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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. The use of sentence fragments in the description of the spreading fire is probably intended to create what effect?
(a) Chaos and speed.
(b) Confusion and doubt.
(c) Distance and irony.
(d) Apathy and resignation.

2. What is the first thing that the voice-clock announces?
(a) Time for work.
(b) It is raining.
(c) Time for breakfast.
(d) Time to get up.

3. What happens to the dog when it cannot get into the kitchen?
(a) It leaves the house.
(b) It runs through the house breaking things.
(c) It dies.
(d) It scratches through the door.

4. The line "And swallows circling with their shimmering sound" is an example of which technique?
(a) Personification.
(b) Metaphor.
(c) Parallelism.
(d) Alliteration.

5. The robot mice are said to live in "warrens." This means that they live in what?
(a) Networks of tunnels.
(b) Racks.
(c) Plastic sleeves.
(d) Small boxes.

6. Which is the best descriptor of the mood of the scene in the study, where the poem is read and music plays as a cigar slowly burns down to ash?
(a) Haunting and ironic.
(b) Amusing and nostalgic.
(c) Tragic and melodramatic.
(d) Frantic and chaotic.

7. To what does the phrase "the children's hour" allude?
(a) A poem by Longfellow.
(b) A fairy tale.
(c) A nursery rhyme.
(d) A poem by Teasdale.

8. What does Bradbury say that the house is angry about when the dog shows up?
(a) Needing to clean up the mud from its feet.
(b) That the family is not with it.
(c) That the dog is probably contagious.
(d) The disturbance to its routine.

9. In the sentence "The morning house lay empty," there is an example of which technique?
(a) Punning.
(b) Parallelism.
(c) Metaphor.
(d) Passive voice.

10. What happens at ten-fifteen?
(a) The house shuts itself down.
(b) The sprinklers begin watering the lawn.
(c) A window breaks.
(d) The nursery walls come to life.

11. What does the dog do once it gets inside the house?
(a) It begins eating the spoiled food.
(b) It barks at every door.
(c) It falls asleep in the nursery.
(d) It looks through the house for the family's other dog.

12. On what date does the story begin?
(a) August 4.
(b) August 6.
(c) April 4.
(d) April 6.

13. What causes the fire to eventually win the battle with the house?
(a) The wind creates flames so intense the house cannot fight them.
(b) The fire reaches the house's "brain" in the attic.
(c) The house stops defending itself.
(d) The rain stops.

14. What does Bradbury metaphorically compare the house to?
(a) A bomb shelter.
(b) An elderly unmarried woman.
(c) A zoo.
(d) A closed umbrella.

15. Why does the dog want to get into the kitchen so badly?
(a) Its food dish is in the kitchen.
(b) The rest of the house is filling with smoke.
(c) It thinks the family is in the kitchen.
(d) The house has begun making pancakes.

Short Answer Questions

1. What happens at ten o'clock?

2. "Seven-nine, breakfast time" is an example of which rhyming technique?

3. What "delicacies" does the fire consume upstairs?

4. During the fire, what does Bradbury compare the house's dialogue to?

5. When the story ends, what is left standing?

(see the answer keys)

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