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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What area is the ibis native to?
(a) Canada and the American North.
(b) South America to Florida
(c) Africa.
(d) The American South.

2. Where are Doodle's cart and coffin in the time when this story is being told?
(a) They have been thrown away.
(b) In the front room of the house.
(c) They were buried with Doodle.
(d) Still in the loft in the barn.

3. What Biblical event does Aunt Nicey mention when the boys tell the family that they have a big surprise for them?
(a) Noah being swallowed by a "great fish."
(b) The Flood.
(c) The Resurrection.
(d) Adam and Eve eating the apple.

4. What deadline do Doodle and Brother set for Doodle's physical training?
(a) They want to be done by the time Doodle starts school.
(b) They want to be done by springtime.
(c) They want to be done by Christmas.
(d) They want to be done by Doodle's seventh birthday.

5. When it is clear that the training plan is harming Doodle, why does Brother continue?
(a) He secretly wants to hurt Doodle.
(b) He is young and excited.
(c) He promised Aunt Nicey.
(d) His own pride.

6. Why does Doodle cry when Brother takes him to see the "only beauty" Brother knows (3)?
(a) Because it is pretty.
(b) Because he has never seen flowers before.
(c) Because he loves Brother.
(d) Because his life is too hard.

7. Who does Doodle suggest that Brother can marry?
(a) Their aunt.
(b) Their neighbor.
(c) Their mother.
(d) Their father.

8. What is Doodle's real name?
(a) Robert Graves.
(b) James Hurst.
(c) It is never given.
(d) William Armstrong.

9. Just before they notice the ibis, what does Daddy say he is expecting?
(a) A larger cotton crop than usual.
(b) A storm.
(c) A letter from a neighbor who is fighting in the war.
(d) A delicious dessert.

10. Doodle has an active mind and talks a lot. What is his family's reaction to this?
(a) They suggest that he might become a writer.
(b) They make fun of him.
(c) They are jealous of him.
(d) They ignore him.

11. The sentence "Mama once said, 'And bless the Pearsons, whose boy Joe was lost at Belleau Wood'" (8) is an example of which literary technique?
(a) Hyperbole.
(b) Sarcasm.
(c) Metaphor.
(d) Foreshadowing.

12. Just before they notice the ibis, what does Doodle contradict Brother about?
(a) He says that he will be ready to help harvest the cotton.
(b) He says that he heard a rain-frog.
(c) He says that the other boys in school will not care if he is different.
(d) He says that they are done with his physical training.

13. What happens when Brother begins to dance Aunt Nicey around after they reveal that Doodle can walk?
(a) She steps hard on his toe.
(b) Doodle starts to imitate them.
(c) Aunt Nicey falls down.
(d) Mama tells him to stop immediately.

14. After the incident where Brother makes Doodle touch the casket, what does Doodle cry out over and over?
(a) "Don't leave me."
(b) "I hate you."
(c) "Why?"
(d) "Am I going to die?"

15. When Brother comments that "Hope no longer hid in the dark palmetto thicket but perched like a cardinal in the lacy toothbrush tree, brilliantly visible" (3), what two literary techniques are being used?
(a) Personification and simile.
(b) Metaphor and imagery.
(c) Hyperbole and sarcasm.
(d) Irony and understatement.

Short Answer Questions

1. At first, Daddy is upset by the hurricane and looks defeated. What does he do that makes Brother and Doodle think that things will be all right?

2. When is the story being told?

3. When Brother says that both he and Doodle believed in his "infallibility" (7), what does he mean that they believe?

4. In what year does Brother train Doodle?

5. Even though it seems hopeless, why does Brother say he keeps trying to teach Doodle to walk?

(see the answer keys)

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