I am entering my fifth year in education as of the 2015-16 school year. I primarily teach Freshman English courses, though I have taught numerous electives in a high school setting. My goal is to share resources with other educators in an effort to facilitate their professional experiences, particularly for those new to the profession or the field of English.
I am entering my fifth year in education as of the 2015-16 school year. I primarily teach Freshman English courses, though I have taught numerous electives in a high school setting. My goal is to share resources with other educators in an effort to facilitate their professional experiences, particularly for those new to the profession or the field of English.
This file contains the following quizzes and keys, covering the entirety of 1984 by George Orwell and designed to measure comprehension and hold students accountable for assigned readings. Quizzes break down as follows:
Book 1: Chapter 1.
This is a 10-question short answer quiz. Questions pertain to the following key details:
♦ "Big Brother is watching you"
♦ Setting
♦ Winston's job
♦ The telescreen and its purpose
♦ The ironic role of the Ministry of Peace
♦ Characteristics of proles
♦ Writing as an act of rebellion
♦ The Party's efforts to stir up hate
♦ Winston's feelings toward the Party
♦ Winston as a thought-criminal
Book 1: Chapters 2-3.
This is an 11-question short answer quiz. Questions pertain to the following key details:
♦ Winston's fear of the Thought Police
♦ The Junior Spies and their job
♦ Public executions of the Party's dissidents
♦ Winston's dream involving O'Brien's voice
♦ Winston's dream involving his mother
♦ A government purge
♦ Physical jerks
♦ Why it is so difficult to recall one's childhood
♦ Oceania's enemy country
♦ Communication via the telescreen
Book 1: Chapters 4-6.
This is a 10-question short answer quiz. Questions pertain to the following key details:
♦ Comrade Withers
♦ The concept of "unpersoning" an individual
♦ The purpose of Newspeak
♦ Understanding Doublespeak
♦ Syme's intelligence and Winston's concerns about it
♦ Ironic messaging from the Ministry of Plenty
♦ Winston's diary entry
♦ The government's goal concerning sexual behavior
♦ Winston's ex-wife
♦ Winston's internal strife
Book 1: Chapters 7-8.
This is a 9-question short answer quiz. Questions pertain to the following key details:
♦ Winston's assessment on who would best stage a revolt against the government
♦ Winston's reasoning behind the aforementioned assessment
♦ The logic as to why the proles would not likely stage a revolt
♦ Living conditions
♦ A photograph and Winston's concerns about it
♦ Winston's belief on how reality should be determined
♦ Winston's curiosity about actual history (not the Party-sanctioned accounts of it)
♦ Winston's fear over being followed
♦ An alternative to the Thought Police's torture
Book 2: Chapters 1-3.
This is a 10-question short answer quiz. Questions pertain to the following key details:
♦ The irony of Julia's message to Winston
♦ Analysis of Julia's comment, " We're not dead yet."
♦ Hate Week
♦ The prisoner transport
♦ Winston's reaction to Julia's very personal admission
♦ Primary influences on Julia's behaviors
♦ How the government manipulates people into frenzy
♦ Winston's alarming admission about his ex-wife
Book 2: Chapters 4-6.
This is an 11-question short answer quiz. Questions pertain to the following key details:
♦ The room Winston rents
♦ Julia's encounter with a rat
♦ The significance of the paperweight
♦ Winston's imagination as he stares into the paperweight
♦ The expected vanishing of a character
♦ Winston's reaction to the singing of a prole woman
♦ The hate song and other preparations for Hate Week
♦ Julia's accusations against the Party
♦ An encounter with O'Brien
♦ O'Brien's offer to Winston
Book 2: Chapters 7-8.
This is a 10-question short answer quiz. Questions pertain to the following key details:
♦ Winston's nightmare
♦ Winston's previous belief that he was responsible for his mom's death
♦ A flood of memories returning
♦ The Party's influence on its members
♦ How Winston and Julia are jeopardizing their own safety
♦ Winston and Julia's desire to join the Brotherhood
♦ An encounter with O'Brien
♦ Winston's feelings after his meeting with O'Brien
Book 2: Chapters 9-10.
