the five people you meet in heaven study guide -...

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The Five People You Meet in Heaven Study Guide

Directions: Below is a study guide to complete as you read Mitch Albom’s The Five People You Meet in

Heaven. You may complete the assignment on this guide using your iPad OR on a separate sheet of paper

(please label carefully and clearly if that is the case).

Chapter 1: The End

Predict: From the novel’s title and the title of the first chapter, what will the chapter be about:

Vocabulary:

Arthritis (pg. 2) –

Carousel (pg.3) –

Protrude (pgs. 2 & 3) –

Imminent (pg. 4) –

Nimble (pg. 11) –

Sprawled (pg. 17) –

Questions:

1. Who is the story about and what is going to happen to him? (pg. 1)

2. Describe Ruby Pier. (pg. 1) --provide a minimum of 5 details

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3. Have you ever visited a place like Ruby Pier? If so, where? If not, what place have you heard of that

might resemble Ruby Pier? What are some similarities and what are some differences?

4. Briefly describe Eddie (pg. 2) – five items minimum

5. What’s Eddie’s job? (pg. 2)

6. If Eddie could “hear” trouble in the rides, what does this suggest about him? (pg. 2)

7. Why does Eddie like kids better than teenagers? (pg. 3)

8. Is Eddie’s job at Ruby Pier the job he always wanted? (pg. 5)

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9. In your experience, why do people sometimes give up their dreams?

10. Do you think Eddie and Dominguez get along well? Explain your answer. (pgs. 6-7)

11. Describe Eddie’s “One true-love snapshot”. (pg. 9)

12. What does Eddie do / make for the little girl? (pgs. 12-13)

13. Why do you think Eddie does things like that for little kids? What does that say about him as a person?

14. How did Eddie die and why did he put himself in such danger? (pg. 15)

Today is Eddie’s Birthday (#1)

15. What decade in the 1900s was Eddie born? (pg.19)

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Chapter 2: The Journey

Predict: From the novel’s title and the title of the second chapter, what will the chapter be about:

Vocabulary:

Turquoise (pg. 21) –

Endured (pg. 21) –

Expired (pg. 21) –

Questions:

16. Did Eddie die trying to save the little girl? (pg. 21)

Yes No Unknown (circle one)

17. Did Eddie save the little girl? (pg. 21)

Yes No Unknown (circle one)

18. Why do you think Eddie doesn’t feel worry or pain? Explain your answer. (pg. 22)


19. How old is Eddie? And what is his party like? (pgs. 23-25)

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Chapter 3: The Arrival

Predict: From the novel’s title and the title of the third chapter, the chapter will be about what:

Vocabulary

Hoisted (pg. 26) –

Pristine (pg. 27) –

Kiosk (pg. 29) –

Questions:

20. Where does Eddie wake up? How is it different from what he remembered at the end of his life? (pgs.

26-27)

21. How is Eddied different? What can he do that he hadn’t done (or been able to do) for years? (pgs. 27-28)

22. At the end of the chapter, who is waiting for Eddie? (pg. 31).

Chapter 4: The First Person Eddie Meets in Heaven

Vocabulary:

Grotesque (pg. 32) –

Solace (pg. 35) –

Sweatshop (pg. 39) –

Shamed (pg. 40) –

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Commodity (pg. 41) –

Coronary Arteries (pg. 44) –

Questions:

23. Why does Eddie feel like a child? (pg. 32)

23.Describe the Blue Man. (pg. 33)

24. Where does the Blue Man tell Eddie he is? (pg. 34)

25. Why isn’t Eddie happy with the answer? (pg. 34)

26.According to the Blue Man, what is the purpose of heaven and how does it tie into the title: The Five

People You Meet in Heaven? (pg. 35) (important to the novel’s theme)

27. What killed the Blue Man? (pg. 36)

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28. Based upon what you know about Eddie thus far, how do you think the Blue Man’s revelation about

who killed him affected Eddie? Explain your answer.


29. Based upon what happened in this section, who is braver: Eddie or Joe? Explain why.

30. Describe the Blue Man’s childhood. Why doesn’t his father care for him? (pgs.39-40)

31. Why is the Ruby Pier in the 1920s the Blue Man’s heaven? (pg. 42)

32. How did the Blue Man die? What was the initial cause that set things in motion? (pgs. 43-44)


33. Where does Eddie unwillingly go on his 8th

birthday?

