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74 pages 2 hours read

Pam Muñoz Ryan

Echo

Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2015

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.

During Reading

Reading Questions & Paired Texts

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

PROLOGUE

Reading Check

1. What is Otto holding when he wakes up from his faint?

Short Answer

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

1. Whom does Otto meet in the woods?

PART 1, CHAPTERS 1-5

Reading Check

1. What physical characteristic do people stare at and bully Friedrich over?

Short Answer

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

1. How does Friedrich happen to find the harmonica?

PART 1, CHAPTERS 6-10

Reading Check

1. What Nazi organization does Elisabeth belong to?

Short Answer

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

1. When Elisabeth learns about the medical condition Friedrich had as a baby, what does she say must happen next?

Paired Resource

Eugenics

  • This entry from Holocaust Encyclopedia explains the Nazis’ eugenics policies. Note: It contains references to ableism and forced sterilization.
  • This resource relates to the themes of The Effects of Intolerance and Growing Up Fast During Wartime.
  • What beliefs about people with disabilities shaped the Nazis’ policies? What difficult truths does Friedrich have to face about his sister?

PART 1, CHAPTERS 11-16

Reading Check

1. Which of Martin’s friends tells Friedrich that the harmonica is a vulgar instrument, and that he should play music by a German composer for his audition?

Short Answer

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

1. Why does Martin intend to continue supporting the Jewish community?

PART 1, CHAPTERS 17-21

Reading Check

1. In which concentration camp is Martin imprisoned?

Short Answer

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

1. How do the Brown Shirts figure out that the family is getting ready to flee Germany?

PART 1, CHAPTERS 22-26

Reading Check

1. Where does Elisabeth hide the money she sends to Friedrich?

Short Answer

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

1. When is the last time Friedrich plays the harmonica, and what does he do with it afterward?

Paired Resource

Releasing Stress Through the Power of Music

  • This page from the University of Nevada, Reno Counseling Services offers a scientific explanation for the stress-reducing power of music and provides sample audio tracks.
  • This resource relates to the theme of The Power of Music.
  • What physiological effects does music have on the human body? In Echo, what evidence is there that the harmonica affects people’s emotions and thinking? Can this be attributed to the power of music alone?

Lullaby

  • This 3-minute video shares a performance of Johannes Brahms’s Op. 49 No. 4, “Lullaby.”
  • This resource relates to the theme of The Power of Music.
  • What thoughts and feelings does this piece of music inspire in you? How is your response similar to or different from Friedrich’s response? How does this particular piece of music help characterize Friedrich?

PART 2, CHAPTERS 1-5

Reading Check

1. What kind of work does Pennyweather find for the children in her care?

Short Answer

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

1. Why did Mike and Frankie’s grandmother choose Bishop’s over other orphanages?

PART 2, CHAPTERS 6-11

Reading Check

1. In what part of Eunice’s house do Mike and Frankie end up sleeping?

Short Answer

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

1. How does Mike demonstrate that he is willing to sacrifice for his brother’s happiness when speaking with Mr. Howard?

PART 2, CHAPTERS 12-17

Reading Check

1. What kind of music does Mr. Potter teach the boys to play on the harmonica?

Short Answer

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

1. What does Eunice want and what does Mr. Howard think when it comes to Mike and Frankie’s adoption?

Paired Resource

Siblings Belong Together

  • This brief explanation of how separation impacts children in the foster-care/adoption system comes from nonprofit Arms Wide.
  • This resource relates to the theme of The Bonds Siblings Share.
  • What benefits do children experience from being kept together with their siblings? How do Mike and Frankie rely on one another as they adjust to their strange new circumstances at Eunice’s house? How is their relationship similar to and different from Friedrich’s relationship with Elisabeth?

PART 2, CHAPTERS 18-24

Reading Check

1. What song do Mike and Eunice adapt together?

Short Answer

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

1. What motivates Mike to decide that he and Frankie must run away?

PART 3, CHAPTERS 1-5

Reading Check

1. What is the name of the new neighbors’ daughter who says she will save Ivy a seat on the bus?

Short Answer

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

1. Why is Ivy unable to play her harmonica solo on the radio?

PART 3, CHAPTERS 6-10

Reading Check

1. Where are the Yamamotos?

Short Answer

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

1. What prevents Susan Ward from socializing with people her own age?

Paired Resource

Manzanar National Historic Site

  • This virtual museum exhibit tells stories of forced relocation through pictures, paintings, objects, and documents related to internment at Manzanar.
  • This resource relates to the theme of The Effects of Intolerance.
  • What might the Yamamotos’ lives be like in the “internment” camp they are in? What do you imagine they are thinking and feeling about Ivy’s family or the Wards? What circumstances give Ivy some insight into the Yamamotos’ experiences?

