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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. In "Sometimes a Dream Needs a Push," what does the narrator's father do now?

2. In "Flying Lessons," why does Nani take Santosh on the trip in the first place?

3. In "Main Street," how long have the narrator's parents been together?

4. In "Seventy-Six Dollars and Forty-Nine Cents," who is the narrator's best friend?

5. In "Sometimes a Dream Needs a Push," what is the narrator's name?

Short Essay Questions

1. In "Seventy-Six Dollars," how does Monk convince Herve that he has superpowers?

2. In "Main Street," what has happened to the narrator's mother?

3. In "Sometimes a Dream Needs a Push," why does the narrator's dad always seem so quiet?

4. In "Choctaw Bigfoot," how does the story climax and eventually end?

5. In "Seventy-Six Dollars," how does Monk convince Angel Carter he has superpowers?

6. In "Flying Lessons," who does Santosh meet at the beach?

7. In "Choctaw Bigfoot," what does the narrator's mother tell him about his uncle?

8. In "Flying Lessons," what is wrong with Santosh's choice of ice cream?

9. In "Seventy-Six Dollars," how did Monk get his name?

10. What do Santosh and Tomas have in common?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write an essay in which you discuss which character you think has the most influence on the narrator's growth in the story "How to Transform an Ordinary Hoop Court into a Place of Higher Learning and You at the Podium" and why.

Essay Topic 2

Write an essay in which you think about how and why Santosh's opinion of his grandmother changes over the course of the story "Flying Lessons." How does this change affect what the story is trying to tell us.

Essay Topic 3

Many images seem to reappear over the course of this story collection: the beach, ice cream, basketball, water, cars, etc. Choose one image that shows up in at least two stories. The compare and contrast how the image is used in each story to develop the stories' themes.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,145 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample