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Little Women
Trailblazers · 4th–6th
Jo says trifles show character and reads Professor Bhaer by a hod of coal and a book of fairy tales, while the young men read her by her job and her style, so what makes one way of judging a person fairer than the other, and does Jo herself always use it?
The tension The journal is a record of judging and being judged. Jo likes Bhaer for carrying a servant girl's coal, for Tina on his back, for throwing the grammar down and coming back with Andersen, and she likes him against his rusty clothes, missing buttons, and big appetite. The hall-mirror young men dismiss her as a governess with no style, and she answers by hating ordinary people and calling his pupils idiots. She accepts Miss Norton's favor because such favors from such people do not burden her. By January she claims to take more interest in others; the letters both support and complicate the claim.
Watch how Jo sizes up the people in her new house, and how they size her up.
Jo writes home in letters and journal entries from November to January. She settles in as governess at Mrs. Kirke's, watches Professor Bhaer with Tina and the Kirke girls, overhears the young men at the hall-mirror, takes German lessons from him and ends with a New Year's masquerade.
Start with the hod of coal. Ask what Jo sees in a stranger carrying it, and why she writes it down.
Retell The student tells the journal back in order: the arrival, the coal, the young men, the lessons, the Shakespeare and the masquerade.
Imitate the author After copying the passage, the student writes one sentence that lists a person's appearance, turns on "yet," and gives a reason to like that person anyway.
Debate Take sides: can a small act tell you more about a person than looks or a job? Each side must use at least one quote from the chapter.
Purpose Close by asking why the author tells this chapter through Jo's own letters.
Easier Read the coal scene and the Saturday frolic aloud together and talk through discussion questions 1 and 2 only.
On level Talk through all five discussion questions, then have the student write one critical-thinking answer with two pieces of evidence from the chapter.
Harder Ask the student to find one more place where Jo sums up someone quickly, and to add it to a critical-thinking answer.
1. Jo sees a stranger carry a servant girl's coal and writes, “Wasn’t it good of him?” Why might that small act stay with her?Inference
What it asks It asks why a small kindness on a staircase matters to Jo on her first evening, and what she takes from it.
It stays with her because he did it for someone who could never pay him back, and said so lightly.
take the heavy hod of coal out of her hand, carry it all the way up
It goes better so. The little back is too young to haf such heaviness.
It stays with her because she is newly arrived and a little homesick, and the act shows her a kind person in a house of strangers.
I felt a trifle blue
even in that big house full of strangers
A strong answer The man takes the heavy hod from a little servant girl, carries it up three flights, and walks away saying it goes better so. He asks for no thanks. Jo is alone in a big house of strangers, so a kind act from one of them may count for more than it would at home. A strong answer says what the act shows about him and gives a reason it matters to Jo in particular.
2. Jo says the professor's clothes are rusty and his face has no handsome feature but his teeth, “yet I liked him.” What is she setting against those flaws?Character
What it asks It asks what weighs more than worn clothes for Jo, and whether it is his looks, his manner or how he treats others.
She sets his bearing against the clothes: a fine head and a gentleman's look.
yet I liked him, for he had a fine head; his linen was very nice, and he looked like a gentleman
the kindest eyes I ever saw
She sets his kindness against them, in how he treats the cat, little Tina and the servant.
stroke the cat, who received him like an old friend
Thou shalt haf thy Bhaer; come, then, and take a goot hug from him, my Tina
A strong answer Jo lists the worn clothes, then turns on the word "yet." What she puts against them is partly how he looks, since she says he has a fine head, nice linen and the look of a gentleman, and partly how he behaves: he strokes the cat and hugs Tina. A strong answer says which side she seems to count more and uses her own words.
3. The young men at the hall-mirror say Jo has "no style." She writes, “I hate ordinary people!” What does that answer show about her?Character
What it asks It asks what lies under Jo's sharp reply to a slight: hurt, pride, or something she might hold against herself.
It is wounded pride: she says she does not care and then lashes out.
I felt angry at first, and then I didn’t care
I hate ordinary people!
It is also quick judging of her own: she dismisses the young men, and their cigars, as fast as they dismissed her.
the elegant beings who clattered away, smoking like bad chimneys
a governess is as good as a clerk, and I’ve got sense, if I haven’t style
A strong answer The young men sum her up in a few words, governess and no style, and Jo is angry and then says she does not care. She defends herself with sense and then sweeps them all away with "I hate ordinary people!" A strong answer can read this as hurt pride, or as Jo doing back what they did, and uses her own words to show which.
