Take the journey to California with the Joad family, in hopes of a better life during the Great Depression. Study questions can be used as discussion starters, as well as a way to monitor student reading. Identify industries other than farming that may be affected negatively by drought. Students put themselves into the story and imagine traveling along with the Joads, and what it would be like to live in the encampments. Create a handbill advertising the many jobs, good wages, and great living conditions being offered out west. Match vocabulary words from the text to their meanings. Determine the parallels between the expositional and narrative chapters in the book, and identify plot elements for each in a Structure Graphic Organizer. Aligned to your State Standards and written to Bloom's Taxonomy, additional crossword, word search, comprehension quiz and answer key are also included.

About the Novel:
The Grapes of Wrath is a Pulitzer Prize-winning story about an impoverished family making their way to California in hopes of a better future. Set in the Great Depression, the Joad family travel from Oklahoma to California after their farm is destroyed in the Dust Bowl. Along the way, the family meets others on their way to California. While talking to those coming back from California, the Joad's are forced to confront the possibility that their lives may not be bettered by going to California. Aware that nothing remains for them in Oklahoma, the family continue on. Reaching California, the family is met with hard labor, unions, protests, and finally murder.

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