Study Guide Questions
Chapter
One:
1. What city is the school in?
2. How many months had passed since he saw his father?
3. What is the narrator’s name?
4. What is his sister’s name?
5. How old is the narrator?
Chapter
Two:
1. What is the brother’s name?
2. What state are they in?
3. How old is the brother?
4. What disease does the father have?
5. What are the symptoms?
6. Why did the father send Ben off to school?
7. What had the father been talking about building?
8. What year is it?
Chapter Three:
1. Describe their house. See pages 12-15.
2. How serious does the father’s illness seem to be?
3. What was the cause of the mother’s death?
1. Who is interested in marring Nettie?
2. How many years do they have left to pay for their land?
3. To speak to the father what do they have to do?
4. Who fed the father?
5. He says he was what when he was done feeing his father?
1. What does Harrison say is the reason the family never came to get Ben for the holidays?
1. What was the schedule for taking care of the father?
2. What did Ben come to think of his father as?
1. Ben says that cleaning his father was to become what?
1. When Ben took lunch to Harrison and Nettie in the field, what did he realize?
1. How much land do they have?
2. When Ben went to the field, what seemed to respond more than his father?
3. Ben struggles to find something to talk to his father about. What is it he talks about?
4. What does Ben ask his father to do to show he is responding?
1. What did Nettie and Harrison think when Ben rushed to the fields to tell them father spoke?
2. When Ben took Harrison and Nettie back to the house what did he have father do to show them he knew them?
1. What did Ben suggest they do in order to get father at the table?
2. What does Nettie say they are going to have to do in order to know what father can do?
1. What is Ben going to build?
2. What sign did the father give to show this is what he wanted?
1. Ben wants Harrison and Nettie to realize what? (see pages 57-58)
1. When Nettie returns what news does she have?
2. Whose help does Ben need to convince Nettie and Harrison to build the barn?
1. What did they put father in to take him outside?
2. When Harrison showed father the wheat field and father was pleased, how did Harrison feel?
3. Why did Ben go back inside and leave the others?
4. How did father show them he wanted the barn?
5. What does Nettie agree to let them do?
6. Who convinced them?
1. What was Harrison’s response when Ben said they could work harder?
2. What did father lose that Nettie believes they need in order to line up the stakes?
3. When does Ben say they can line up the stakes without a compass?
4. What object did they use to make their North-South line?
5. Explain how they made their first corner.
6. Who told father they staked out the barn?
7. Who does Harrison think the father will only listen to?
1. What kind of wood are they going to use?
2. Who did all the work to peel the bark and split the logs?
3. Ben says the building isn’t just a barn, but what?
1. This time at the creek allowed them to be what?
1. Ben suggests Nettie write to Mr. Dortmeister for what reason?
2. When does Ben say he will go back to school?
1. How long did it take to prepare the logs and gather rocks?
1. Who taught Harrison to build?
1. How old is Nettie?
2. What does Nettie say she won’t do now?
1. On
what day does Ben say they should do the work?
2.
How will building this barn differ from when neighbors build?
1.
What seems to happen to father?
2.
What does Ben want to start on right away?
1.
What did Harrison say that reminded Ben of Mr. Dortmeister?
2.
How many days did they spend on the foundation?
1.
What did Ben do to provide more light for them?
2.
How long did it take to get the walls up?
3.
While they were working, where was father?
4.
What does Ben think the barn says?
5.
Who tells father the barn is done?
6.
What is father’s response?
7.
What is the climax?
1. What has happened to father?
2. What does Ben say was his only thought when he saw father?
3. Who does Ben admit he was building the barn for?
4. What does Nettie say is the reason father died when he did?
5. What does Harrison say was gather’s gift to Ben?
1. Who build the coffin?
2. Where does Ben say father is if he is anywhere?
1. Ben is approximately hold old when he is telling the story?
2. What does he look at every day?