A Reluctant Hero

Fact, Question, Response

Use this organizer to keep track of your thoughts as you listen to the audio story. In the "Fact" column, record interesting or useful factual information you learn about the topic. In the "Question" column, write questions that occur to you as you listen. Finally, in the "Response" column, make a list of responses to the story, either as they occur to you or in relation to one of the facts or questions you’ve listed.

T-Chart: 9/11 Hero

Listen to the interview with Michael Benfante and how he rescued a woman on 9/11. In the first column, take notes on what he did and in the second column, take notes on what he saw and felt.

Language Identification

Listen closely and check off each phrase as you hear it

• moved her from the wheelchair into an evacuation chair, and carried it down 68 floors
• it turns out that can be very hard to take
• What He's Learned, How He's Struggled, and What No One Should Ever Forget
• Sometimes still you feel so awful about it
• it was a way to provide a story from that day that was of hope
• trying to wrap your arms around the whole thing
• focus my thoughts on the good that occurred that day
• she began to cry, she motioned me to give her a hug
• a large piece of facade from a tower standing in front of me
• you found a vehicle and just dived under
• Not really even anticipating what the ramifications of her answer
• I got out within about five or six minutes
• we ran into some obstacles and fortunately we were able to overcome them
• they're responsible for keeping me positive and keeping me going

Fill in the Blank

As you listen to the story, fill in the blank in each sentence below with the word or phrase that fits best.

• A simple act, impossibly hard, but a simple act that years later created such complications, because the man was called a 9/11 , and it turns out that can be very hard to take.
• We should say right up front, you know, there's a here, because this is going to be a difficult conversation.
• So all this unbelievable , and then you're a hero.
• These are some of the things that also you.
• On 9/11 he and coworker John Sequeira carried Tina Hansen in a down 68 floors of the World Trade Center.