ENGLISH 221-224 NINTH-GRADE ENGLISH
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(4) ENCOURAGES COMMUNICATION AND PERSONAL CONNECTIONS; (5) NURTURES CURIOSITY, CREATIVITY, AND A PASSION FOR LEARNING; (6) FOSTERS SELF-CONFIDENCE AND SUCCESS FOR ALL LEARNERS.
Sandra Cisneros’s The House on Mango Street
Section Six: Fitting in
Pages 74-87: Four Skinny Trees; No Speak English; Rafaela Who Drinks Coconut and Pineapple
Juice on Tuesdays; Sally; Minerva Writes Poems; Bums in the Attic
Working with Figurative Language
(1) “Four Skinny Trees”
In this vignette, Esperanza uses four skinny trees outside her house as a metaphor for how she
feels about herself and the future. Complete the chart below to see how this metaphor works.
How she describes the
trees:
“Four skinny trees with skinny necks
and pointy elbows like mine” (74)
“Four who do not belong here but
are here. Four raggedy excuses
planted by the city.” (74)
“They grow up and they grow down
and grab the earth between their
hairy toes and bite the sky with
violent teeth and never quit their
anger.” (74)
“Let one forget his reason for being,
they’d all droop like tulips in a glass,
each with their arms around the
other.” (75)
What does this description tell us about how
Esperanza feels? Refer to specific words from
the description in your answer.
With all the skinny imagery, from using
“skinny” twice to her “pointy” elbows,
maybe Esperanza feels that she sticks out.
Maybe she feels small and skinny when
she’d rather be larger and more
confident?
“Four who grew despite concrete.”
(75)
“Four who reach and do not forget to
reach.” (75)
(2) “No Speak English”
 “Mamacita…every once in a while lets out a cry, hysterical, high, as if he had torn the only
skinny thread that kept her alive” (78)  Challenge
 “the language that sounds like tin” (78)
Choose one of the similes above and explain what two things are being compared. Then, take a guess
as to why Cisneros might have chosen this image.
(3) “Rafaela Who Drinks Coconut and Papaya Juice on Tuesdays”

“bitter like an empty room” (80)
 Why is an empty room bitter? Explain the simile:

“sweet like an island” (80)
 What is sweet about an island?

How do these two similes summarize the story of Rafaela?
(4) “Sally”
 “eyes like Egypt” (81)
 “her hair is shiny black like raven feathers” (81)
 “she flicks her hair back like a satin shawl over her shoulders and laughs” (81)
Sally’s dad “says to be this beautiful is trouble” (81). Cisneros uses Egypt, raven feathers, and satin
shawls to suggest that Sally’s beauty is dangerous. Think of new similes that would do the same thing.

eyes like ___________________________________________________________

her hair is shiny black like ______________________________________________

she flicks her hair back like _____________________________________________

INFER: What does all of Sally’s dreaming say about how she is feeling?
(5) “Minerva Writes Poems”

Minerva is “sad like a house on fire” (84) Why is a burning house sad?
And why does this simile work especially well for the story?
(6) “Bums in the Attic”
Esperanza describes “all of us staring out the window like the hungry” (86). She is comparing
_____________________________ to the way that hungry people
_______________________________________. This comparison helps the reader see that
_____________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________.
Describe a situation where you once felt really out of place or uncomfortable. Why did you feel this
way?