1. By Harper Lee Discussion Questions
To Kill a Mockingbird
By Harper Lee
Discussion Questions

2. Types of questioning Factual questions – have one correct answer
Interpretive questions – have two or more answers that are rooted in the text

3. Chapter 1
Why do Scout, Jem, and Dill want to see Boo Radley? (interpretive)
Why does Scout say, “Atticus said no, it wasn’t that sort of thing, that there were other ways of making people into ghosts” (Lee 11). (interpretive)
What is significant about the chapter’s last paragraph? (interpretive)
What does Stephanie Crawford mean when she says, “He was so upright he took the word of God as his only law” (Lee 12)?

4. Chapter 2
What does Scout mean when she says, “I never loved to read. One does not love breathing” (Lee 18)? (interpretive)
What does Scout mean when she says, “Miss Caroline, he’s a Cunningham” (Lee 20)? (interpretive)
What is Miss Caroline symbolic of in the novel? (factual)

5. Chapter 3
Why does Atticus say, “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view…until you climb into his skin and walk around in it” (Lee 30)? (interpretive)
Why do the Ewells only go to school on the frist day? (interpretive)

6. Chapters 4-5
Why do Jem, Scout, and Dill make up the Boo Radley game? (interpretive)
Why does Dill “only [grow] closer to Jem” (Lee 41)? (interpretive)
Why does Scout call Miss Maudie “a chameleon lady” (Lee 42)?
What does Miss Maudie mean when she says, “There are some kind of men who’re so busy worrying about the next world they’ve never learned to live in this one” (Lee 45)? (interpretive)
Why does Atticus scold Jem for putting Boo’s “life’s history on display for the edification of the neighborhood” (Lee 49)? (interpretive)
Why does Jem say, “I thought I wanted to be a lawyer But I ain’t so sure now!” (Lee 50).

7. Chapter 6
Why does Jem say, “It’s like this, Scout…Atticus ain’t ever whipped me since I can remember. I wanta keep it that way” (Lee 56)? (interpretive)
What does Scout mean when she says, “It was then, I suppose, that Jem and I firt began to part company” (Lee 56)? (interpretive)

8. Chapters 7-8
Why do Jem and Scout consider everything they found in the knot-hole to be their property (page 59)? (interpretive)
Why does Mr. Nathan Radley plug the knot-hole in the tree with cement? (interpretive)
Why does Atticus say, “Looks like all of Maycomb was out tonight, in one way or another” (Lee 71-72)?

9. Chapter 9
What does Atticus mean when he says, “Try fighting with your head for a change…” (Lee 76)? (interpretive)
What does Atticus mean when he says, “Simply because we were licked a hundred years before we started is no reason for us not to try to win” (Lee 76)? (interpretive)
Why does Scout lie to Uncle Jack when he asks her if she called Francis a “whore-lady”? (interpretive)
Why does Atticus talk to Uncle Jack about

10. Chapter 10 What is the purpose of the event involving Tim Johnson?
Why does Jem say, “Atticus is a gentleman, just like me!” (Lee 99)?
Why is it a sin to kill a mockingbird?

11. Chapter 11
Why does Atticus say, “ I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It’s when you’re licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what” (Lee 112).

12. Chapter 12 Why does Calpurnia begin calling Jem “mister Jem”?
What was Harper Lee’s purpose in including this chapter in the book? (What is revealed to the reader because of this chapter?)

13. Chapter 13
Create a chart that illustrates the caste system of Maycomb as explained by Scout.
What does Scout mean when she says, “I know now what he was trying to do, but Atticus was only a man. It takes a woman to do that kind of work” (Lee 134)?

14. Chapter 14
Why doesn’t Aunt Alexandra want Scout and Jem to go to church with Alexandra?
Why does Atticus say, “Let’s leave it at this: you mind Jem whenever he can make you” (Lee 138)?
What does Dill mean when he responds to Scout’s question by saying, “Maybe he doesn’t have anywhere to run off to…” (Leee 144).

15. Chapter 15
What does Link Deas mean when he says, “You’ve got everything to lose from this, Atticus. I mean everything” (Lee 146)? (interpretive)
What is revealed about Maycomb when Atticus says, “Same just stood on his porch and told ‘em things had come to a pretty pass, he’d sold ‘em the very sheets on their backs. Same made ‘em so ashamed of themselves they went away” (Lee 147).
Why does the mob disperse?

16. Chapter 16
What does Atticus mean when he says, “It took an eight-year-old child to bring them to their senses” (Lee 157)?
Why didn’t Atticus tell the children that he was appointed by the court to defend Tom Robinson?

17. Chapter 17
Create a chart comparing the home of the Ewells to the negro’s and the Finch’s.
What does Scout mean when she says, “Six chipped-enamel slop jars holding brilliant red geraniums, cared for as tenderly as if they belonged to Miss Maudie Atkinson, had Miss Muadie deigned to permit a geranium on her premises” (Lee 171).
Why does Scout say, “All the little man on the witness stand had that made him any better than his nearest neighbors was, that if scrubbed with lye soap in very hot water, his skin was white” (Lee 171).

18. Chapter 18 Why is Mayella upset when Atticus calls her ma’am?
Why is Mayella confused when Atticus asks her if she has any friends?
Why is Mayella confused when Atticus asks her if she loves her father?

19. Chapter 19
Why does Scout call Mayella “the loneliest person in the world” (Lee 191)?
What does it mean when Tom says, “She says what her pap do to her don’t count” (Lee 194).
What does it mean when Mr. Gilmer reiterates, “You felt sorry for her, you felt sorry for her?” (Lee 197).

20. Chapter 20
Why does Dolphus Raymond “try to give ‘em a reason” (Lee 200)?
What does it mean when Dolphus Raymond says, “Cry about the simple hell people give other people – without even thinking” (Lee 201)?
What is Atticus speaking about when he says, “The defendant is not guilty, but somebody in this courtroom is” (Lee 203)?

21. Chapter 21
Why is it that “a jury never looks at a defendant it has convicted” (Lee 211)?
Why does Reverend Sykes make the children stand up when their father passes?