Out of My Mind · Garden Heights

Part 7

for Out of My Mind · Part 7 · Chapters 27–29

8 Parts40 min

What Happens in Part 7

Winning the regional round turns Melody into a local story, and the story isolates her. The front page covers the Whiz Kids’ victory, but its photograph shows Melody without the other Whiz Kids, and much of the article focuses on her disability. Rose is cold and says the whole team belonged in the picture. Mr. Dimming announces daily practice, and after two weeks Melody is one of six finalists chosen for Washington. She packs with her mother and Mrs. V, ready to make the trip. At airport check-in, however, the family learns that bad weather has canceled their flight. The rest of the team went to breakfast, arrived early, and caught the last plane without calling her. Back home, Penny comforts Melody while her mother rejects Mr. Dimming’s excuses and rocks Melody to sleep.

What We Will Learn

Section	What you will practice
Vocabulary	Media and belonging words: publicity, stereotype, condescend, cancellation, stranded…
Literary Elements	First-person narration, situational irony, and a piece of quiet foreshadowing
Cross-Curricular	Media literacy: how framing, uplift stories, and tokenism shape what an audience believes

Chapter Summary

Ch.	What happens
27	The Front Page — the morning paper celebrates the Whiz Kids’ regional win, but its photograph shows Melody without the rest of the team and much of the article focuses on the girl with cerebral palsy who helped secure the victory. Rose is cold and says everyone should have appeared in the picture. Mr. Dimming congratulates the team, hands out Washington trip packets, and announces daily practices to choose six finalists.
28	The Last Flight Out — after two weeks of practice, Mr. Dimming names Connor, Rose, Molly, Elena, Rodney, and Melody to the final team. Melody packs with her mother and Mrs. V, excited to travel to Washington. At the airport, an employee says her flight has been canceled because of bad weather. The other Whiz Kids had gone to breakfast, reached the airport early, and caught the last flight out without calling her family.
29	Home Without Answers — back home, Melody cries and wonders whether the team left her deliberately. Penny curls up beside her, and her parents try to comfort her. When Mr. Dimming calls, Melody’s mother refuses his excuses: the group could have called, and Melody could have reached the airport earlier too. She hangs up, gathers Melody into her lap, and rocks her to sleep.

Part 1

Vocabulary

Study 10 key words from Chapters 27–29, then answer each question.

📺Knowledge Bank · The Words a Newsroom Chooses

Media · Language of CoverageEvery news story is built out of choices, and the plainest choices are words. A reporter decides whether a student is a competitor or a case, whether a team lost or was beaten, whether a result is a triumph or merely a surprise. Journalists call the pattern of those choices framing: the angle that tells an audience what a story is supposed to mean before a single fact has been weighed. Coverage of disabled people has a well-documented frame. It reaches for inspiration even when the subject has done something ordinary, and it reaches hardest of all when the subject has done something difficult, so that real skill disappears into courage. A second habit is tokenism, in which one included person stands in for a whole group and the group is then declared welcome. A third is the vocabulary of pity, where verbs such as suffer and struggle arrive uninvited. Careful writers replace all three with the ordinary language of achievement, and the correction is not politeness. It is accuracy.

publicityn.Ch.27

Public attention that news coverage brings to a person or group

“The publicity landed on one team member and stayed there.”

headlinen.Ch.27

The title printed above a newspaper article

“The headline celebrates a team win while the photograph shows only Melody.”

inspirationn.Ch.27

Something that makes other people feel encouraged or moved

“Being called an inspiration for showing up is not really a compliment.”

stereotypen.Ch.27–29

A fixed, oversimplified idea about a whole group of people

“One stereotype insists that a quiet body holds a quiet mind.”

condescendv.Ch.27

To speak to someone as if they were less capable than you

“Adults condescend when they praise ordinary work far too loudly.”

resentmentn.Ch.27

A slow anger at something felt to be unfair

“Rose’s resentment surfaces when she says the whole team belonged in the picture.”

excludev.Ch.27–29

To keep a person out of a group or an activity

“A group can exclude someone simply by leaving without calling.”

tokenn.Ch.27

A single member included mainly for appearances

“Nobody wants to be the token face in a team photograph.”

cancellationn.Ch.28

The act of stopping a planned event, trip, or service

“The weather cancellation leaves no later flight that can reach Washington in time.”

strandedadj.Ch.28

Left behind in a place with no way to go on

“Stranded at check-in, Melody learns the rest of the team has already flown out.”