This is a 9-question short answer quiz. Questions pertain to the following key details:
♦ Winston's 90-hour work week
♦ Oceania's new enemy
♦ Goldstein's book
♦ A singing prole woman
♦ "We are the dead"
♦ The picture on the wall and what it conceals
♦ The sudden appearance of troops
♦ A realization about Mr. Charrington
Book 3: Chapters 1-3.
This is a 10-question short answer quiz. Questions pertain to the following key details:
♦ Winston's imprisonment
♦ A prole woman with the last name of Smith
♦ An imprisoned poet and his crime
♦ Parson's imprisonment and his crime
♦ Who turned Parsons in for his crime
♦ Winston's suicidal thoughts
♦ O'Brien's torture techniques/methods of persuasion
♦ The Party's efforts to control the mind
♦ Winston's growing appreciation for O'Brien
♦ The Party's efforts to eliminate their opposition
♦ O'Brien's comments about Julia
♦ Room 101
Book 3: Chapters 4-6.
This is an 11-question short answer quiz. Questions pertain to the following key details:
♦ Winston's efforts to see the Party's way
♦ Winston's nightmare
♦ Winston's confession that he still hates the Party
♦ Room 101
♦ Winston's worst nightmare and O'Brien's most effective torture technique
♦ Winston's means of getting out of his torturous situation (betrayal)
♦ A reunion at the Chestnut Tree Cafe
♦ Winston's ultimate feelings about Big Brother
This is a 13-question reading comprehension assessment in multiple choice format. The corresponding answer key is included. Questions pertain to the following important details:
♦ Cassio's verbal exchange with Desdemona
♦ Iago encouraging Othello's suspicions toward Desdemona
♦ Desdemona's requests for Othello to forgive Cassio
♦ Othello's insistence that Iago tell him everything he knows
♦ Iago's underhanded behaviors and statements
♦ Othello's statements on marital trust and jealousy
♦ The retrieval of Desdemona's handkerchief
♦ Othello's mounting suspicions
♦ Othello's ultimatum to Iago
♦ Desdemona's frustrations
This close reading worksheet helps students analyze Atticus's closing remarks in chapter 20 of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird. It is seven questions in length, and an answer key is included. The following is addressed:
♦ "I have nothing in my heart but pity..."
♦ A "rigid and time-honored code..."
♦ A suggestion of Mayella's motives
♦ The ignorance and arrogance of the Ewells
♦ Evil assumptions
♦ The idea of all men being created equal
This quiz measures reading comprehension of “To Build a Fire” by Jack London. It features 13 multiple choice questions, and an answer key is provided. Questions pertain to the following key ideas:
♦ The arrogance of the protagonist
♦ The old timer’s disregarded advice
♦ The protagonist’s husky companion
♦ The lack of understanding of the severe climate
♦ The omnipresent dangers of the setting
♦ The building of the fires
♦ The protagonist’s lack of imagination and its consequences
♦ The protagonist’s alarming thought concerning the husky
♦ The protagonist’s realization before his demise
This file contains 13 individual quizzes on To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee designed to measure reading comprehension and hold students accountable for their assigned reading. Each quiz features approximately 10 to 15 multiple choice questions. The corresponding answer keys are included.
This is a 14 question comprehension assessment in multiple choice format. The corresponding answer key is also included. Questions pertain to the following important details:
• Point of view
• The kids' mother and father
• Calpurnia's job
• Dill
• Background on Boo
• The dare
• Walter Cunningham's philosophy
• The effects of the Great Depression on Maycomb's citizens
• Scout's fight
• The teacher's reaction to an alarming situation
• Perception of the Ewells
A 34-slide PowerPoint on ethics in journalism. Concepts covered include:
The Janet Cooke Incident
Code of ethics
Journalistic credibility
Journalism and the Constitution
Prior restraint
Journalistic objectivity
Sensationalism
Overstatement
Right of reply
Attribution
Fairness to all
Plagiarism
The Stephen Glass Incident
Slander
Libel
Libel laws
Examples of libel
Defenses against libel
Privacy lawsuits
Limits on scholastic journalism
In loco parentis
The Tinker Decision of 1969
The Hazelwood Case of 1988
A 15-slide PowerPoint covering the following:
- The concept of news judgment
- Determining an audience's interest level in people, events, or stories
- The elements of news
- Timeliness
- Proximity
- Prominence
- Conflict
- Consequence
- Human interest
- The brainstorming process
- The concept of synergy
This is a 10-slide introductory PowerPoint covering various functions of journalists, including the political function, the economic function, the sentry function, the record-keeping function, the entertainment function, the social function, the marketplace function, and the agenda-setting function.
