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ABOUT THE BOOK
NO SPOILERSIt is August 1904 in rural Indiana, and fifteen-year-old Russell Culver has big plans: the moment their stern schoolteacher Miss Myrt Arbuckle dies, he figures Hominy Ridge one-room schoolhouse will finally shut down for good, leaving him free to head up to the Dakota wheat fields and work the threshing harvest. When Miss Myrt does drop dead right before the school year starts, Russell and his ten-year-old brother Lloyd celebrate, only to have their hopes crushed by a far worse fate. The school board, too cheap to hire a real teacher from the normal school, drafts Russell's older sister Tansy to take over the classroom, making Russell a student under his own sister's authority, with her pointer, her cowbell, and her no-nonsense grip on everything he tries to get away with.
Free Battle of the Books questions for The Teacher's Funeral
SPOILERSEvery one of these has the same answer, and that is the point. In a real battle the question is read aloud with a dozen other books in play, and students have a few seconds to place it. Here is what a battle might ask about The Teacher's Funeral. Use them as a quiz, a trivia round, or BOTB practice.
Where in the book they come from
- Early in the book
In what book does a girl reach into a coffin to grab back a polished maple pointer?
✓ Answer
The Teacher's Funeral by Richard Peck
Tansy is outraged to see the valuable pointer being buried with Miss Myrt. She turns back her cuffs and pries it from the dead woman's hands, claiming there's plenty of use left in it.
- First half
In what book does an outhouse catch fire because two boys were sneaking a smoke?
✓ Answer
The Teacher's Funeral by Richard Peck
Russell and Charlie's smoking sets the dry grass behind the boys' privy ablaze. They blame it on a lightning bolt from a cloudless sky, though everyone knows what really happened.
- First half
In what book does a farm dog get porcupine quills stuck in his tongue and one eyelid?
✓ Answer
The Teacher's Funeral by Richard Peck
On the Tarbox farm, J.W. attacks a porcupine and ends up with quills in the roof of his mouth, his tongue, and through one eyelid. Glenn Tarbox saves his life with fence pliers.
- Second half
In what book do students haul a huge woman from a ditch with a bell rope and a mail wagon?
✓ Answer
The Teacher's Funeral by Richard Peck
Lester shinnies up the bell tower and cuts the rope down with a knife in his teeth. The children saw the rope under Aunt Fanny and hitch the ends to George Keating's mail wagon to drag her free.
- Second half
In what book does an auto company send a country school a plaster bust of Lincoln?
✓ Answer
The Teacher's Funeral by Richard Peck
The Overland Automobile Company keeps sending pricey gifts as Eugene Hammond courts Tansy. The Lincoln bust comes with a slogan saying he would have driven one of their cars.
- Near the end
In what book does a small first-grader write "SEE THE FAT MAN" in front of a visiting inspector?
✓ Answer
The Teacher's Funeral by Richard Peck
Asked to put letters into words, Little Britches labors with her pencil and produces a cheeky description of the round superintendent. She then floors the inspectors by reciting multiplication tables.
