To Kill a Mockingbird
Oral Assessment Guidelines
Part One – Tuesday, October 25
Part Two – Wednesday, October 26
General Directions:
▪
▪
▪
Please review the quotations (Part 1) and higher-level questions (Part 2) in preparation for your oral exam over
To Kill a Mockingbird
​
.
If you do not know the answer to your quote/question, you may pass ​ONE TIME​ for a ten-point penalty.
However, keep in mind that if you choose to use a pass, you may not know your second question either.
Please see me in advance with questions you have about any of the quotations/questions. I ​WILL NOT​ answer
them for you, but I am happy to talk you through it.
Part One – Quote Analysis (50 points)
Tuesday, October 25
Draw two quotes and pick one. Then explain the significance of the quote. Your explanation must contain:
✓ The speaker of the quote
✓ The context (what is happening in the book when this is said/what causes the character to say it)
✓ An analysis of the quote’s meaning (your analysis must extend beyond literal meaning and touch on
themes/lessons of the novel)
1.
“When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow” (Lee 1).
2.
“Maycomb was an old town, but it was a tired old town when I first knew it. In rainy weather the streets turned to red slop; grass
grew on the sidewalks, the courthouse sagged in the square” (Lee 2).
3.
“‘First of all,’ he said, ‘if you can learn a simple trick…you’ll get along a lot better with all kinds of folks. You never really
understand a person until you consider things from his point of view –‘“(Lee 22).
4.
“You just hold your head high and keep those fists down. No matter what anybody says to you, don't you let 'em get your goat.
Try fightin' with your head for a change” (Lee 63).
5.
“’Mockingbirds don’t do one thing but make music for us to enjoy. They don’t eat up people’s gardens, don’t nest in corncribs,
they don’t do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird’” (Lee 75).
6.
“’…before I can live with other folks I’ve got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn’t abide by majority rule is a person’s
conscience’” (Lee 87).
7.
“’I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It’s when you
know you’re licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes
you do’” (Lee 93).
8.
“Dill’s eyes flickered at Jem, and Jem looked at the floor. Then he rose and broke the remaining code of our childhood. He went
out of the room and down the hall. ‘Atticus,’ his voice was distant. ‘can you come here a minute, sir?’” (Lee 118).
9.
“’Do you really think so?’
“This was Atticus’ dangerous question. ‘Do you really think you want to move there, Scout?’ Bam, bam, bam, bam, and the
checkerboard was swept clean of my men” (Lee 123).
10. “Mayella looked as if she tried to keep clean, and I was reminded of the row of red geraniums in the Ewell yard” (Lee 151).
11. “’I try to give ‘em a reason, you see. It helps folks if they can latch onto a reason. When I come to town, which is seldom, if I
weave a little and drink out of this sack, folks can say Dolphus Raymond’s in the clutches of whiskey – that’s why he won’t change
his ways’” (Lee 169).
12. “But there is one way in this country in which all men are created equal – there is one human institution that makes a pauper the
equal of a Rockefeller…That institution gentlemen is a court…in our courts all men are created equal’” (Lee 173).
13. “’Miss Jean Louise, stand up. Your father’s passin’ ‘” (Lee 179).
14. “’How could they do it, how could they?’”
“’I don’t know, but they did it. They’ve done it before and they did it tonight and they’ll do it again and when they do it – seems
that only children weep’” (Lee 180).
15. “Atticus’s eyes filled with tears. He did not speak for a moment. ‘Tell them I’m very grateful,’ he said. ‘Tell them -- tell them they
must never do this again. Times are too hard…’” (Lee 181).
16. “’It’s like bein’ a caterpillar in a cocoon, that’s what it is,’ he said…’I always thought Maycomb folks were the best folks in the
world, least that’s what they seemed like.’” (Lee 182).
17. “'I simply wanted to tell you that there are some men in this world who were born to do our unpleasant jobs for us. Your father's
one of them'" (Lee 182).
18. “’I think I’ll be a clown when I’m grown…There ain’t one thing in this world I can do about folks except laugh, so I’m gonna join
the circus and laugh my head off’” (Lee 183).
19. “’He meant it when he said it… Jem, see if you can stand in Bob Ewell’s shoes a minute. I destroyed his last shred of credibility at
that trial, if he had any to begin with… So if spitting in my face and threatening me saved Mayella Ewell one extra beating, that’s
something I’ll gladly take” (Lee 186).
20. “’As you grow older, you’ll see white men cheat black men every day of your life, but let me tell you something and don’t you
forget it – whenever a white man does that to a black man, no matter who he is, how rich he is, or how fine a family he comes
from, that white man is trash’” (Lee 187).
21. “She took off her glasses and stared at me. ‘I’ll tell you why,’ she said. ‘Because –he—is—trash, that’s why you can’t play with
him. I’ll not have you around him, picking up his habits and learning Lord—knows—what. You’re enough of a problem to your
father as it is” (Lee 191).
22. “’If there’s just one kind of folks, why can’t they get along with each other? If they’re all alike, why do they go out of their way to
despise each other? Scout, I think I’m beginning to understand…why Boo Radley’s stayed shut up in the house all this time…it’s
because he ​wants to stay inside’” (Lee 193).
