MCAP Grade 8 ELA Practice Questions - Maryland Comprehensive Assessment Program English Language Arts - Grade 8 Exam

Read the excerpt from 'The Forge of Echoes': Fourteen-year-old Thomas held his breath as the glowing iron ingot was pulled from the furnace of the Baltimore foundry. The heat rolled off the hearth in stifling waves, filling the soot-stained room with an orange radiance. Master Smith Vance stood over the anvil, hammer poised in mid-air. 'A bad strike now, Thomas, and the grain of the iron fractures,' Vance cautioned, his voice low against the rumble of the bellows. 'Strength isn't about how hard you hit; it's about knowing when the metal is ready to yield.' Thomas gripped his tongs tighter, carefully aligning the raw iron edge. He realized that surviving his apprenticeship—and mastering the craft—required patience rather than sheer brute force. Which sentence best states the central theme of this passage?