Flowers for Algernon

Flowers for Algernon

​Reading: Notice Details to Make Inferences

​Making inferences means noticing details that an author provides and using them to make logical assumptions about the events, settings, themes, and other story elements that the author leaves unstated. Consider these details that author Daniel Keyes has Charlie tell us:

I had a test today. I think I faled it. and I think that maybe now they wont use me. What happind is a nice young man was in the room and he had some white cards with ink spilled all over them. He sed Charlie what do you see on this card. I was very skared even tho I had my rabits foot in my pockit because when I was a kid I always faled tests in school and I spilled

ink to.

​Reading: Notice Details to Make Inferences

​From these details, you might make the following inferences:

• Charlie is no longer of school age.

• Charlie has a learning disability, so he had a hard time when he was in school.

• Charlie is superstitious.

• Charlie very much wants to pass a test and be used in an experiment.

Open Ended

They said how come you went to the adult nite scool all by yourself Charlie. How did you

find it. I said I askd pepul and sumbody told me where I shud go to lern to read and spell

good.

What can you infer about Charlie from these details?

Open Ended

Their really my friends and they like me. Sometimes somebody will say hey look at Joe or Frank or George he really pulled a Charlie Gordon. I dont know why they say that but they always laff.

What can you infer about Charlie from these details?

Open Ended

Dr. Nemur wanted to publish the results of the experiment at the end of this month. Dr. Strauss wanted to wait a while longer to be sure. Dr. Strauss said that Dr. Nemur was more interested in the Chair of Psychology at Princeton than he was in the experiment.

What can you infer about the doctors from these details?

​Literary Analysis: Point of View

​Point of view is the perspective from which a story is told. In a story told from the first-person point of view, the narrator is a character in the story and refers to himself or herself with first-person pronouns like I and me. In a story told from the third-person point of view, the narrator stands outside the story and refers to all the characters with third-person pronouns like he, she, and they. A first-person narrator can tell only what he or she sees, hears, knows, thinks, or feels. “Flowers for Algernon” is told from the first-person point of view of its main character,

Charlie Gordon, who gives his account in a series of progress reports.

Open Ended

How old is the narrator and how he is different from other people his age?

Open Ended

What role do vocabulary and spelling have in showing the changes that take place

in the narrator as the story unfolds?

Open Ended

Why do you think the author, Keyes, has the narrator, Charlie, tell his story in

spaced-out progress reports instead of telling the whole story on a single day in

May or in July?

Multiple Choice

What is the point of view of “Flowers for Algernon”?

• first person, from Charlie’s point of view

• first person, from Charlie’s doctors’ point of view

• third person, telling the thoughts of many characters

• third person, telling the thoughts of just Charlie and Miss Kinnian

Multiple Choice

What form does the story “Flowers for Algernon” take?

• progress reports by Charlie

• medical reports by Charlie’s doctors

• diary entries by Miss Kinnian

• job reports by Charlie’s boss

Multiple Choice

What can you infer from the details about Charlie at the start of “Flowers for

Algernon”?

• He has below-normal intelligence.

• He sees and hears things that are not there.

• He cannot control his temper.

• He cannot hold down a job and support himself.

Multiple Choice

Choose the most likely inference from this passage in “Flowers for Algernon.”

They called the mouse Algernon. Algernon was in a box with a lot of twists and turns like all kinds of walls and they gave me a pencil and a paper with lines and lots of boxes. On one side it said START and on the other side it said FINISH. They said it was amazed and that Algernon and me had the same amazed to do. I dint see how we could have the same amazed if Algernon had a box and I had a paper but I dint say nothing.

• Algernon can read.

• Algernon is running in a maze.

• Charlie finds Algernon amazing.

• The doctors find Charlie amazing.

Multiple Choice

In “Flowers for Algernon,” what happens during Charlie’s first inkblot test?

• He shows he has a strong imagination.

• He shows he has a violent temper.

• He loses to Algernon.

• He fails to see things in the inkblot.

Multiple Choice

In “Flowers for Algernon,” why do the doctors use Charlie in their experiment?

• He is the only person willing to do it.

• They know he needs a better job, which he can get if his skills improve.

• They feel he is motivated to try to learn.

• They see that he has bonded with Algernon.

Multiple Choice

Before his operation in “Flowers for Algernon,” how does Charlie feel about it?

• He is very frightened.

• He is happy and excited.

• He is angry to be used in an experiment.

• He does not care one way or the other.

Multiple Choice

In “Flowers for Algernon,” why do Charlie’s fellow workers want Charlie fired?

• They become jealous when Charlie becomes smart.

• They resent Charlie for damaging the factory.

• They become frightened by Charlie’s bad temper.

• They think he is evil.

Multiple Choice

In “Flowers for Algernon,” what tells you that Charlie is going back to his old

condition?

• He learns German.

• He asks Miss Kinnian to dinner.

• He starts spelling badly again.

• He says he hates Algernon.

Multiple Choice

How does the author of “Flowers for Algernon” view science?

• Science always improves the world.

• Science inevitably ruins the environment.

• Science may do unexpected harm.

• Science wastes money.

Multiple Choice

What phrase best describes Charlie at the end of “Flowers for Algernon”?

• kind and intelligent

• proud and overbearing

• angry and threatening

• sad but not hopeless

Multiple Choice

What is the opposite of refute?

• deny

• prove

• entertain

• think

Multiple Choice

What is the meaning of introspective?

• inward-looking

• coming soon

• thoughtless

• egardless