This is a 12-question reading comprehension assessment in short answer format. The corresponding answer key is included. Questions pertain to the following important details:
• An incident that helped lead Mowat to become a biologist
• The purpose behind Mowat's study
• A long trip to "the middle of nowhere"
• Mowat's supplies
• An issue with radio contact
• Mike's background
• The first encounter with a wolf
• An alarming discovery near the cabin
• A second alarming discovery concerning Mowat
• A move to facilitate wolf observations
• "Marking territory"
Helping students comprehend what they read is an essential skill that promotes success in terms of academics and career readiness. This close reading exercise helps students derive deeper meaning from the seventh chapter of To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Featuring 7 multiple choice questions, this resource includes an answer key and covers the following:
♦ Paraphrasing Atticus’s advice for Scout about Jem.
♦ Deriving meaning: “Can’t anybody tell what I’m gonna do lest they know me, can they, Scout?”
♦ Understanding vocabulary in context: grim.
♦ Applying literary devices: foreshadowing.
♦ Applying literary devices: slang.
♦ Applying literary devices: situational irony.
♦ Interpreting idiomatic expressions: “bad humor.”
In addition to helping students gain deeper understanding of the material and greater confidence in their ability to read harder texts, this resource was designed to prepare students for ACT-style questioning.
Need a resource to measure your students' reading comprehension of Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet?
This zip file contains two documents. The first is an 14-question quiz in multiple choice format. The second is the corresponding answer key.
Specifically, this quiz covers the following key plot details and concepts:
♦ Mercutio's reason for fighting Tybalt
♦ Romeo's ill-fated attempt to stop the fight
♦ Romeo's reason for leaving Verona
♦ Juliet's criticisms of the Nurse
♦ The Nurse's confusing news
♦ Juliet's conflicting emotions toward her husband
♦ Friar Laurence's perspective on the Prince's punishment
♦ Romeo's erratic behavior
♦ Lord Capulet's arrangement with Paris
♦ Mantua
♦ A character who plans to have Romeo killed
♦ A threat of being disowned
♦ The Nurse's advice to Juliet
♦ Juliet's foreshadowing comments
Helping students comprehend what they read is an essential skill that promotes success in terms of academics and career readiness. This close reading exercise helps students derive deeper meaning from the sixteenth chapter of *To Kill a Mockingbird *by Harper Lee. Featuring 10 multiple choice questions, this editable resource includes an answer key and covers the following:
♦ Drawing inferences: "The full meaning of the night’s events hit me and I began crying. Jem was awfully nice about it: for once he didn’t remind me that people nearly nine years old didn’t do things like that."
♦ Applying literary terminology (metaphor): "Atticus watched in frank admiration; Aunt Alexandra sipped coffee and radiated waves of disapproval."
♦ Reading closely: "Children who slipped out at night were a disgrace to the family."
♦ Inferring meaning: "You know how they talk among themselves. Everything that happens in this town’s out to the Quarters before sundown."
♦ Paraphrasing Atticus’s feelings toward Mr. Cunningham after the mob incident.
♦ Understanding literary terminology (hyperbole): "‘It’s all over town this morning,’ [Dill] announced, 'all about how we held off a hundred folks with our bare hands…"
♦ Defining vocabulary in context: formidable.
♦ Reading closely: Why Maudie chooses not to attend the trial.
♦ Identifying accurate statements: Dolphus Raymond’s banishment from traditional society and condemnation to an uneasy life among a minority class.
♦ Discerning the significance of the children’s placement in the balcony among the African American community.
This resource aligns well to Adolescent Literacy Project teaching principles. I recommend using these worksheets as the basis for small-group discussions, letting students discuss, debate, and support their reasoning for answer choices. In the role of facilitator, I observe my students becoming more consistently engaged with the novel and taking greater ownership of their learning.
