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Reading Check and Short Answer Questions on key points are designed for guided reading assignments, in-class review, formative assessment, quizzes, and more.

PART ONE (CHAPTERS 1-21)

Reading Check

1. What does Melinda liken to being a social outcast at lunch?

2. How does Melinda’s family communicate?

3. What does the girl at the Pep Rally accuse Melinda of?

4. Which “clan” does Heather make it into?

5. What is the Merriweather High Mascot?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. How does Anderson characterize Melinda?

2. How does Melinda’s use of nicknames for both teachers and peers indicate her relationship with them?

3. What did Melinda do over the summer to become a social outcast?

4. In what ways is Melinda a sympathetic character?

5. What might the school board’s indecisive take on the school Mascot symbolize?

Paired Resource

“We Wear the Mask” and “Richard Cory”

• Potential Sensitivity Issues: “Richard Cory” contains a direct reference to suicide. These poems by Paul Laurance Dunbar and Edwin Arlington Robinson explore the costs of hiding pain from others.
• Both poems relate to the theme How Personality and Perception Change as a Result of Trauma.
• What clues imply that Melinda is “wearing a mask”? What does she have in common with Richard Cory, and how does the poem’s warning relate to her?