PART 3, CHAPTERS 11-16

Reading Check

1. What song does Ivy play on the harmonica during her first orchestra meeting?

Short Answer

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

1. What does Ivy plant at the Yamamotos’ house, and what happens to these plants?

PART 3, CHAPTERS 17-21

Reading Check

1. What does Kenneth ask Victor to send to his sisters?

Short Answer

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

1. What does Ivy find in the Yamamoto home, and what does she decide to do about it?

PART 4, CHAPTER 1-EPILOGUE

Reading Check

1. What job does Friedrich have in New York in 1951?

Short Answer

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

1. How does the harmonica end up saving Kenneth’s life?

Recommended Next Reads 

A Sky Full of Song by Susan Lynn Meyer

  • Jewish immigrant Shoshana adjusts to life on the 1905 North Dakota prairie and finds comfort in music after she and her family flee Russian persecution in Ukraine.
  • Shared themes include The Power of Music, The Effects of Intolerance, and The Bonds Siblings Share.
  • Shared topics include middle grade historical fiction, growing up quickly during hard times, loss of home, poverty, and determination.

Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis

  • During the Great Depression, 10-year-old Bud Caldwell—determined to find a better life for himself than the one offered by a series of foster homes—leaves on his own to find and confront the musician he suspects is his father.
  • Shared themes include The Power of Music and The Effects of Intolerance.
  • Shared topics include middle grade historical fiction, growing up quickly during hard times, loss of parents, poverty, and determination.
  • Bud, Not Buddy on SuperSummary

Reading Questions Answer Key

PROLOGUE

Reading Check

1. A harmonica (Prologue, Section 4)

Short Answer

1. He meets Eins, Zwei, and Drei, the three sisters from the fairy tale he has been reading. (Prologue, Sections 1-2)

PART 1, CHAPTERS 1-5

1. The birthmark on his face (Part 1, Chapter 1)

Short Answer

1. He hears music coming from the factory’s machinery graveyard. When he follows it, he finds the harmonica in a drawer. (Part 1, Chapter 5)

PART 1, CHAPTERS 6-10

Reading Check

1. The League of German Girls (Part 1, Chapter 6)

Short Answer

1. She says that because Friedrich had seizures as a baby, both she and he are required to be sterilized under Nazi law. (Part 1, Chapter 9)

PART 1, CHAPTERS 11-16

Reading Check

1. Rudolph (Part 1, Chapter 16)

Short Answer

1. Martin believes it is the right thing to do. It is also personal to him, because he knows that whatever the Nazis get away with doing to the Jews will eventually also be done to people with disabilities, like Friedrich. (Part 1, Chapter 12)

PART 1, CHAPTERS 17-21

Reading Check

1. Dachau (Part 1, Chapter 21)

Short Answer

1. Friedrich tells Anselm that he is going to visit Elisabeth in Berlin, but the Brown Shirts know that since Elisabeth is not actually in Berlin, the family must be up to something. (Part 1, Chapter 18)

PART 1, CHAPTERS 22-26

Reading Check

1. In a tin of cookies (Part 1, Chapter 22)

Short Answer

1. On his last night at home, Friedrich plays Brahms’s “Lullaby” to comfort himself. The next day, he packages the harmonica up for shipping. (Part 1, Chapters 25-26)

PART 2, CHAPTERS 1-5

Reading Check

1. Farm work (Part 2, Chapter 1)

Short Answer

1. Mike is a gifted piano player, and Bishop’s was the only orphanage with a piano. (Part 2, Chapter 3)

PART 2, CHAPTERS 6-11

Reading Check

1. In the tower (Part 2, Chapter 9)

Short Answer

1. Although Mike wants to stay with Frankie and wants badly to leave the orphanage for a better home, he tells Mr. Howard that if there is only room for one of them at Eunice’s, he would like Frankie to have this opportunity. (Part 2, Chapter 7)

PART 2, CHAPTERS 12-17

Reading Check

1. The blues (Part 2, Chapter 13)

Short Answer

1. Eunice wants to undo the adoption, because the boys remind her too painfully of her own lost son. Mr. Howard thinks that the boys are exactly what Eunice needs in order to make her house a happy one again. (Part 2, Chapter 14)

PART 2, CHAPTERS 18-24

Reading Check

1. “America the Beautiful” (Part 2, Chapter 20)

Short Answer

1. Mike finds a letter saying that the appeal to their adoption agency has been granted. (Part 2, Chapter 23)

PART 3, CHAPTERS 1-5

Reading Check

Short Answer

1. Her family is moving to Orange County so that her father can take a job there, and they are leaving right away. (Part 3, Chapters 1-2)

PART 3, CHAPTERS 6-10

Reading Check

1. In a “reeducation camp” camp (Part 3, Chapter 6)

Short Answer

1. Susan’s brother Donald was killed at Pearl Harbor. Since then, her father has kept Susan close to home because he is afraid to lose another child. (Part 3, Chapter 8)

PART 3, CHAPTERS 11-16

Reading Check

1. “Johnny Comes Marching Home” (Part 3, Chapter 11)

Short Answer

1. She plants beds full of flowers and a vegetable garden, but someone tears all of the plants out and tramples them. (Part 3, Chapters 13-14 and 16)

PART 3, CHAPTERS 17-21

Reading Check

1. Their flutes (Part 3, Chapter 20)

Short Answer

1. Ivy finds a secret room filled with instruments, and she decides that it is her patriotic duty to reveal what she has found. (Part 3, Chapters 18-19)

PART 4, CHAPTER 1-EPILOGUE

Reading Check

1. Conductor (Part 4, Chapter 1)

Short Answer

1. During the war, the harmonica was in his pocket and stopped a bullet from striking him. (Part 4, Chapter 3)

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