Quiz and chapter 4-5 review

We had our first quiz today on Chapters 1-3

of "TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD".

During our second class we did some group work

for chapters 4-5.

READING TO DO:

Chapter 6 > By Monday, May 7th.

Chapter 7 > By Tuesday, May 8th.

Chapter 9 > By Thursday, May 10th.

HOMEWORK:

Chapter questions 4-5 for next class Monday.

Here is a summary for Chapters 4-5:

Chapter 4
Summary:
School continues; the year goes by. Scout doubts that the new educational system is really doing her any good - she finds school boring and wishes the teacher would allow her to read and write, rather than ask the children to do silly activities geared toward "Group Dynamics" and "Good Citizenship."

One afternoon, as she runs past the Radley house, she notices something in the knot-hole of one of the oak trees in the front yard. She investigates further and finds two pieces of chewing gum. Scout is careful, but eventually decides to chew them. Upon learning she is chewing found gum, Jem makes her spit it out. Later, toward the end of the school year, Jem and Scout find two polished Indian-head pennies, good luck tokens, inside the same knothole. The children don’t know if the knothole is someone’s hiding place or if the pennies are a gift, but decide to take them and keep them safely at the bottom of Jem’s trunk.

Dill comes to Maycomb for the summer again, full of stories about train rides and his father, whom he claims to have finally seen. The three try to start a few games, but quickly get bored. Jem rolls Scout inside an old tire, but he pushes so hard that it ends up in the Radley’s yard. Terrified, Scout runs back home, but leaves the tire behind. Jem has to run into the yard and retrieve the tire. Dill thinks Boo Radley died and Jem says they stuffed his body up the chimney. Scout thinks maybe he's still alive. They invent a new game about Boo Radley. Jem plays Boo, Dill plays Mr. Radley, and Scout plays Mrs. Radley. They polish it up over the summer into a little dramatic reenactment of all the gossip they've heard about Boo and his family, including a scene using Calpurnia's scissors as a prop.

One day Atticus catches them playing the game and asks them if it has anything to do with the Radley family. They deny it, and Atticus replies, "I hope it doesn't." Atticus's sternness forces them to stop playing, and Scout is relieved because she's worried for another reason: she thought she heard the sound of someone laughing inside the Radley house when her tire rolled into their yard.

Analysis:
The schools have attempted to teach children how to behave in groups and how to be upstanding citizens, but Scout notes that her father and Jem learned these traits without the kind of schooling she is getting. The school may be attempting to turn the children into moral beings, but Scout's moral education occurs almost exclusively in her home or in the presence of Maycomb adults and friends. This suggests that schools can only provide limited change in children's moral sensibility, or no change at all - families and communities are the true sculptors of children's sense of what is right and good, and what is not.

Accepting gifts in the Radley tree knothole and rolling accidentally into the Radley yard are some of the first signs that the children are slowly coming closer to making contact with Boo. They're still terrified, however, by the mystery of Boo. Their curiosity and the drama game they create shows how desperately they wanted to find answers to their questions about Boo in the absence of any real information or knowledge. Likewise, the townspeople have a tendency to react unfavorably to things that are "different" until they have reasons to understand the difference. In addition, the children are gradually humanizing Boo - he was referred to in the opening chapter as a "malevolent phantom," but by now, he is a real man whose antisocial behavior marks him as unusual and therefore suspicious or dangerous.

Chapter 5
Summary:
Jem and Dill have become closer friends, and Scout, being a girl, finds herself often excluded from their play. Dill, in childish fashion, has decided to get engaged to Scout, but now he and Jem play together often and Scout finds herself unwelcome.

Instead of playing with the boys, Scout often sits with their neighbor, the avid gardener Miss Maudie Atkinson, watches the sun set on her front steps, or partakes of Miss Maudie's fine homemade cake. Miss Maudie is honest in her speech and her ways, with a witty tongue, and Scout considers her a trusted friend. Scout asks her one day about Boo Radley, and Miss Maudie says that he's still alive, he just doesn't like to come outside. She also says that most of the rumors about him aren't true. Miss Maudie explains that the Radleys are foot-washing Baptists - they believe all pleasure is a sin against God, and stay inside most of the time reading the Bible. She says that Arthur was a nice boy when she used to know him.

The next day, Jem and Dill hatch a plan to leave a note for Boo in the Radley’s window, using a fishing line. The note will ask him to come out sometimes and tell them what he's doing inside, and that they won't hurt him and will buy him ice cream. Dill says he wants Boo to come out and sit with them for a while, as it might make the man feel better. Dill and Scout keep watch in case anyone comes along, and Jem tries to deliver the note with the fishing pole, but finds that it's harder to maneuver than he expected. As he struggles, Atticus arrives and catches them all. He tells them to stop tormenting Boo, and lectures them about how Boo has a right to his privacy, and that they shouldn't go near the house unless they're invited. He accuses them of putting Boo's life history on display for the edification of the neighborhood. Jem says that he didn't say they were doing that, and thus inadvertently admits that they were doing just that. Atticus caught him with "the oldest lawyer's trick on record."

Analysis:
Though Atticus tries to encourage the children to leave Boo alone, their senses of sympathy have been summoned by thinking about Boo's solitude and his strict upbringing. Though still frightened of him, they wish to befriend him and help him now. Miss Maudie's description of Boo helps the children understand him as a victim of his upbringing.

Miss Maudie is one of the only women that Scout respects and is friendly with. Calpurnia and Miss Maudie are the main motherly influences in her life. Later on, while Aunt Alexandra imposes herself as a maternal substitute, trying to turn Scout into a "lady" against her will. Miss Maudie is the most unbiased and supportive of these three women, though Calpurnia becomes much more sympathetic as time goes by. Miss Maudie is obsessed with her flowerbeds, and goes about tending them despite disapproval of the "foot-washing Baptists," who occasionally accuse her of spending too much time in such vain earthly pursuits. Miss Maudie is opposed to these staunch, strict ideas but is also religious, showing that perhaps she finds a relationship between maintaining beautiful things in the world and connecting with God. Just as in the case of the Ewells hunting out of season, some things are more important than following the letter of the law exactly.

The very religious Radley family stays indoors all day and rarely participates in community affairs, except during emergencies. However, Miss Maudie seems to think that serving living things - whether human or floral - is an important part of serving God. There is no one clear way to worship God, but the chapter suggests that reading the Bible inside all day may be an application of God's law which, like the hunting law when applied to the Ewell's, becomes self-defeating if applied too severely. In both cases, the maintaining of life (Mr. Ewell's children or Miss Maudie's flowers) is more important than observing the strictest codes. Miss Maudie also believes in the importance of pleasure and the enjoyment of life.