ⓘ The vocabulary words in this list are selected to help you understand and complete this workbook. Some may not appear verbatim in the original novel.

1Public attention that news coverage brings to a person is ___.Ch.27

2A fixed, oversimplified idea about a whole group of people is a ___.Ch.27–29

3To ‘exclude’ someone is to make sure they are fully part of the group.Ch.28

4To speak to someone as if they were less capable than you is to ___ them.Ch.27

5Fill in each blank with the correct word.Ch.27–29

Word choices:resentmentpublicitystrandedcancellation- some words will not be used

A slow anger at something felt to be unfair is .

Left behind with no way to go on, she was .

6A single member included mainly for appearances is a ___.Ch.27

7‘Cancellation’ means that a planned service or event has been stopped.Ch.28

8Calling someone an ‘inspiration’ for doing ordinary things is always a plain compliment.Ch.27

9Fill in each blank with the correct word.Ch.27–29

Word choices:headlinestereotypecondescendtoken- some words will not be used

The title printed above a newspaper article is its .

A fixed idea about a whole group of people is a .

10To keep a person out of a group or an activity is to ___ them.Ch.27–29

Part 2

Comprehension

Show you understood what happens in Chapters 27–29.

🤝Knowledge Bank · When One Player Becomes the Story

Social Psychology · Groups and ResentmentTeams run on shared effort, so anything that looks like unequal credit puts pressure on the group. Researchers who study cooperation describe a strong preference for equity: members compare what each person put in against what each person got out, and they notice a mismatch fast. When a newspaper prints only one member’s picture after a team victory, the arithmetic feels broken even if that member earned every point on the board. The anger that follows rarely announces itself. It shows up as exclusion — conversations that stop when someone arrives, plans made where she is not, invitations that were somehow never issued. Psychologists call this indirect form relational aggression, and it is harder to name and harder to prove than a shove in a hallway. The unfairness in this part runs in two directions at once. The coverage really does treat the rest of the team as scenery, which is a fair complaint, and the team answers it by punishing the person with the least control over the coverage. Groups often aim at the easiest target rather than the responsible one, and the result is displacement.

1What appears on the newspaper’s front page in Ch.27?Ch.27

2How does the news coverage treat the team?Ch.27

3How does Rose respond to the newspaper photograph?Ch.27

4Melody earned her place on the team by out-scoring her classmates on the qualifying test.Ch.27–29

5Write the numbers 1–5 in the boxes to show the correct order of events in Chapters 27–29. Number 1 = what happens first.Ch.27–29

Six finalists, including Melody, are chosen after two weeks.
Bad weather cancels Melody’s flight at the airport.
A front-page story runs with a photograph of Melody.
At home, Melody’s mother rejects Mr. Dimming’s excuses.
Mr. Dimming announces daily practice for the Washington team.

6Mr. Dimming is unhappy about the Whiz Kids’ regional victory.Ch.27

7What competition are the Whiz Kids preparing for after the regional round?Ch.27–28

8Why can Melody not fly to Washington when she reaches the airport?Ch.28

9The rest of the Whiz Kids reached the airport early after going out to breakfast.Ch.28

10What does Melody’s mother do when Mr. Dimming calls the house?Ch.29

Part 3

Literary Elements

Understanding HOW and WHY Sharon M. Draper tells the story across Chapters 27–29.