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Chapter 5: The First Lesson

Predict: From the novel’s title and the title of the 5th chapter, the chapter will be about:

Vocabulary: - -

Skeptical (pg. 47)

–Intersect (pg. 48)

– Carnage (pg. 51)

– Questions:

34. Explain what the Blue Man meant when he says to Eddie, “We are all connected. That you can no more

separate one life from another than you can separate a breeze from the wind. (pgs. 48-49)

35. What do you believe the Blue Man meant when he said to Eddie, “Strangers are just family you have yet

to come to know”? (pg. 49)

36. Do you agree with the Blue Man’s statement in question #32? Explain why or why not.


37. Which parent (Eddie’s father or mother) seems more engaged in Eddie’s life? Explain why.

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Chapter 6: The Second Person Eddie Meets in Heaven

Vocabulary:

Porous (pg. 57) –

Obliged (pg. 64) –

Adjacent (pg. 68) –

Deteriorated (pg. 85) –

Tourniquet (pg. 89) –

Questions:

38. What does Eddie find that scares him, even in Heaven? (pg. 57)

39. Why does Eddie decide to sign up and go to war? (pgs. 57-60) (It is not stated clearly and it is partly

your opinion based upon what you know of Eddie).

40. Who did Eddie meet in the tree? Where had they fought together? (pgs. 61-62)

41. Of all the things Eddie learned during the war, list the three that you believe would be the most profound or

life changing. Explain why they are life changing (pgs. 62-63)

a.

b.

c.

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42. Why does Eddie think he lived a “nothing life”? (pg. 65)

43. Do you agree with Eddie, that he lived a “nothing life”? Explain your answer.

44. Describe Eddie’s captivity (how was he treated, what did they make him do, etc.)? (pgs. 66-71)

45. What event changed Eddie’s (and the Captain’s) attitude and why they focused on escape afterwards?

(pg. 71)

46. What carnival/Ruby Pier skill did Eddie use to help engineer his escape? (pgs. 73-75)

47. Do you think it was right for Eddie and the other prisoners to kill the guards, even Crazy Three who'd

snuck food to Eddie and the other prisoners? Explain.

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48. Why do you think Eddie spent the evening of his 18th

birthday just before going to war at Ruby Pier with

Marguerite?

49. How long had Eddie and his fellow soldiers been held captive? (pg. 80)

50. Why did Eddie go into the burning building? What does this say about him as a person despite all that had

happened to him in the last 6 months? (pgs. 81-84)

51. What difficulty did the Captain (with respect to soldiers under him) have during the war and how did he try

to deal with or solve it? (pg. 86)

52. Why did Eddie attack the Captain when he learned it was him who shot Eddie in the leg? (pgs. 87-88)

Chapter 7: The Second Lesson

Vocabulary:

Barren (pg. 91) –

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Questions:

53. What was the lesson the Captain explained to Eddie about sacrifice? (pgs. 93-94) Be complete as this ties

in with the theme)

54. What did the Captain mean when he said, “Sometimes when you sacrifice something precious, you’re really

not losing it. You’re just passing it on to someone else”? (pg. 94)

55. What had the Captain been waiting for that Eddie gave him? Why do you think this was important to the

Captain? (p. 94)

56. Does Dominquez and Willie’s response at work to Eddie’s death seem normal? Why or why not? (pg.

97)

Chapter 8: The Third Person Eddie Meets in Heaven

Vocabulary:

Oblivious (pg. 101) –

Meager (pg. 105) –

Calloused (pg. 105) –

Devote (pg. 106) –

Semaphore (pg. 108) –

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Exhilarating (pg. 114) –

Abhorred (pg. 115) –

Questions:

57. Who did Eddie see in the diner that upset or got Eddie’s attention? (pg. 101)


58. Why do you think Eddie is upset (to the point of tears) when his father stares at Eddie’s wounded leg? (pg.

103)

59. Do you agree with the statement that: “All parents damage their children. It cannot be helped”? (pg.

104) Explain.

60. Eddie’s father damaged his son in a number of ways. Briefly explain how each happened (pgs. 104-110)

Neglect

Violence

Denial of Affection

Silence

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61. From Eddie’s memories, why, while sitting at the docks, did Eddie “feel he was like the fish pulled in on

the nets, embarrassed because he saw himself in those helpless, flopping creatures, snared and beyond escape”?

(pg. 113)

62. What was the connection between railroads and amusement parks? (pg. 115)

63. What was the old woman’s name and her connection to Ruby Pier? (pg. 116)


64. What bars happiness and joy from Eddie’s life? (pgs. 117-118)

65. What devastated Ruby and Emile’s future and broke his spirit? (pgs. 121-122)

66. Why is Ruby there/what is she going to tell Eddie? (pg. 124)

67. When Eddie held up his hands, showing his dying father his grease-stained fingertips, what was he “saying”

to his father? (pg. 125-126)

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68. What does Eddie believe caused his father’s pneumonia? (pg. 127)

69. What did Eddie take of his father’s from the drawer? Why did he take that to represent “a piece of his

father”? (pg. 127)

70. Why did Eddie “curse his father”? (pg. 128)


70. Is Eddie used to the “darkness” in his life? (pg. 130)

Yes No Not Quite (circle one)

