View a FREE sample

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

Multiple Choice Questions

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

2. At what time of year is Doodle finally ready to show the family that he can walk?
(a) Midsummer.
(b) Planting time.
(c) Midwinter.
(d) Harvest time.

3. When Brother says that the smell of the graveyard flowers is coming through their windows and "speaking softy the names of our dead" (1), this is an example of which literary technique?
(a) Euphemism.
(b) Hyperbole.
(c) Understatement.
(d) Personification.

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

5. When Brother says that "the flood of childish spite evanesced" (11), what is he saying happened?
(a) His anger went away.
(b) The storm started to break.
(c) He could see through the trees to where Doodle lay on the ground.
(d) His pride was like a flood of water.

Short Answer Questions

1. When Brother says, of the hope they had when they started training, "Success lay at the end of summer like a pot of gold" (7), what should the reader understand from this simile?

2. Just before they notice the ibis, what does Daddy say he is expecting?

3. How old is Doodle when he begins to try to move himself?

4. When Doodle first begins to move, how does Mama feel?

5. When Mama tells Brother that she is afraid that Doodle might not be "all there," what is Brother's response (2)?

Short Essay Questions

1. When Doodle and "Brother" take up telling one another stories to pass the time, what story does Doodle tell?

2. When Doodle collapses during their "training," what conversation do he and "Brother" have and how does the conversation show their different attitudes about Doodle's disability?

3. What are Chateau-Thierry, Amiens, and Soissons, and how do they relate to this story?

4. When the boys are almost ready to show the family that Doodle can walk and they keep hinting that they have a big secret, what does Nicey tell them and what is its thematic significance?

5. How old is Doodle when he learns to walk, and why is his age relevant to him learning to walk?

6. What do Doodle and "Brother" do with the flowers at Old Woman Swamp?

7. How does Doodle get his nickname?

8. When "Brother" dances around with Aunt Nicey to celebrate Doodle walking, what happens, and why it is it ironic?

9. Where is the grindstone and what is its symbolic meaning?

10. When they are eating lunch on the day the ibis appears, what argument are the brothers having?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,023 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample