The Last Bus Home
A short story about a snowy evening and a brother and sister waiting for a bus, with eight questions on feelings, evidence and language.
Read the passage
By the time the bell rang for the end of football club, it had started to snow. Tessa zipped up her coat, took her little brother Ravi’s hand and led him to the bus stop. The street was nearly empty, and the sky had turned the colour of dishwater.
Ten minutes passed. Then twenty. The snow settled on the shelter like icing sugar, but there was no sign of the number 14.
“Maybe it’s not coming,” said Ravi in a small voice. He was only seven, and his teeth had begun to chatter.
“Of course it’s coming,” said Tessa, in the most cheerful voice she could manage. She pulled a squashed bag of crisps from her pocket and made a show of choosing the biggest one. Inside, however, her stomach had twisted into a knot. Their house was three miles away, and she had never walked it. She had no idea where her phone was.
“Tell me a joke,” said Ravi.
Tessa told three, and each one was worse than the last. Ravi laughed anyway, and somehow that made her feel braver.
Then, across the road, a light flickered on in the window of the corner shop. A man in a woolly hat unlocked the door and beckoned to them. “You two look frozen!” called Mr Hussein. “Come inside. You can ring your mum from the shop.”
Ten minutes later, Tessa was holding a mug of hot chocolate and listening to her mum’s voice on the phone. “Stay exactly where you are,” she said. “I’m on my way.”
When the car finally pulled up, Tessa noticed that her hands had stopped shaking. She had been the big sister tonight, she decided, and it had not been as easy as it looked.
Answer the questions
- Which bus were Tessa and Ravi waiting for? (1 mark)
- How old was Tessa’s little brother Ravi? (1 mark)
- Find and copy one word that means “signalled to come over”. (1 mark)
- The writer says the snow “settled on the shelter like icing sugar”. What does this comparison suggest about the snow? (2 marks)
- Tessa spoke “in the most cheerful voice she could manage”. How was she really feeling? Use evidence from the passage. (2 marks)
- Why do you think Tessa made a show of choosing the biggest crisp? (1 mark)
- What does the last paragraph suggest Tessa has learned about herself? (2 marks)
- Write two sentences to sum up what happened in the story. (2 marks)
Answer key for parents and teachers
1. The number 14. (1 mark)
Finding information (2b). A detail to find in the second paragraph.
2. Seven. (1 mark)
Finding information (2b). Finding a number or age in the text is a basic retrieval skill.
3. beckoned (1 mark)
Word meaning (2a). The child matches a less common word to its meaning.
4. That it was light, soft, white and covered the shelter gently (any sensible answer). (2 marks)
Language choices. A simile helps the reader picture the scene, and the child explains the effect.
5. Worried or frightened. Evidence: “her stomach had twisted into a knot”, or she had never walked home and did not know where her phone was. (2 marks)
Inference (2d). What a character says can hide what they feel, and the child finds the evidence of the truth.
6. She was trying to look calm and relaxed so that Ravi would not be worried. (1 mark)
Explaining from the text. Understanding a character’s reason for their actions.
7. That she can stay brave and look after someone else, even though it is hard. (2 marks)
Inference (2d). The ending hints at a change in the character without stating it.
8. One mark for the problem (the bus did not come in the snow) and one for the resolution (Mr Hussein helped them to phone their mum, who collected them). (2 marks)
Summarising (2c). A good summary picks out the problem and how it was solved.
What this practises
Finding information (2b), Word meaning (2a), Language choices, Inference (2d), Explaining from the text, Summarising (2c). The codes in brackets are the reading content domains from the national curriculum test framework. Marks and answers are a guide: accept any sensible answer that is backed up by the text.
Now try the writing task
Continue the story: write what Tessa and Ravi say to their mum on the journey home.
Aim for eight to twelve sentences. Read it back aloud together and fix anything that does not sound right.
Want feedback on your child's own writing?
You mark the worksheet yourself with the answer key. LiteracyLab AI is different: it reads what your child has written and gives specific feedback, such as what worked, one thing to try next, and a corrected version, matched to their year. The Free plan includes 3 pieces a month and needs no card.
More Year 5 worksheets
Free to print and copy for your own family or classroom. Please do not sell or republish. The passage and questions were written for LiteracyLab AI.