Use these essay questions as writing and critical thinking exercises for all levels of writers, and to build their literary analysis skills by requiring textual references throughout the essay.

Differentiation Suggestion: For English learners or struggling writers, strategies that work well include graphic organizers, sentence frames or starters, group work, or oral responses.

Scaffolded Essay Questions

Student Prompt: Write a short (1-3 paragraph) response using one of the below bulleted outlines. Cite details from the text over the course of your response that serve as examples and support.

1. Choose one fairytale from the story and connect it back to what is happening in either Tiền’s or Hiền’s life.

• How does the fairytale reflect what is happening in the story? (topic sentence)
• What are three examples from the text that illustrate these similarities?
• In your concluding sentence or sentences, connect your answer back to the motif of communicating through fairytales or stories as a special language.

2. Water appears in many panels throughout The Magic Fish.

• What does water symbolize? Does the symbol change? (topic sentence)
• Use three examples in which water appears to support your thesis.
• Finally, in your concluding sentence or sentences, explain why this symbol is important to the story as a whole.

3. Hiền has difficulty communicating with Tiền because she mostly speaks Vietnamese, and he mostly speaks English.