1a. What does the speaker say it is hard to get meat without? Where does the speaker's father get meat for his family?
2a. In lines 7–9, what traditions of his people did the speaker's father miss out on? What happened when the speaker's father brought home horns and hides from work?
3a. What word does the speaker use to describe his or her father's tire tracks? What does the speaker remember on his or her father's chest? What does the speaker hear in the night?
1b. How has the way of life of the speaker's people changed? Explain whether this change has affected just the speaker's father or others as well.
2b. Why do you think the speaker's father brought home horns and hides from the packing house? How do you think the speaker's father feels about missing out on some of the traditions of his people?
3b. Explain whether the speaker's father's car really left these types of tracks. Was the father's chest really painted? Why do you think the speaker associates these sights and sounds with his or her father?
4a. Identify the details in the poem that are representative of a traditional Native American way of life. What elements of modern urban life are present in the poem?
4b. Explain why the focus of this poem is more on the things that are not a part of the day-to-day life of the speaker's father than on his everyday realities. What does this focus reveal about the speaker?
5a. Define what the speaker's attitude and feelings are toward his or her father.
5b. Compare and contrast what you have learned about the relationship between parents and child in "Without Title" to what you have learned about that relationship in "Childhood of the Ancients." What two different sides of the relationship between parents and child are shown in these poems?
Analogy. In this poem, the author presents an analogy comparing and contrasting life in a traditional Native American culture and life in a modern city. Based on the comparison and contrast you have seen in this poem, explain whether the poet is making any sort of judgment about the two ways of life she describes in the poem.
Simile. In the last line of this poem, the speaker says, "in the night I heard / his buffalo grunts like a snore." What things are being compared and contrasted in this simile?
1. Imagine that someone in your family told you that you have it too easy and don't know the meaning of the word hard. Write an appeal explaining why this attitude is wrong and pointing out some of the difficulties and challenges you face in everyday life. Your appeal should be persuasive so that you can change this family member's attitude.
2. Write a children's story loosely based on any of the parent-child relationships from "Digging," "Childhood of the Ancients," and "Without Title." Use simple language that young children would understand to tell your story, and create pictures after every few sentences to help your young audience understand the action of the story.
3. Write a comic skit about a child who complains about something being hard and a parent who launches into a story about how hard his or her childhood was in comparison to that of the complaining child. Your skit should be brief, and your goal is to make your audience laugh.
Homonyms. A homonym is a word that has the same pronunciation as another word but a different meaning, origin, and usually, spelling. "Without Title" contains several homonyms. For example, the word meat is a homonym (meet). Some other homonyms from "Without Title" are listed below. For each of the first five items, write a homonym and a simple definition for each word. Then write down five other homonym pairs and their definitions.
Example
see: to view something sea: the ocean
1. know:
2. bow:
3. red:
4. there:
5. heard:
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
Expanding and Combining Sentences. If you use too many short sentences in a paragraph, your writing might sound choppy. You may be able to combine two sentences that deal with the same idea, or expand on one of the sentences. This will help your writing sound smooth and clear and assist your reader in seeing how your ideas are connected. For further information, read the Language Arts Survey 3.39, "Combining and Expanding Sentences." Then combine or expand on each of the sentences below.
1. The squat pen rests. It rests between my finger and my thumb. The pen rests snugly.
2. I hear my father digging.
3. When I was your age, I got up in the dark. When I was your age, I walked five miles to school. I then walked ten miles back from school.
4. My father worked in the stockyards. All his life he worked. He worked to bring us meat.
5. The aerial on my dad's car waved. The car was old. The aerial waved like a bow string.
6. Native Americans had many traditions. These traditions were important to their culture. Many of these traditions have been lost.
7. My grandfather dug potatoes. My father dug potatoes. I will dig in a different way.
8. I was proud of my father. My father worked hard. He worked in the packing house.
9. My grandfather said he had to walk five miles to school. My grandfather said he had to walk ten miles back from school. I think he was exaggerating.
10. Seamus Heaney wrote a poem about family. Andrew Hudgins wrote a poem about family. Diane Glancy wrote a poem about family.
Using a Thesaurus. In the poem "Digging," the poet uses the words old man as a synonym for father. Find at least three synonyms for each of the terms below having to do with families.
1. family:
2. father:
3. mother:
4. brother:
5. grandmother:
Formal and Informal English. Review the Language Arts Survey 3.2, "Formal and Informal English." Then rewrite the sentences below, replacing the underlined phrase with more formal words.
1. My mother flipped out when she saw that we had left the kitchen so messy.
2. When Ryan began behaving badly, Wanda was like, "Get lost."
3. We had a great time just chilling in the sun by the river.
4. For his fourteenth birthday, Lou planned to throw a birthday bash.
5. After hiking five miles, Chynna and I were wiped out.
6. Ramon asked me to watch his band's gig tonight.
7. Most of the friends I hang with are musicians.
8. I was stoked about our field trip to the zoo.
9. Rami convinced me to check out the new shark movie.
10. Once we were all cool with the destination, we made plans for our vacation.
