The Challenge by Gary Soto is one of the texts that you can find on Commonlit. This text is intended for 5th grade with Lexile of 760. It is known that Gray Soto is an American poet, memoirist and novelist. In this story, he tells about a boy who tries to impress the new girl at his school.
On Commonlit, you can take an assignment by answering some questions beside the text after reading and understanding the text. However, CommonLit gives you an assignment to assess your reading skills whether or not you understand the text you’ve read. Before you take an assignment, you can then discuss the text first.
Discussion of The Challenge by Gary Soto on CommonLit
You can find the text of The Challenge by Gary Soto on CommonLit here. To easily answer the questions, you can discuss the text first. There are also some guiding questions that allow you to answer the questions correctly.
After taking the guiding questions, you may be able to answer the assignment for The Challenge by Gary Soto easily. Here are some discussions about The Challenge by Gary Soto that include:
- Has someone ever wrongly assumed something about you because of your gender? How did it make you feel?
- In the context of the story, how does love emerge? Why does José initially have feelings for Estela? Why does this change?
- In the context of the story, what different qualities are expected from boys and girls? How do these expectations shape how people interact with each other?
Here are some guiding questions you can find next to The Challenge text:
- Why does José want to improve his grades?
a. Estela is smart and José wants to impress her.
b. His mom won’t let him go out until he gets his grades up.
c. Estela told him he should.
d. He wants to prove to his teacher that he has been studying.
Answer: a. Estela is smart and José wants to impress her. - How does José finally get Estela’s attention?
a. He falls off his bike in front of her.
b. She hears how good his grades are.
c. She sees him playing racquetball.
d. He tells her he also plays racquetball.
Answer: d. He tells her he also plays racquetball. - Why does José think he can beat Estela at racquetball?
a. She doesn’t play racquetball often.
b. He is very athletic.
c. She is a girl.
d. He has played racquetball before.
Answer: c. She is a girl - When they meet to play racquetball, Estela is…
a. not as good as José was expecting.
b. better than José was expecting.
c. just as good as José.
d. planning on going easy on José.
Answer: b. better than Jose was expecting - Which of the following describes how José is playing?
a. He does not know the rules and isn’t as good as Estela.
b. He is doing well for how little experience he has.
c. He has the strength to beat Estela but doesn’t know the rules of the game.
d. He is struggling to keep up with Estela and thinks she might be cheating.
Answer: a. He does not know the rules and isn’t as good as Estela. - Why does José decide to start lifting weights?
a. The match against Estela makes him realize how weak he is.
b. He wants to be strong in case he has to play Estela again.
c. He wants to distract himself from his embarrassing loss.
d. He wants to challenge Estela to a rematch.
Answer: b. He wants to be strong in case he has to play Estela again.
The Challenge Answer Keys
Since we cannot find the answer keys to The Challenge by Gary Soto on CommonLit, we then searched for them through other sources. We finally got the example of answer keys to The Challenge by Gary Soto on Faspe.info.
Once again, we emphasize the answer keys we show below are only the examples of the answers to The Challenge text. Because the question is based on the text, we think you may have your own answer for the text. Here are the examples of answer keys to The Challenge by Gary Soto questions:
- PART A: How do José’s actions develop the theme of the story?
Answer: After his disastrous date with Estela, José learns that lying is not the way to impress a girl.
- PART B: Which detail from the story best supports the answer to Part A?
Answer: ‘José figured out another way to get to know her. He had noticed the grimy, sweat-blackened handle of a racket poking out of her backpack.’ (This can be found in the paragraph 11)
- PART A: After the racquetball match, how do José’s feelings about Estela change?
Answer: He is impressed by her good sportsmanship, and comes to respect her.
- PART B: Which section from the story best supports the answer to Part A?
Answer: ‘When his uncle finished his ‘reps,’ José got up slowly and peeled the weights down to sixty pounds. It was his turn to lift.’ (This can be found in the paragraph 74)
- How does paragraph 31 develop the plot of the short story?
Answer: Paragraph 31 develops the plot of the short story by adding a conflict to the story. ¨But Jose´s mind twisted with worry¨ is a quote that supports this.
- In the context of the story, how does love emerge? Why does José initially have feelings for Estela? Why does this change?
To note: for the 6th question, we think you may need to answer this question with your own words, and make sure to answer this question based on your point of view.
To answer this question, you may need to tell Jose’s feelings to Estella, at the beginning of the story. However, his feeling to Estella actually change, because she seems very buff and strong, unlike Jose’s image of her being a sweet girl. In the end of the story, Jose was weak compared to Estella.
