Deathwatch PowerPoint Chapter Reading Questions

Reading Response Questions:  The day each chapter is due, you will be given several reading response questions in class.  You will have some time to work on and discuss these with other students.  You will then complete these in typed, final draft, complete sentences.  The questions will be available online after they are presented in class.  These are due four times throughout the book.  See schedule for due dates.

•Chapters 1 & 2
1.What is Madec’s proposal?    Is Madec’s argument logical?  Would most 19-20 year olds have accepted the offer?
2.What do we learn about Madec in the first chapter?
•Chapters 3 & 4
1.On page 40, Madec explains why he is a more important person than Ben.  Do you agree with him?  Explain.
2.How does the incident with the watering can exemplify Madec’s cruelty?
3.What does Ben find in the old man’s box?  How might it be useful?

•Chapters 5 & 6

  1. Find Ben’s 3 choices for survival.  Which seems best to you?
  2. “Mechanics, machines, supplies were not a part of this game.  In the final analysis, even the guns were not a part of it.”  What does this mean?  What WILL determine the winner of this deadly “game”?
  1. What did Madec do to the catch basin?  What does this prove about him?
  2. Why does Ben think the jeep is so important?
  3. Why is Ben happy to see a saguaro?

Chapters 7 & 8

  1. What are the stages of a person dying of thirst?
  2. What is Ben’s greatest fear?
  3. How does Ben know he cannot survive much longer?
  4. Why does Ben say that he has been cheated, he has been robbed?

•Chapters 9 & 10

1.What usually occurs when people dying of thirst are rescued?  Why is this strange?
2.Describe the lake Ben found.
3.How does Ben plan to cook the next birds he kills?
4.Why didn’t Ben ever shave when he went on long trips to the desert?

5.   Ben begins to speak of the “chain” between Madec and him.  How can he shorten it?  What must he do?

6.   What is Madec’s plan?  Why is it easier for Madec to climb than for Ben?

•Chapters 11 & 12

1.How does Ben know Denny O’Neil is the pilot of the helicopter?
2.What are Ben’s 3 possible plans?  What is the problem with each one?
3.Why does Ben walk backward from the butte?
4.What 3 fears does Ben have as he waits in the sand?

•Chapters 13 & 14

1.Who has the upper hand at the end of Chapter 13?
2.Page 159 describes Madec starring at Ben.  How should we interpret Madec’s look?
3.Why does Ben stop to pick up the body of old man? 
 
•Chapters 15 & 16
1.  How does the deputy’s reaction to Madec and the old man differ?
2.  Why does Ben receive such rough treatment from the doctor and nurse?
3.  What happened to the slingshot?
4.  What evidence is Ben’s last hope of convincing the justice of the peace and the sheriff that he, not Madec, is telling the truth?
•Chapter 17
1.  The doctor’s findings clear Ben.  What are the four parts to his statement?
2.  Explain the last paragraph on pg 219
3.  Explain Ben’s last statement on pg 220.  Why wouldn’t he want to press charges?