Use these essay questions as writing and critical thinking exercises for all levels of writers, and to build their literary analysis skills by requiring textual references throughout the essay.

Differentiation Suggestion: For English learners or struggling writers, strategies that work well include graphic organizers, sentence frames or starters, group work, or oral responses.

Scaffolded Essay Questions

Student Prompt: Write a short (1-3 paragraph) response using one of the below bulleted outlines. Cite details from the text over the course of your response that serve as examples and support.

1. Genesis Begins Again is full of recurring symbols including hair, music, the list, and the brown paper bag.

• Choose one symbol as the focus of your essay and state your argument for why it reflects Genesis’s struggle with her identity. (topic sentence)
• Analyze no fewer than 3 moments that your selected symbol appears in the text (ideally, moments at the beginning, middle, and end of the novel). How does Genesis evolve alongside the symbol throughout the novel?
• In your conclusion, explain how the symbol relates to the Harmful Effects of Internalized Colorism as well as Genesis’s experience of Bullying and Self-Acceptance.

2.The talent show is a major event—arguably, the climax—in the narrative arc of Genesis Begins Again.