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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 does the narrator mean when she says Mother told her "not to be so fresh" (26)?
2. How much had the character who always played Joseph unsuccessfully offered another character to play the role of Joseph instead?
3. How many rehearsals in total does Mother say will take place before the pageant performance?
4. Who begins to write down on a pad of paper every bad action taken by the Herdman siblings during the pageant rehearsals?
5. What is NOT a role assigned to the older boys and girls without major parts in the pageant?
Short Essay Questions
1. In what way does Reverend Hopkins redirect his congregation when he notices their treatment of the Herdman siblings?
2. Discuss the significance of Mother's comment when she states to Father, "No, their chief instinct was to get Mary and the baby out of the barn. But even so, it was Herod they wanted to do away with, and Mary or Joseph. They picked out the right villain -- that must mean something" (50).
3. Discuss how the theme of appearance versus reality appears in Chapter Five.
4. In what ways does the author depict Father as a funny man?
5. For what reasons does the pageant not have a real baby to play Jesus?
6. What questions are raised in the narrator's mind about the Nativity story as a result of her interactions with the Herdmans?
7. How is foreshadowing employed within the last two sentences of Chapter Six?
8. What message is being sent about arrogance within Mother's exclamation when she shouts, "That woman! She must be surprised that the sun is still coming up every morning without her to supervise the sunrise" (45)?
9. Discuss a moment in the narrative when the narrator thinks that her friend Alice is behaving badly.
10. Discuss the significance of Mrs. Armstrong's comment to Mother when she says, "And then I always remind them that there are no small parts, only small actors" (25).
Essay Topics
Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:
Essay Topic 1
Discuss the author's choice to tell the story of Barbara Robinson’s novel The Best Christmas Pageant Ever using the first person point-of-view. What elements of the novel's themes lend themselves to this choice and what are the author's intended and invoked effects on the reader?
Essay Topic 2
Trace the characterization arc of the narrator’s character throughout the novel. Discuss whether she is a round or flat character and whether she is a static or dynamic character.
Essay Topic 3
William Faulkner once famously claimed that the most important literature deals with the subject of the human heart in conflict with itself. Explain how the theme of Human versus Self is demonstrated within Barbara Robinson’s novel The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. Create a decisive, arguable claim and prove it with quotes from the book.
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This section contains 1,564 words (approx. 6 pages at 300 words per page) |
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