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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. When the high-ranking soldiers for whom the band played has taken their leave, what is NOT a rule put in place by the remaining Khmer Rouge soldiers?
(a) Now no one is allowed to fall in love.
(b) Now no one can hunt for their own food.
(c) Now the band has to play at nighttime meetings so that all of the kids can learn the words to the songs.
(d) Now no one is allowed to speak to the soldiers for any reason.

2. Who is in the picture that Arn hangs on his bedroom wall at the beginning of the novel?
(a) The Prince of Cambodia's daughter.
(b) The first lady of the United States.
(c) The young U.S. President's widow, Jackie Kennedy.
(d) His mother during her opera heyday.

3. When Arn is told by a Khmer Rouge soldier that he has a new job in addition to his job as a musician in the band, what does that new job turn out to be?
(a) He has to push the dead and dying into the mass grave in the mango grove.
(b) He has to cook for all of the children in the camp.
(c) He has to take away the material belongings from the captives' tents and give them to the soldiers.
(d) He has to clean the area where the whole camp relieves themselves.

4. The morning just before the Khmer Rouge drive through the village making announcements on their bullhorns, what sounds are noticeably absent?
(a) The sound of birds chirping and the sound of the wind in the trees.
(b) The sound of children laughing and the sound of vendors selling their wares.
(c) The sound of monks chanting and the sound of the temple gong.
(d) The sound of gunfire and the sound of explosions.

5. What is the event that first causes Arn to think maybe the Khmer Rouge have evil intentions?
(a) Hi sister tells him that all of the girls in the village are being rounded up by the soldiers in order to force the girls to cut their hair short.
(b) He sees a soldier speaking roughly to a monk at his temple school.
(c) He sees a soldier kill a boy when the boy refuses his request for a motorcycle ride.
(d) A soldier sees Arn selling his wares on the street and tips over his cart for no apparent reason.

Short Answer Questions

1. Which of the following is NOT a topic of the Khmer Rouge songs the children are taught to play with their musical instruments?

2. What method does Mek, the new music teacher, tell Arn that he uses to survive?

3. Who tells Arn's aunt about Arn and Munny seeing the American movie?

4. Where do Arn and Munny hide when they hear the sounds of a nearby battle during their make-believe game of war?

5. When the Khmer Rouge soldiers take all of the captives' clothes and burn them, what clothing do they provide instead?

Short Essay Questions

1. When Arn's curiosity gets the better of him and he finally asks Sombo the reason for his permissiveness concerning Arn's behavior, what reasoning does Sombo provide and what is the author's purpose in portraying Sombo's character in this particular way?

2. What is ironic about the fact that the rice crop falls significantly short of the Khmer Rouge's expectations and they then reduce everyone's food allotment even further than before?

3. When Arn sneaks out to tell Mek about the soldier who forced him to cook the liver of a murdered captive, he is caught by a soldier but does not suffer the dire consequences he is expecting. What happens instead and what significance does it hold for Arn?

4. Why do the Khmer Rouge burn everyone's clothes and all of their material belongings?

5. When a soldier from Arn's home village comes to camp, what does he offer Arn in exchange for some rice and what does Arn learn as a result of accepting his offered deal?

6. When the current leader of the camp tells Mek that he and band will soon be going somewhere new, they are all terrified that they will be killed instead and that this is just another instance of the Khmer Rouge's euphemisms. However, they are not killed and what happens instead introduces the theme of fame into the novel. What happens in lieu of their deaths?

7. How does Arn fix the problem of the new music teacher's apathy and what effect does this solution have on the band's members?

8. What are the signs that lead Arn to think that perhaps the Mango Grove is a mass burial site used by the Khmer Rouge to inter their victims?

9. What happens to the pregnant woman and her husband who are walking next to Arn within the mass exodus of all cities? What lesson does Arn learn from seeing what happens?

10. What ploy do the Khmer Rouge use to get the government soldiers to come to the airport and what happens once they arrive?

(see the answer keys)

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