Encounter Quiz

What is the point of view of this book?

• Third person limited

• First person narrative

• Third person omniscient

Who is the narrator of the book Encounter?

• Jane Yolen

• Christopher Columbus's cabin boy

• a Native American child

How does the author's choice of point of view impact how the events are described?

• The events are described in such a way that the reader finds the events funny and entertaining.

• The events are described in a way in which the reader has sympathy and concern for the European visitors.

• Since the narrator is a Native American, the reader is presented with a description of how the Natives might have felt seeing the European explorers for the first time.

How might the story events been different if the narrator had been an adult telling the story?

• The tribe might have listened to the adult and not trusted the Europeans.

• The story events would still be the same.

• The Europeans would not have been portrayed as gods from the sky.

Read the passage below. How does the author's choice of words portray aspects of the Europeans?

• The author's words show that the Native Americans thought the Europeans were like them and had skin and no tails.

• Words such as 'skin was moon to my sun' shows how pale and white the Europeans seem to the Native Americans. They think someone this pale must not be from Earth.

• The author's words make the Native Americans seem more powerful because they don't come from the sky.

The reader can infer that the chief and many of the Native Americans admire the Europeans. They are almost in awe (or wonder) about them. Which sentences from the text support this inference? Choose 2.

• We were smiled at with many white teeth, a serpent's smile.

• They desired all that the strangers had brought: the sharp silver spear, round silver pools to hold in the hand that gave a man back his face...

• "See how pale they are. No one can be that color who comes from the earth. Surely they are from the sky."

• There feet were hidden, also,

• So it was we lost our lands to the strangers from the sky.

Mood is the feeling a reader has when they read a passage. Read the passage below and study the illustration. What mood does the author's choice of words and the illustration create?

• hopeful

• cheerful

• scary

• funny

We can infer the European's perspective of the Native Americans was that they were a group to rule or control. Which sentences support the inference? Choose 3.

• The stranger made a funny noise with his mouth, not like talking but like barking of a yellow dog.

• ...they hid their bodies in colors, like parrots.

• Three of them knelt before their chief and pushed sticks into the sand.

• We were patted upon the head as a child pats a yellow dog.

• They took five of our young men and many parrots with them.

Study the illustration.  Which choice of words best supports the illustration?

• They desired all that the strangers had brought...

• We were patted upon the head as a child pats a yellow dog.

• they gave us...darts that sprang from sticks with a sound like thunder

• When I returned to the feast, one of the strangers let me touch his sharp silver stick

Encounter by Jane Yolen is a historical fiction book.  What is the historical setting of this book? 

• On an island during the time of Christopher Columbus

• Canada during the time of George Washington

• Native America during the time of Christopher Columbus

• Australia during the time of Christopher Columbus