🎭Knowledge Bank · A Victory That Becomes an Exclusion

Literary Craft · Irony and Point of ViewA first-person narrator gives a reader one thing no other viewpoint can: the gap between what other people do and what the character understands. Draper uses that gap constantly here. Melody’s family sees a celebratory front page, but because we are sitting inside her head, we also hear her worry that the missing teammates will blame her for the newspaper’s choices. The main device at work is situational irony: the team’s victory earns Melody a national trip, yet the rest of the team reaches Washington without her. Draper also plants foreshadowing. Rose’s cold reaction to the photograph and the group’s uneasy acceptance make the airport exclusion feel prepared rather than random. Both effects depend on one narrow channel of information: a girl who notices everything, says almost none of it aloud, and reports it to us with complete, sharp clarity.

First-person narration

Everything reaches us through Melody, so the reader feels both her excitement and her fear that the team does not really accept her.

Situational irony

The victory that earns Melody a trip to Washington ends with the rest of the team flying there without her.

Foreshadowing

The team’s cold response to the newspaper photograph anticipates the much larger exclusion at the airport.

1Because Melody narrates these chapters herself, readers can hear ___.Ch.27–29

2Fill in each blank with the correct literary term.Ch.27–29

Word choices:ironynarrationflashbacksimile- some words will not be used

Words that mean the opposite of what they seem to say create .

A story told by the character living it uses first-person .

3A team victory earns Melody a trip, but the team flies without her. This is ___.Ch.27–29

4Draper hides Melody’s worries about the front-page photograph from the reader.Ch.27

5Rose’s cold response to the newspaper photograph works mainly as ___.Ch.27

6Situational irony means an event turns out the opposite of what was expected.Ch.27–29

7Following the airport scene with Melody’s night at home mainly ___.Ch.29

8Fill in each blank with the correct literary term.Ch.27–29

Word choices:tonesymbolmotifirony- some words will not be used

The attitude a narrator takes toward events is .

An image or idea repeated across a whole book is a .

9These chapters are narrated by Mr. Dimming rather than by Melody.Ch.27–29

10Draper first shows the team’s exclusion through cold looks and missing contact because ___.Ch.27–28

Part 4

Think Deeper

Four deeper challenges — no single-word recall. Read, weigh the evidence, and reason it out.

📷Knowledge Bank · The Uplift Headline

Media Ethics · Framing DisabilityNews stories about disabled people fall into a small number of shapes, and audiences absorb those shapes without ever being taught them. The most common is uplift: a viewer is invited to feel moved simply because a disabled person did something, and the accomplishment itself goes unexamined. Advocates object because the story is not really about its subject at all — it is arranged to make a nondisabled audience feel better, a use of a person that scholars call objectification. A second shape is tragedy, in which a whole life is presented as a loss to be pitied. A third is the medical shape, where every question circles a possible cure and none touches school, work, friendship, or design. What connects all three is that the subject gets described rather than heard. Newsrooms that take the problem seriously apply a plain test before publishing: would this sentence survive if the same person were not disabled? Style guides go further, asking reporters to quote the subject directly, name the real accomplishment, and treat an access failure as news about the building.

Think back over these chapters. A front-page article celebrating a regional victory and a photograph that shows one student instead of the whole team. Rose looking away at school; Mr. Dimming handing out Washington packets and announcing daily practice; six names on the final roster after two fast weeks. Then an airport check-in desk where bad weather has canceled Melody’s flight and an employee explains that the rest of the team arrived early and caught the last plane out. Finally, home: Penny curled beside Melody, a phone call full of excuses, and her mother rocking her after hanging up.

Original passage written for Garden Heights — not a quotation from the novel.

1Claim: “The news coverage in Part 7 harms Melody even though every sentence in it was meant kindly.” — choose the two details that best prove it.Claim & Evidence

2Coverage that reports achievement, or Coverage that harvests emotion? Tap each detail to send it left or right.Sort into two

◄ Coverage that reports achievementCoverage that harvests emotion ►

3Match each cause to its result. For each cause, pick its result.Cause & Effect

The front page shows Melody without her teammates→

Mr. Dimming schedules two weeks of daily practice→

Bad weather cancels Melody’s booked flight→

The other students arrive early after breakfast→

4Fill both blanks to complete the reasoning.Build the Argument

The clearest sign that the coverage framed Melody badly is that , which shows that .