In addition to helping students gain deeper understanding of the material and greater confidence in their ability to read harder texts, this resource was designed to prepare students for ACT-style questioning.
This comprehensive, 29-page To Kill a Mockingbird reading guide promotes active reading, reading comprehension, vocabulary comprehension, plot recall, character analysis, quote analysis, an awareness of historical context, and more. A complete key is included.
The guide is grouped by chapters. Each section includes a vocabulary section, requiring students to define potentially challenging words. Additionally, each section includes a series of plot-based questions and features meaningful quotations, which require an articulation of context. Finally, each section identifies several aspects of the assigned reading which students should review post-reading.
This reading guide in Word format encourages active reading and facilitate plot comprehension and recall. Each section is divided by chapter.
1. A list of challenging vocabulary terms.
2. Questions pertaining to the novel's plot.
3. Quotations -- students must identify the speaker and the context of the quote.
In addition, you receive two PDF files. The first offers answers to questions from chapters 1 through 11. The second offers answers to questions from chapters 15 through 18.
This item, which features hundreds of questions, covers the following and more:
♦ Description of a hobbit
♦ Gandalf's first meeting with Bilbo
♦ Thorin's ancestral history
♦ Bilbo's reluctance to participate in the journey
♦ Bilbo's role
♦ The trolls
♦ Gandalf as the mentor
♦ The adventurers' general disdain toward Bilbo
♦ Elrond
♦ Moon letters
♦ Bilbo's significant discovery
♦ Gollum's characterization and peculiar habits
♦ The riddle contest
♦ The escape from Gollum and the cave
♦ The incident with the wargs
♦ The Eages' aid
♦ Beorn's background
♦ Beorn's role as a protector of nature
♦ The dangers of Mirkwood
♦ Bombur's dream
♦ The conflict involving spiders
♦ Bilbo's strategic thinking and heroic victory
♦ The change in the adventurers' perception of Bilbo
♦ The characterization of the wood elves
♦ Thorin's imprisonment and stubbornness
♦ Bilbo's growing frustrations with the other adventurers
♦ Lake Town, its inhabitants, and their reaction to the adventurers
♦ Bilbo's plan to rescue the dwarves -- and its weakness
♦ Lonely Mountain
♦ Bilbo's growing seriousness toward his role
♦ The secret door of the mountain
♦ The significance of the thrush
♦ Smaug's interactions with Bilbo
♦ Smaug's reaction to the people of Lake Town
♦ The Arkenstone
♦ The exit from the mountain
♦ Bard's talents and significance
♦ How the Master of Lake Town infuriated his people
♦ Smaug's death
♦ The relationship between Thror's people and ravens
♦ Roac's recommendation
♦ The return to the mountain
♦ Bard's attempt to rationalize with Thorin
♦ Thorin's disinterest in sharing his wealth
♦ Bilbo's secret bargaining with Bard and the Elvenking
♦ Gandalf's pride in Bilbo
♦ Bilbo's justification for the bargain
♦ Thorin's angry response
♦ Dain's involvement
♦ Battle of Five Armies
♦ Unity among factions
♦ Thorin's dynamic character/sudden realization
♦ The Eagles' return
♦ Honoring the dead
♦ Various new roles for previously met characters
♦ Bilbo's return home
♦ Bilbo's shocking discovery
♦ Bilbo's new reputation
This resource measures reading comprehension and holds students accountable for their assigned reading of "The Wife's Story" by Ursula K. Le Guin. A multiple choice assessment, this quiz features 11 questions and includes an answer key. Questions pertain to the following key details:
♦ The narrator's emotional state
♦ The narrator's characterization of her husband
♦ The relationship between the narrator and her sister
♦ A quality about the narrator's husband that "brings the shivers on" her
♦ The moon's role in the husband's transformation
♦ The "curse in his blood"
♦ The husband's tendency to leave home abruptly
♦ The husband's strange smell upon returning
♦ The children's fear of their own father
♦ A physical transformation
♦ The story's resolution
Common Core Standards Addressed:
RL.9-10.1, RL.9-10.2, RL.9-10.3, RL.9-10.10, RL.11-12.1, RL.11-12.2, RL.11-12.3, RL.11-12.10, CCRA.R.1, CCRA.R.2, CCRA.R.3, CCRA.R.10
