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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What are the names of the families from the Joy Luck Club that come up to Jing-Mei’s mother and father after Jing-Mei’s performance at the talent show?
(a) The Hsus, the Jongs, and the St. Clairs
(b) The Woos, the Lees, and the Wilsons
(c) The Yus, the Tsings, and the Lees
(d) The Tsings, the Lees and the Hsus

2. Who performs first at the talent show where Jing-Mei makes her piano debut?
(a) The oldest children
(b) The trombone players
(c) The youngest children
(d) The adults

3. How old was Shirley Temple when she began her film career?
(a) 3
(b) 8
(c) 10
(d) 5

4. How does Jing-Mei’s mother respond when Jing-Mei throws a fit when she’s told she’ll be taking piano lessons?
(a) She calls her father
(b) She laughs at her
(c) She slaps her
(d) She weeps

5. Jing-Mei describes the girl playing piano on The Ed Sullivan Show as having the sauciness of whom?
(a) Little Orphan Annie
(b) Shirley Temple
(c) John Wayne
(d) Peter Pan

Short Answer Questions

1. The majority of the narrative of “Two Kinds” is related from what perspective?

2. How does Jing-Mei describe the Schumann piece that she was to play at the talent show?

3. How does Jing-Mei describe the look on her mother’s face when Jing-Mei looks up from her curtsey after her piano solo in the talent show?

4. When Jing-Mei’s mother asks her for the capital of Finland, Jing-Mei responds with the capital of what country in the beginning of the story?

5. After Jing-Mei’s hair debacle where it was cut off like a boy’s, what statement does she make about her feelings of the haircut?

Short Essay Questions

1. What theme connects “Two Kinds” to the other stories in The Joy Luck Club?

2. How does the narrative style in “Two Kinds” shift throughout the story? Why does it shift?

3. How does Jing-Mei describe her life as she passed from childhood to adulthood? In what ways does she say she disappointed her mother?

4. How does the central conflict of the story begin to manifest in Jing-Mei’s mind following her revelation in the mirror?

5. How does Jing-Mei say her perceptions differed from her mother’s in regard to ambition as she looks back at the end of the story?

6. How does Jing-Mei describe Mr. Chong when she begins piano lessons with him? What does she secretly nickname him?

7. What does Jing-Mei discover about Mr. Chong’s disabilities as she studies with him? How does this discovery influence her actions?

8. How does Suyuan Woo go about discovering her daughter’s “genius” in the beginning of the story?

9. How do Suyuan Woo’s ambitions in the beginning of the story set up the central conflict in “Two Kinds”?

10. What does Jing-Mei overhear her mother and Auntie Lindo talking about after she’s studied piano for a year?

(see the answer keys)

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