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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What is Auntie Lindo’s husband’s name?
(a) Uncle Wu
(b) Uncle Tin
(c) Uncle Lee
(d) Uncle Tom

2. What word from the story mean to find fault in, blame, or censure?
(a) Confiscate
(b) Adulterate
(c) Tolerate
(d) Reproach

3. When Jing-Mei’s mother still lived in China, her husband was serving as an officer where?
(a) Shanghai
(b) Beijing
(c) Chongqing
(d) Guangzhou

4. How does Jing-Mei describe Mr. Chong’s eyes as always looking when she began piano lessons with him?
(a) Sprightly and bright
(b) Dark and mysterious
(c) Daunting and scary
(d) Tired and sleepy

5. “Two Kinds” is a short story that was initially published in what periodical in February 1989?
(a) The Atlantic
(b) Reader’s Digest
(c) The San Franciscan
(d) The New Yorker

6. How old is the little girl on The Ed Sullivan Show that Jing-Mei and her mother watch playing piano?
(a) 3
(b) 16
(c) 9
(d) 12

7. What musical term from Jing-Mei’s piano lessons means characterized by abruptness and disconnectedness?
(a) Arpeggio
(b) Staccato
(c) Reverie
(d) Trill

8. Where does Jing-Mei describe the piano as standing in her parents’ living room at the end of the story?
(a) In front of the door to the kitchen
(b) In front of the television
(c) In front of the bay windows
(d) In front of the staircase

9. Jing-Mei says that as a child “sometimes the prodigy in me became impatient.” What did Jing-Mei’s inner prodigy tell her at this time?
(a) If you don’t hurry up and get me out of here, I’m disappearing for good
(b) I’m dying of boredom. When are we going to do something fun?
(c) If I’m not on stage in a year, I’ll never get there
(d) Tell her to stop making you do this. This is taking forever

10. Which of the following is a major theme throughout “Two Kinds”?
(a) Sister-brother rivalry
(b) Mother-daughter relationships
(c) Father-daughter relationships
(d) Political corruption

11. When Jing-Mei and her mother get into an argument about Jing-Mei beginning piano lessons, Jing-Mei’s mother exclaims, “If she had as much talent as she has temper, she would be” what?
(a) Easier to deal with
(b) Famous now
(c) Rich now
(d) A better daughter

12. “Two Kinds” is a short story from Amy Tan’s book The Joy Luck Club. This collection of short stories revolves around the lives of Chinese immigrant women who form a club and play what game?
(a) Bridge
(b) Chess
(c) Mah-jongg
(d) Chinese checkers

13. What is the name of the Schumann piece that Jing-Mei is to play at the talent show?
(a) Pleading Child
(b) Peter’s Waltz
(c) Perfectly Contended
(d) Anita's Dance

14. Jing-Mei says that during her childhood, the tests her mother gave her “got harder—multiplying numbers in my head, finding” what card in a deck of cards?
(a) The five of spades
(b) The queen of hearts
(c) The ace of diamonds
(d) The joker card

15. Who founded the Ripley’s Believe It or Not franchise?
(a) George Ripley
(b) Alexander Ripley
(c) James Ripley
(d) Robert Ripley

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Jing-Mei kick under her feet as her mother drags her to the piano for practice after the talent show?

2. When did the Japanese invasion of China take place, leading Jing-Mei’s mother to flee China?

3. When Jing-Mei was helping her father get things in order after Jing-Mei’s mother died, she says she found “some old Chinese silk dresses, the kind with” what?

4. When was Edvard Grieg born?

5. Auntie Lindo tells Jing-Mei’s mother that all day long she has no time to do anything but what, when she is bragging about her daughter?

(see the answer keys)

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