Part 5

Standardized Test

Reading passage · The Story the Camera Tells · Media Framing, Ableism & Words in Context · SAT & TOEFL-style practice

🎯 You already have the skills from the sections above — this is just a fun way to meet real SAT & TOEFL-style questions. Read the passage (the highlighted words are tested below), then answer the questions below. Tap an answer to select it, then tap it again to confirm — you can change your choice until you confirm.

Every news report is a set of choices about what to show, whom to quote, and which detail to put first. Journalists call the pattern of those choices framing, and a frame tells an audience what a story means before the audience has weighed a single fact. Two reports can contain the same true sentences and still leave viewers with opposite impressions. Researchers who study coverage of disability find that one frame appears far more often than any other.

That frame is uplift. A disabled person is shown doing something, gentle music rises, and viewers are invited to feel moved rather than informed. Advocates object that the subject is being used as a mirror for the audience, since the report explains almost nothing about the work, the training, or the barriers involved. A related problem is tokenism, in which a single included person is presented as proof that a school, a team, or a company has solved a problem it has barely started.

Better coverage is not complicated. Reporters can quote the subject directly instead of quoting a teacher about the subject, name the actual accomplishment with numbers, and treat a missing ramp as a fact about the building rather than a hardship of the person. Newsrooms increasingly measure their own representation, counting how often disabled people appear as sources on subjects unrelated to disability. Style guides now advise against verbs such as suffer and confine, and against praise that would sound strange applied to anyone else. The test is simple: if a sentence would embarrass a reporter when written about a nondisabled competitor, it does not belong in the story.

Original passage written for Garden Heights — not a quotation from the novel.

1What is the passage mainly about?SAT · Central Ideas

2According to the passage, what does a frame do?TOEFL · Factual Information

3In the passage, framing means ___.SAT · Words in Context

4The passage suggests that two reports made of true sentences can ___.SAT · Inference

5According to the passage, the uplift frame invites viewers to ___.TOEFL · Factual Information

6In the passage, tokenism means ___.TOEFL · Vocabulary

7According to the passage, better coverage would treat a missing ramp as ___.TOEFL · Factual Information

8The passage implies that quoting a teacher about a student rather than the student ___.SAT · Inference

9In the passage, representation means ___.SAT · Words in Context

10The test at the end of the passage asks reporters to ___.SAT · Central Ideas

Part 6 · Optional

Creative Writing

A bonus challenge to practice your English. Take your time and have fun with it.

About This Section

This writing task is optional and is not part of your auto-graded score. The feedback below checks only the basics — length, spelling, and grammar — not whether your ideas are right or wrong. It is meant for classroom discussion and creative practice, so feel free to use your imagination!

Writing Task — Part 7 “The Story Someone Else Tells About You”

In these chapters a newspaper frames Melody’s team achievement around her disability, and its photograph excludes the other players. Write about a time somebody described you, your work, or your family in a way that was technically true but still wrong — a label, a rumor, a compliment that stung. What did they get right? What did their version leave out? 6–10 sentences. End with the sentence you would have written about yourself instead.

You can start with: “What they said about me was true, and it still was not the truth, because...”

0 / 40 words minimum

🗣 Teach It · Just for Fun (optional)

No right or wrong — tell someone nearby what happened in this part. Can’t find anyone? Tell yourself out loud. The moment you teach it, you truly understand it.

Part 7 Complete!

You finished Chapters 27–29 of Out of My Mind.

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Your Writing

Your writing was checked automatically for length, spelling, grammar, and whether you included the key parts of the scene. Scroll back to Part 5 anytime to read your feedback and improve your work.

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Independent study guide by Garden Heights. Not affiliated with or endorsed by Sharon M. Draper. Contains original analysis only; no text from the novel is reproduced. Reference text: This workbook follows Sharon M. Draper’s classic text (the standard Puffin edition sold worldwide). Revised 2023 UK editions change some wording and may not match the vocabulary studied here.