Bring on the tough stuff - there’s not just one right answer.
- If you had been in the Joads' shoes, would you have left your home and gone to California?
- Let's say you have to load up your car and move two thousand miles away, never to see your current home again. What items would you bring with you, and why?
- Why does Mae the waitress sell the customer two pieces of candy for a penny?
- How has our world changed since the Great Depression?
- Does this book make you want to tinker with a car or eat some side-meat?
- You have been commissioned to design a lesson or to create a textbook about the Great Depression in America. How would you structure your lesson or textbook, what stories would you tell, and how would you tell these stories?
- Why do you think Steinbeck structured this novel in the way that he does? Do you like the way in which chapters about the Joads are interspersed with chapters dealing with the greater historical context? Why or why not?