Solution of Chapter 5. The Hundred Dresses - I (First Flight - English Book)

Where in the classroom does Wanda sit and why?

Where does Wanda live? What kind of a place do you think it is?

When and why do Peggy and Maddie notice Wanda’s absence?

What do you think ‘to have fun with her’ means?

In what way was Wanda different from the other children?

Did Wanda have a hundred dresses? Why do you think she said she did?

Why is Maddie embarrassed by the questions Peggy asks Wanda? Is she also Wanda, or is she different?

Why didn’t Maddie ask Peggy to stop teasing Wanda? What was she afraid of?

Who did Maddie think would win the drawing contest? Why?

Who won the drawing contest? What had the winner drawn?

How is Wanda seen as different by the other girls? How do they treat her?

How does Wanda Feel about the dresses game? Why does she say that she has a hundred dresses?

Why does Maddie stand by and not do anything? How is she different from Peggy? (Was Peggy’s friendship important to Maddie? Why? Which lines in the text tell you this?)

What does Miss Mason think of Wanda’s drawings? What do the children think of them? How do you know?

look at these sentences

(a) She sat in the corner of the room where the rough boys who did not make good marks sat, the corner of the room where there was most scuffling of feet…

(b) The time when they thought about Wanda was outside the school hours….These clauses help us to identify a set of boys, a place, and a time. They are answers to the questions ‘What kind of rough boys?’ ‘Which corner did she sit in’? And ‘What particular time outside of school hours?’ They are ‘defining’ or ‘restrictive’ relative clauses. (Compare them with the nondefining relative clauses discussed in Unit-1)

Combine the following to make sentences like those above.

1. This is the bus (What kind of bus?) It goes to Agra. (Use which or that)

2. I would like to buy (a) shirt (which shirt?). (The) shirt is in the shop window. (use which or that)

3. You must break your fast at a particular time. (when?). You see the moon in the sky. (use when)

4. Find a word (what kind of word). It begins with the letter Z. (use which or that)

5. Now find a person (what kind of person?). His or her name begins with letter Z. (use whose).

6. Then go to a place (What place?). There are no people whose name begins with Z in that place. (use where)

The narrative voice.

This story is in the ‘third person’ that is, the narrator is not a participant in the story. But the narrator often seems to tell the story from the point of view of one of the characters in the story. For example, look at the Italianized words in the sentences.

Thank goodness, she did not live up on Boggins Heights or have a funny name.

Whose thoughts do the words ‘Thank goodness’ express? Maddie’s, who is grateful that although she is poor, she is yet not as poor as Wanda, or as ‘different’. (So she does not get teased; she is thankful about that.)

A. Here are two other sentences from the story. Can you say whose point of view the italicized words express?

(i) But on Wednesday, Peggy and Maddie, who sat down front with other children who got good marks and who didn’t track in a whole lot of mud, did notice that Wanda wasn’t there.

(ii) Wanda Petronski. Most of the children in Room Thirteen didn’t have names like that. They had names easy to say, like Thomas, Smith or Allen.

Can you find other such sentences in the story? You can do this after you read the second part of the story as well.

Look at these sentences. The italicized adverb expresses an opinion or point of view.

Obviously, the only dress Wanda was the blue one she wore every day. (This was obvious to the speaker).

Note: A word that tells us more about the verb, adjective or (except noun and pronoun) other words is called an Adverb.

For Example:

Other such adverbs are apparently, evidently, surprisingly, possibly, hopefully, incredibly, etc. Use these words appropriately in the blanks in the sentences below. (You may use a word more than one word may be appropriate for a given blank.)

1. ………………… he finished his work on time.

2. ………………… it will not rain on the day of the match.

3. ………………….., he had been stealing money from his employer.

4. Television is ………………… to blame for the increase in violence in society.

5. The children will ……………….. learn from their mistakes.

6. I can’t ………. Lend you that much money.

7. The thief had ……………….. been watching the house for many days.

8. The thief …………. Escaped by bribing the jailor.

9. ………………., no one had suggested this before.

10. The water was ………….. hot.