23. “I tell you there are some good but misguided people in this town. Good, but misguided. Folks in this town who think they’re
doing right, I mean. Now far be it from me to say who, but some of ‘em in this town thought they were doing the right thing a
while back, but all they did was stir ‘em up” (Lee 198).
24. “’His food doesn’t stick going down, does it?’” (Lee 198).
25. “After all, if Auntie could be a lady at a time like this, so could I” (Lee 202).
26. “’Don’t do that, Scout. Set him out on the back steps.’”…
“Sighing, I scooped up the small creature, placed him on the bottom step and went back to my cot” (Lee 203).
27. “Then Mr. Underwood’s meaning became clear: Atticus had used every tool available to free men to save Tom Robinson, but in
the secret courts of men’s hearts Atticus had no case. Tom was a dead man the minute Mayella Ewell opened her mouth and
screamed” (205).
28. “’To my way of thinkin’, Mr. Finch, taking the one man who’s done you and this town a great service an’ draggin’ him with his shy
ways into the limelight – to me, that’s a sin’” (Lee 234).
29. “’Yes sir, I understand,’ I reassured him. ‘Mr. Tate was right.’
“Atticus disengaged himself and looked at me. ‘What do you mean?’
“’Well, it’d be sort of like shootin’ a mockingbird, wouldn’t it?’” (Lee 234).
30. “Neighbors bring food with death, flowers with sickness, and little things in between. Boo was our neighbor…we never put back
into the tree what we took out of it: we had given him nothing, and it made me sad” (Lee 236).
31. “Atticus was right. One time he said you never really know a man until you stand in his shoes and walk around in them. Just
standing on the Radley porch was enough” (Lee 237).
32. “’…Atticus, when they finally saw him, why he hadn’t done any of those things…Atticus, he was real nice…’”
“’Most people are, Scout, when you finally see him’” (Lee 238).
33. “He would be there all night, and he would be there when Jem waked up in the morning” (Lee 238).
Part Two – Higher-Level Questions (50 points)
Wednesday, October 26
Your answer to the higher level questions must prove the following:
✓ You read the novel in its entirety.
✓ You have a deep understanding of the novel and can apply your answers to the themes at large.
✓ You can use specific textual references to the text in your answers. (Note: You will not have the book in
front of you, but you can reference specific details/scenes/moments from the text in your verbal response.)
1.
What is one lesson that Atticus attempts to teach his children and how does he teach it to them?
2.
Explain the significance of the shift in setting between parts one and two of ​To Kill a Mockingbird.
3.
Though Tom received a guilty verdict, what did Atticus accomplish during the trial? How do you know?
4.
What is “Maycomb’s disease”? What effect does this have on the people of Maycomb? Is there a cure?
5.
Why is it significant that Miss Maudie makes the conscious decision to not attend the trial?
6.
What can you infer about courage based on Jem and Scout’s experiences with Mrs. Dubose?
7.
What is revealed about Calpurnia’s character through her conflict with Lula in chapter 12?
8.
Explain the role of language in chapter 12. What does the language reveal about social class/racial class?
9.
Explain the significance of setting in chapter 15 where Atticus is guarding Tom Robinson.
10. Describe Scout’s effect on the lynch mob. What does this reveal about her character?
11. Why is Jem so hopeful about the eventual verdict?
12. Draw a conclusion about why you think Judge Taylor gave this case to Atticus.
13. What values does Mrs. Grace Merriweather seem to represent in the novel?
14. What irony is present in Miss Gates’ lesson on democracy?
15. Explain how Aunt Alexandra is a dynamic rather than a static character.
16. How does Scout’s perspective on what it means to be a lady evolve during the Missionary Circle scene (chapter 24)?
17. How does Miss Maudie’s information about mockingbirds add to Atticus’s comment that “it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird”? How is
this motif significant within the novel?
18. Why does Jem encourage Scout to ask Atticus about Cecil Jacobs’s comments instead of just explaining them to her?
19. Explain the significance of Dill’s reappearance in chapter 15 of the novel.
20. Why is it significant that Scout, Jem, and Dill sit with the “colored folks” during the trial scene?
21. What does it say about Dill that he wants to be a circus clown when he grows up? Why is it important that he says this
immediately following the events of the trial?
22. After the death of Tom Robinson in chapter 24 of the novel, Mr. Underwood likens it to the “senseless slaughter of songbirds.”
How does this relate to the overall theme of the novel?
23. Explain how Jem has “come of age” throughout the course of the novel.
24. What is significant about the fact that Scout plays the role of “ham” in the pageant?
25. Explain how the event of Mr. Nathan Radley filling the knothole with cement foreshadows Jem’s reaction to Tom Robinson’s
guilty verdict.
26. Explain how Scout has “come of age” throughout the course of the novel.
27. Explain how the first line of the novel foreshadows later conflict.
28. When Scout walks Boo Radley home, what lesson has she finally learned? How do you know?
29. Discuss one internal and one external conflict developed in the novel.
30. Discuss one theme in the novel and a character/symbol/event that demonstrates this theme.
31. Pick a character from the novel who, for the time period in which the novel takes place, goes against society’s expectations.
32. This novel is considered an extremely controversial piece of literature and has often been banned. Using facts from the novel,
explain why this may be the case.
33. Why does Jem get upset at Scout for asking him about Miss Gate’s hypocrisy shortly after the trial, and what does this say about
Jem’s character?