Use these essay questions as writing and critical thinking exercises for all levels of writers, and to build their literary analysis skills by requiring textual references throughout the essay.

Differentiation Suggestion: For English learners or struggling writers, strategies that work well include graphic organizers, sentence frames or starters, group work, or oral responses.

Scaffolded Essay Questions

Student Prompt: Write a short (1-3 paragraph) response using one of the below bulleted outlines. Cite details from the text over the course of your response that serve as examples and support.

1. At the end of the story, Billy gets his minibike and rides it down to the river to meet his friends.

• What does the desire for a minibike symbolize, and how might it be influenced by the book’s setting? (topic sentence)
• Choose three mentions of the minibike as a motivator for Billy to keep eating worms and connect them back to your argument.
• Finally, in your concluding sentence or sentences, describe how the minibike illustrates Billy’s development as a character.

2. Joe and Alan’s attempts to sabotage Billy grow increasingly tricky in nature.

• How do their antics illustrate their growing desperation to win the bet? (topic sentence)
• Using three supporting examples from the text, show how their treatment of Billy changes as it becomes more and more likely that Billy will win the bet.