1a. What event in the experience of her people did the narrator's grandmother miss by eight or ten years? What does the narrator think she must have experienced despite missing this event?
2a. What ceremony did the narrator's grandmother participate in as a child? Why did the ceremony stop? What does the narrator remember his grandmother doing most?
3a. Where is the narrator's grandmother's grave?
4a. Identify key events in the journey of the Kiowa as presented by Momaday.
5a. Evaluate the impact on the grandmother's life of changes that occurred in the Kiowa culture.
1b. Explain the significance to the narrator of the Fort Sill incarceration.
2b. How did the prayers make the narrator feel despite the fact that he could not understand them? Why might the narrator be impressed with the reverence of his grandmother's prayers?
3b. Why is the location of the grave appropriate?
4b. Summarize the effect of all of these events on the Kiowa people.
5b. Compare the experiences of the Kiowa and those of the African Americans expressed in "Follow the Drinking Gourd."
Description.How does Momaday use description at the beginning of the narrative? What sensory details does the author include?
Narration.Whose story does Momaday recount?
Chronological Order.What sections of the selection are told using chronological order? What transitions are used in telling the story of Momaday's journey that retraces the Kiowas' migration?
Oral Tradition and Myth.According to the Kiowa, how did they enter the world? How was the Big Dipper formed? How did Momaday's grandmother keep the oral tradition of the Kiowas alive?
Tone.What tone does Momaday use when describing his grandmother in her familiar postures on page 61?
Classification Order.Which section of "The Way to Rainy Mountain" uses classification?
Comparison and Contrast Order.Which method of comparison and contrast order is used in the description of the grandmother's house as it was in the past and as it is after her death?
1. In this selection, Momaday describes a place that is special to him. Write a description of a place that is close to your heart.
2. Create a paragraph-long original myth that explains an object or event in the natural world.
3. An elegy is a poem that laments the dead. Write an elegy for Momaday's grandmother or for the Kiowa culture.
Finding the Simple Subject and Verb. For each of the sentences below, star (*) the simple subject and denote the simple verb with a plus sign (+). For more information, see the Language Arts Survey 3.20, "Finding the Simple Subject and Simple Predicate in a Sentence."
1. Winter brings harsh weather.
2. Her forebears came down from the country.
3. Yellowstone, it seemed to me, was a region of beautiful scenery.
4. The sky in all directions is close at hand.
5. The land, descending eastward, is a stairway to the plain.