Chapter 9: The Third Person Lesson

Vocabulary:

Insistent (pg. 135) –

Vouched (pg. 137) –

Questions:

71. Why did Eddie’s father save Mickey instead of killing him or letting him drown for what he attempted with

Eddie’s mother? Explain. (pgs. 135-139)

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72. What was Eddie’s father’s last act? Why do you think he did this? (pgs. 135-140)

73. What does Ruby say to Eddie about Anger? Do you agree? Explain. (pg. 141)

74. If you were Eddie, thinking about all that had happened, could you forgive the father as Ruby said Eddie

needed to do? Explain. (pg. 142)

75. What did Eddie mean when he told the spirit of his father, “It’s fixed”? (pg. 144)

76. Based on Dominquez’s answer to the pastor, make a prediction about the next chapter. (pg. 145)

Yes

Explain:

No Maybe (circle one)

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Chapter 10: The Fourth Person Eddie Meets in Heaven

Vocabulary:

Participatory (pg. 149) –

Accordion (pg. 155) –

Amid (pg. 165) –

Protocol (pg. 167) –

Sallow (pg. 167) –

Questions:

77. What events does Eddie keep “stepping” into? (pg. 147-149)

Weddings/Receptions Funerals/Wakes Job Interviews/Retirements (circle one)

78. Who does Eddie meet that he knows (4th

person)? (pg. 150)


79. Although Eddie had been promoted to Head of Maintenance, how did his job compare to his brother, Joe’s?

(pg.151)

80. Did Eddie’s wife, Marguerite, already meet her five people? (pg. 157)

No, none yet Some of them Yes, and she waited then for Eddie (circle one)


81. What happens to Marguerite as she is driving to the track to get Eddie? (pg. 163)

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82. What illness kills Marguerite, how old is she when she dies, and what is the last familiar thing she sees

before going into the hospital? (pgs. 166-169)

83. What is one, old warm feeling that Eddie had missed for years, but found again in Heaven? (pg. 170)

Chapter 11: The Fourth Lesson

Vocabulary:

Tousle (pg. 173) –

Questions:

84. Eddie’s wife tells him, “Lost love is still love, Eddie. It takes a different form, that’s all”, what does she

mean? (pgs. 173-174)

85. Why do you think Eddie asked his wife to change back to the age when he last knew her and not the age

when they were first married, even though they were dancing at their wedding? (pg. 175)

86. What did you think of the attorney’s thoughts at end of the section, where he and Dominquez go into

Eddie’s apartment to find any important documents? Explain. (pg. 178)

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Chapter 12: The Fifth Person Eddie Meets in Heaven

Vocabulary:

Vacant (pg. 179) –

Cacophony (pg. 181) –

Questions:

87. About what age is Eddie (or does he feel/appear) now? How can you tell? (pg. 180)

88. What person signals to Eddie? Who do you think it might be? (pg. 181)


89. How does Eddie’s life progress through his birthdays, from 51 to 82? (pgs. 183-184)

90. When Eddie is in the cemetery, visiting his relatives, and stops at his wife’s last, he thinks about taffy. He

thinks it would take his teeth out now, but he would eat it anyhow, if it meant eating it with her. What does

this say to you? (pg. 184)

Chapter 13: The Last Lesson

Vocabulary:

Iridescent (pg. 186) –

Anguish (pg. 189) –

Questions:

91. Who is Tala, the little girl, and how did she die? (pgs. 187-188)

92. What was the darkness that shadowed Eddie all the years of his life after the war? Did he deserve that guilt?

Why/Why not? (pg. 188)

93. Eddie washes Tala’s burns and scarring away. What do you think it shows or represents? (pgs. 189-190)

94. What does the Tala reveal to Eddie, when he tries to explain that he was a nothing person and his life was

nothing? (pg. 191).

95. Did Eddie save the little girl at Ruby Pier? (pg. 192)

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96. Whose hands did Eddie feel and why were they there when he was trying to save the little girl at Ruby Pier?

(pg. 192)

97. Why were there thousands of people at the pier? What does this say about Eddie’s life? (pg. 193)

98. Who does Eddie meet again, on the Ferris Wheel? (pg. 194)

Epilogue

99. Who is Eddie waiting for and why? (pg. 196)

100. The last lines of the novel read: “That each affects the other and the other affects the next, and the world is

full of stories, but the stories are all one.” What is the author trying to say? (pg. 196)

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Grading Rubric (Reading Narrative)

4 3 2 1

Completion of the study guide

demonstrated clear and

detailed reading

comprehension, analysis, and

interpretation of assigned

novel.



detailed reading

comprehension, and analysis

of assigned novel.



detailed reading

comprehension.


lacked demonstration of clear

and detailed reading

comprehension.

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