4. After Jo sniffs with “utter mortification,” the Professor throws the grammar down and leaves, then returns with fairy tales. Why might he change the lesson instead of pressing on?Inference
What it asks It asks what the Professor reads in Jo's tears and in the grammar, and why his answer is a new book and not more effort.
He decides the method is failing, not Jo.
dig no more in that dry book, that goes in the corner for making us trouble
Now we shall try a new way.
He sees that she is ashamed and wants her to keep trying, so he makes it easy and kind.
He spoke so kindly, and opened Hans Andersen’s fairy tales so invitingly before me
in he came, as brisk and beaming as if I’d covered myself with glory
A strong answer Jo thinks she is disgraced and deserted, but the Professor comes back brisk and beaming and blames the dry book. The new way is fairy tales, and it works, since she pegs away with all her might. A strong answer gives a reason for his change, that he blames the method or that he wants her to keep going, and notices how much of it Jo reports from her own side.
5. Alcott tells this chapter in Jo's own letters and journal. What can we see that a narrator's voice might not show us?Author's choice
What it asks It asks what the author gains by letting Jo speak for herself, and what the reader can catch that Jo does not say outright.
Jo's own voice lets her give herself away: her quick judgments and her second thoughts sit side by side with no one correcting her.
I hate ordinary people!
On reading over my letter it strikes me as rather Bhaery; but I am always interested in odd people
Dated entries let us watch her days and moods change from week to week, in her own humor.
I shall keep a journal-letter, and send it once a week
I’m cheerful all the time now, work with a will, and take more interest in other people than I used to
A strong answer A narrator would tell us what Jo is like; in her letters she tells us, and we can catch the gaps, as when she notices her letter is rather Bhaery. The dated entries also let us watch her from November to January and hear her claim that she takes more interest in other people. A strong answer names one thing Jo reveals by writing it herself and does not decide whether her last claim is true.
1. Miss Norton asks Jo to be her escort to lectures and concerts. Using two pieces of evidence, explain why Jo, who is “as proud as Lucifer,” accepts.
What it asks It asks why a proud girl takes an offer that looks like charity, and what makes this one different for her.
She sees it as a real exchange: Miss Norton wants an escort.
asked me if I would sometimes go with her to lectures and concerts, as her escort
She put it as a favor
She trusts the giver: she likes Miss Norton and thinks the offer is kind.
rich, cultivated, and kind
she does it out of kindness to me
A strong answer Jo admits she is as proud as Lucifer but says such favors from such people do not burden her. Two things explain it. Miss Norton asks for an escort, so it runs both ways, and Jo thinks she does it out of kindness. A strong answer uses two different pieces of evidence and says what it is about Miss Norton that lets Jo accept.
2. Jo mends the Professor's socks in secret, and he answers with German lessons. Using two pieces of evidence, explain why he insists on paying her back.
What it asks It asks what Bhaer is after when he turns a secret kindness into a bargain.
He feels a debt and wants to be fair to her.
haf this debt to pay
I haf a heart, and I feel the thanks for this
He wants her to know he noticed, and not to be treated as a man who sees nothing.
he is a stupid old fellow; he will see not what we do
Ah! but I haf an eye, and I see much.
A strong answer Bhaer says he has a debt to pay and feels the thanks in his heart, so the lessons are fair exchange. He also says the ladies think he is a stupid old fellow who sees nothing, and answers that he has an eye and sees much. A strong answer uses both lines and says what giving something back means to him.
3. At the New Year's masquerade no one knows Jo. Using two pieces of evidence, explain what the masked Jo shows that the unmasked Jo does not.
What it asks It asks what the mask lets Jo do that her ordinary manner hides, and what the others make of it.
It shows a playful, quick side that the young men never see.
no one dreamed of the silent, haughty Miss March
burst out into a ‘nice derangement of epitaphs, like an allegory on the banks of the Nile.’
It shows how easily people are wrong about her: the same young men read her differently in costume.
it was fun to see them stare at me
he knew I’d been an actress; in fact, he thought he remembered seeing me at one of the minor theatres
A strong answer Jo in costume is lively: she dances, dresses and plays Mrs. Malaprop, while the house thinks her silent and haughty. When she unmasks, they stare, and one young man thinks he has seen her at a theatre. A strong answer uses one piece of evidence for what the mask shows about Jo and one for what it shows about how others read her.