Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad

Reading Check and Short Answer Questions on key points are designed for guided reading assignments, in-class review, formative assessment, quizzes, and more.

CHAPTERS 1-2

Reading Check

1. What is the term for when enslaved people are made free after the death of their enslaver?

2. Why was Denmark Vesey executed?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. In the area where Tubman lives, why are both the enslaved and the enslavers afraid of one another?

CHAPTERS 3-4

Reading Check

1. What Biblical figure does Tubman’s mother frequently tell her stories about?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. Describe Tubman’s personality in her early childhood, before she is old enough to be put to work.

2. Why does Tubman feel like a muskrat when she is at the Cooks’ house?

Paired Resource

“The Story of Moses: The Servant of the Lord”

• This 10-minute video retells the Biblical story of Moses.
• This resource relates to the theme of Religious Faith and Biblical Allegory.
• Why would enslaved people in America be drawn to the story of Moses? How might hearing this story many times from her mother influence Tubman? How does telling Moses’s story or singing songs about Moses function as an allegory for the enslaved people?

CHAPTERS 5-6

Reading Check

1. What job is Tubman hired out to do for Susan?

2. What does the bandana Tubman wears on her head symbolize?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. Even though she is frequently beaten for not being able to keep up with the grown men who usually do outdoor work, why does Tubman prefer working outdoors?

CHAPTERS 7-8

Reading Check

1. Why will no one buy Tubman when Brodas attempts to sell her?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. What does Tubman do when the overseer corners the young man who is trying to escape?

2. What important outdoor skills does Tubman’s father teach her?

Paired Resource

“Obscure No More: From Harriet Tubman to Twitter, Black Naturalists Move Into Mainstream”

• This article discusses Tubman and other Black naturalists whose understanding of the natural world has been overlooked historically.
• This resource relates to the theme of Nature as Refuge and Resource.
• Why do you think the knowledge of the natural world displayed by people like Tubman has been historically overlooked? What evidence in Petry’s book tells you how important nature is to Tubman?

“Runagate, Runagate”

• This Robert Hayden poem, referenced in the article above, explores the experiences of those fleeing via the Underground Railroad and contains various references and allusions to Harriet Tubman. Note: This poem’s complexity may present an obstacle to younger readers, who are likely to need support to read it effectively.
• This resource relates to the theme of Nature as Refuge and Resource.
• How does Hayden portray the emotions of those escaping enslavement? Where does he refer directly to Tubman? Where does he allude to her knowledge of nature? Do you see other allusions in this poem? How are allusions similar to and different from allegory and symbolism?

CHAPTERS 9-10

Reading Check

1. What does Tubman sew when she is getting ready to be married?

2. How does Tubman communicate her plan to escape without directly talking about it?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. What belief about the North causes John to discourage Tubman from trying to escape?

CHAPTERS 11-12

Reading Check

1. Where does Tubman live and work as a hotel cook once she reaches the North?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. What family situation causes Tubman to return to Maryland for the first time?

2. What happens when Tubman returns to Maryland to try to lead John to the North?

Paired Resource

“Enslaved Couples Faced Wrenching Separations, or Even Choosing Family Over Freedom”

• This article profiles several enslaved couples to demonstrate the complexity of enslaved people trying to form intimate, exclusive, lifelong bonds within marriage. Note: This article contains a brief reference to suicidal ideation.
• This resource relates to the theme of The Bond of Family.
• How is Tubman’s situation with John similar to and different from the situations portrayed in this article? What evidence shows how important family is to Tubman? Given how important family is to her, what do you think she expected from John, and how do you think she felt when he took another wife and refused to leave Maryland?

CHAPTERS 13-14

Reading Check

1. Where is Shadrach captured by fugitive slave hunters?

2. What day of the week do the Maryland plantation owners notice most slaves choose to run away?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. Why does Tubman decide that she will need to start escorting people all the way into Canada?

CHAPTERS 15-16

Reading Check

1. In Chapter 16, to whom does Tubman send a coded message saying that she will be coming to rescue them?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. Why does Tubman decide to spend winters in St. Catharines in Canada?

2. What strategy does Catherine use to slip away from the plantation unnoticed?

CHAPTERS 17-18

Reading Check

1. Who walks a short way with the escaping group on Christmas night?

2. How many missions does Petry say Tubman completed between 1851 and 1857?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. When Tubman takes down the posters advertising for the recapture of Joe and the other men, what other poster is she amused to see?

CHAPTERS 19-20

Reading Check

1. What does Tubman carry down the road as she approaches the plantation where her parents are enslaved?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. What concerns Tubman about trying to rescue her parents?

2. What new opportunity does Tubman receive as a result of her meeting with Franklin Sanborn?

Paired Resource

“The Slave Mother”

• This accessible poem, by Black abolitionist Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, depicts the agony of an enslaved mother as she is separated from her child.
• This resource relates to the theme of The Bond of Family.
• What is happening to the mother and child in this poem? How does Harper use diction and imagery to portray the mother’s emotional torment? Which people in Petry’s book are feeling the pain of being separated from family? What kinds of risks do the people in Petry’s story take in order to be reunited with their families or to protect the family they love?

CHAPTERS 21-22

Reading Check

1. What jobs does the governor of Massachusetts suggest Tubman can perform for the Union Army?

2. What does Tubman hope her land and home will be used for when she donates them to a church?

Short Answer

Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.

1. Whom does Tubman rescue when she is in Troy, New York?

Recommended Next Reads 

BOX: Henry Brown Mails Himself to Freedom by Carole Boston Weatherford, illustrated by Michele Wood

• This middle grade nonfiction book uses poetry and images to tell the story of an enslaved man who mailed himself North to freedom.
• Shared themes include The Bond of Family.
• Shared topics include 19th-century America, slavery, the Underground Railroad, abolition, courage, and the price of freedom.     

History Smashers: The Underground Railroad by Kate Messner and Gwendolyn Hooks, illustrated by Damon Smyth

• This middle grade nonfiction book combines the authors’ text with primary sources, illustrations, sidebars, photos, and other images to offer an engaging discussion of myths and facts surrounding the Underground Railroad.
• Shared themes include The Bond of Family and Religious Faith and Biblical Allegory.
• Shared topics include 19th-century America, slavery, the Underground Railroad, abolition, courage, and the price of freedom.

Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis

• This middle grade historical novel tells the story of Elijah, the first child born in a Canadian settlement of the formerly enslaved, as he braves great danger to journey into the United States.
• Shared themes include The Bond of Family.
• Shared topics include 19th-century America, Canadian settlements of the formerly enslaved, slavery, the Underground Railroad, abolition, courage, and the price of freedom.
• Elijah of Buxton on SuperSummary