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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What symbol represents "the low point" in the speaker's familial communication?

2. What does the original use of a lowpoint then to create?

3. What does the father say in should have brackets to Jonathan about his dreams during the final conversation in the story?

4. What life changing event was going to happen to the speaker's brother a few weeks after the speaker and his father were weeding?

5. How many heart attacks has the speaker's father suffered?

Short Essay Questions

1. Describe the conversation the speaker relays between mother and father to show use of the corroboration mark.

2. Describe the phone call between the speaker and his brother after he ended up in intensive care.

3. What are low points? What conversation between the speaker and his mother does he use to exemplify their use?

4. Describe the snowflake and when it might be used.

5. What are the should-have brackets?

6. What does the severed web symbolize? What does the speaker call this?

7. What are the final words that remain unspoken, as shown by the use of the should-have brackets, between father and son in the final conversation of the story?

8. What is one example the speaker gives of the use of a reversible colon?

9. What is something the speaker and his brother do not discuss? How do you know?

10. What did the speaker's brother learn after first experiencing chest pains and ultimately ending up in intensive care?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write an analysis of the speaker's father's dream in the story. Describe the dream. What might it mean? Why did he tell his son about it? What might he have left out?

Essay Topic 2

Discuss Foer’s focus on the theme of familial communication as presented in the story.

Essay Topic 3

The speaker's grandmother once told him that she hopes he never loves anyone as much as she loves him. Write an analysis of this line. Include her backstory and how her experience may have led her to this moment.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 754 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample