On August 17th, on Facebook, Shannan and I will host the first ever Tween Us Book Club. To help us get excited about the upcoming event I created a discussion guide to get everyone thinking.

Please take a look at our questions and plan to join us next week. I can’t wait to hear what everyone thought about Ally and all that she learned.

Fish in a Tree Discussion Questions

1. “Everybody is smart in different ways. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its life believing it is stupid.”

What is your interpretation of this quote? How do you think it relates to Ally’s life?

2. Describe a “silver dollar” day that Ally had and one “wooden nickel” day. Then do the same for yourself.

3. Ally closes her hands over a butterfly in order to guarantee that her wish would come true. What do you think she wished for? What would your ‘butterfly wish’ be?

4. Ally says, “Well…alone is a way to be. It’s being by yourself with no one else around. And it can be good or bad. And it can be a choice…. But being lonely is never a choice. It’s not about who is with you or not. You can feel lonely when you are alone, but the worst kind of lonely is when you’re in a room full of people, but you’re still alone. Or you feel like you are anyway.”

Describe a time that you felt lonely when you were surrounded by other people.

5. Ally discovers that Shay has been charging her friends for her friendship bracelets. The author writes “I look over at Keisha and Albert and realize that I have been. I’ve been lucky all along but didn’t see it.”

What does Ally mean when she describes herself as lucky.

6. Ally says, “My grandpa used to say to be careful with eggs and words, because neither can ever be fixed. The older I get, the more I realize how smart my grandpa was.”

Describe a time when you or a friend were not careful with your words.

7. Ally’s class must answer the following question: “So I’d like you to tell me, if you could have an unlimited amount of any single object, what would it be? It can’t be magical, have special powers, or anything like that. Just an ordinary, everyday type of object.”

How would answer this question?

8. Ally receives an award for her poetry. Was she deserving? Why or why not?