Literary Terms
About The Test
Multiple Choice Strategy
Texts You Might Have Read!
Vocabulary
100
Anything that shows the reader information about what a character is like
What is characterization?
100
On Question 26, you MUST write about this many texts from section 3 of the test to receive full credit.
What are TWO texts?
100
When looking at multiple choice passages about a reading selection, you should do this first.
What is read the questions carefully?
100
In "The Gift of the Magi", O. Henry uses this literary element when his characters each give up the thing that the reader would least expect them to give up.
What is irony?
100
A poem is divided into these short, paragraph-like sections.
What are stanzas?
200
When and where the story takes place--this literary element can also contribute to the mood or place limits on the characters' actions, depending on how the author uses it.
What is setting?
200
In question 28, you must apply the quote to this many texts you have read (ideally in English class!)
What are TWO texts?
200
When you see a question with one-word answers, you should take the time to do this before answering.
What is jot down a definition of each word you know?
200
In "Lamb To The Slaughter", Roald Dahl uses this literary element early in the story when Mary Maloney eagerly awaits her husband's arrival, takes his coat, and fixes him a drink. Boy, is he in for a surprise--and so is the reader!
What is characterization?
200
To emphasize something, or to place emphasis on it, is to do this.
What is highlight or make something sound important?
300
The "main idea", or a message the reader might take away from reading a text. (You will be asked to come up with one of these as your controlling idea in Question 26.)
What is theme?
300
In Question 26, you will be asked to create a controlling idea, otherwise known as this key element of an essay. It must relate to the topic mentioned in the question!
What is a thesis?
300
If you encounter a word you don't know, these two strategies can help you figure it out.
What are using context clues and looking for word parts you know (prefixes, roots, and suffixes)?
300
In this Holocaust memoir, Elie Wiesel writes about the conflicts he feels during his imprisonment with his father in a concentration camp.
What is Night?
300
If I "depict" something (or if it has been "depicted"), I am doing this using words.
What is showing?
400
The attitude demonstrated by a character or narrator's word choice and manner of speaking.
What is tone?
400
In Question 27, when you write about a literary element, you must first do this, even though the question does not tell you to!
What is define the literary element you have chosen?
400
You can check your answers by going back to the passage and underlining this, to prove that you are correct.
What is textual evidence?
400
In A Raisin In The Sun by Lorraine Hansberry, the main problem, or this literary term, arises when the family matriarch receives a $10,000 life insurance check from her husband's death, and her children have different ideas about how to spend it.
What is conflict?
400
If I "indicate" something (or if it has been "indicated"), I am doing this.
What is pointing out, showing, or signaling?
500
This device is used by authors to give a hint about what will happen later in a story.
What is foreshadowing?
500
In questions 26 and 27, your answers MUST refer to the texts printed in this section of the test.
What is section 3? Or, What are Passage I and Passage II?
500
If Mrs. S. could talk to you during the multiple choice section, she would ask you these two questions about your answers.
What is "How did you get that answer?" and "Where did you find that in the text?"
500
The setting of The Crucible by Arthur Miller is literally this time period, during which young girls were extremely limited in their rights and accusations of witchcraft were almost always followed by jail and hanging, but it was meant to represent the McCarthy Communism Hearings of the 1950s, when accusations of Communism were almost always followed by blacklisting.
What is Salem, Massachusetts in the 1600s?
500
To infer something is to use hints in the text to make an educated guess; to imply something is to do this.
What is hint at or suggest, without actually saying it.
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