeboats? Why didn’t the Titanic crew know (29) ………….. the ice bergs in the area? In the end, there was acceptance. However, the memories of the tragedy of this legendary ship (30) ……….. lived on.

Answer Key

• were
• in
• on
• like
• with
• for
• ship
• had
• of
• of
• times
• about
• but
• the
• when
• open
• before
• in
• out
• an
• water
• them
• by
• cold
• into
• at
• reached
• raised
• about
• have

Cloze Exercises 1 Cloze Exercises 2 Cloze Exercises 3 Cloze Exercises 4 Cloze Exercises 5 Cloze Exercises 6