Name: __________________________________________Date: ___________________________ Period: __________
The Cay Text-dependent Questions
The following text-dependent questions can be either used for oral discussion or as short response “routine writing”
questions. Students need to be given multiple opportunities to closely analyze the language, structure, and plot of
the story while citing textual evidence in order to improve critical reading skills.
1. Analyze Theodore Taylor’s use of narrative techniques, such as flashback and point of view, to engage the
reader. Cite specific examples from the text that illustrate this. (RL1; RL6)
2. Write an objective summary of Theodore Taylor’s The Cay. Analyze how the theme of survival shaping character
is developed throughout the course of the story. Cite textual evidence that supports this analysis. (RL2)
3. Compare the Phillip you read about in the beginning of the book with the one who returns home at the end.
Include physical and personality changes in your descriptions as well as the events that contributed to these
changes. (RL3)
4. Compare and contrast the experience of reading The Cay independently to listening to an audio version of the
text. Explain what you see and hear when reading the text as opposed to what you perceive when listening.
(RL7)
5. In order to recognize the point of view of the author, students have to become skilled at making inferences
about the author’s beliefs. While reading a text that contains multiple characters that experience the same
event, assign different students to each of the characters in the story and have them tell about the event from
their point of view. Provide an opportunity for students to compare and contrast these different points of view
(RL6)
6. Explain how Theodore Taylor develops the point of view of Phillip in The Cay. (RL6)