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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 are Brother and Doodle doing on the day when Doodle cannot keep going and falls to the ground, crying?

2. How does the ibis die?

3. What does Brother say causes him to run home during the storm?

4. What literary techniques are shown in the phrase, "[I]t lay on the earth like a broken vase of red flowers" (9)?

5. After the incident where Brother makes Doodle touch the casket, what does Doodle cry out over and over?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the family's reaction to Doodle when he is born?

2. How does "Brother" go about teaching Doodle to walk?

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

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

5. What changes in Doodle's living situation when he learns to crawl?

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

7. In what ways is the summer of 1918 hard on the family's crops?

8. How does Doodle die?

9. When the narrator finally realizes that he will have to take Doodle everywhere he goes, where does he take Doodle, and what is Doodle's reaction?

10. When Mama tells "Brother" that Doodle might be mentally disabled, what does "Brother" plan to do, and what changes his mind?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write an essay in which you analyze the use of World War I as a background for this story. Explain how thematic motifs in this story are related to World War I and how the story is made richer by this association. Be sure to use textual evidence to support your claims, and if you use outside sources, cite them in MLA format.

Essay Topic 2

Is there any defense of "Brother's" actions where Doodle is concerned? Write an essay in which you consider both why "Brother" did what he did and what effects his actions had in Doodle's life. Be sure to use textual support for your claims.

Essay Topic 3

What role does prejudice against those with disabilities play in the outcome of "The Scarlet Ibis?" Write an essay in which you consider the family's reactions to Doodle and make an argument about what contribution their prejudices had to his death. Be sure to use textual evidence to support your claims.

(see the answer keys)

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