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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. In "Sol Painting, Inc.," what is Merci's father getting in exchange for painting the school?

2. What is first prize for the story writing contest in "The Beans and Rice Chronicles of Isaiah Dunn"?

3. In "The Difficult Path," how does the narrator come to live with the Li family?

4. In "The Beans and Rice Chronicles of Isaiah Dunn," what flavor ice cream reminds Isaiah of his father?

5. In "A Difficult Path," why does the Li family travel to the Infinite Stream temple?

Short Essay Questions

1. In "Secret Samantha," how and why must Secret Santa change?

2. In "How to Transform," what role does the narrator's Mexican heritage play in the story?

3. In "How to Transform," how does the narrator finally get into his first game?

4. In "Secret Samantha," what happens when Samantha goes to the mall with her mother to buy a gift for Blade?

5. In "Secret Samantha," describe Blade's first appearance.

6. In "Sol Painting, Inc.," what does Roli want to be when he grows up?

7. In "The Beans and Rice Chronicles," who is Mr. Shephard?

8. In "The Beans and Rice Chronicles," what are the stories Isaiah's father has written about?

9. How does "How to Transform" end, and what has the narrator learned by the end?

10. In "Sol Painting, Inc.," what do Merci's business cards look like?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In an essay, discuss what role Lin Po's poem plans in "The Difficult Path." How does Po define this path? What is this path for the narrator, and does she succeed in walking it?

Essay Topic 2

In an essay, discuss why you feel the author chose to write "Seventy-Six Dollars and Forty-Nine Cents" in verse. How does writing it this way help him get his point across?

Essay Topic 3

Many images seem to reappear over the course of this story collection: the beach, ice cream, basketball, water, cars, etc. Choose one image that shows up in at least two stories. The compare and contrast how the image is used in each story to develop the stories' themes.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,199 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample