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Garden Heights

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Of Mice and Men — John Steinbeck
Garden Heights · Independent Novel Study

Of Mice and Men

a novel by John Steinbeck
Library  ›  Of Mice and Men
✦GODLevel 7 · High School TrackUS Grades 9–12Lexile 630LAR (ATOS) 4.5 · First published 1937
📖 Read the book first: you need a copy of Of Mice and Men to use this workbook. Recommended edition: Penguin Books paperback, ISBN 9780140177398. Another edition works if you can follow the chapters. All recommended editions →
Subject Personalities
The real-world subjects this novel study leans into — the depth behind every Knowledge Bank and reading passage.
PRIMARY LENS
🏔️ California, 1929–1939
The crash, the Dust Bowl, the road west, the ranches of the Salinas Valley, a month’s pay and a bunkhouse bed — the dated, checkable history the novella is built from.
SUPPORTING
📖 A Play in Six Scenes
Six chapters that each open on one place and close there, dialogue that carries the story, foreshadowing, foils, a dream told like a catechism, and an ending that circles back to its beginning.
SUPPORTING
🧬 The Science in the Story
How a dust storm builds, how a twenty-mule team is driven, what a working dog’s old age costs, how a heron hunts a pool, and what ten acres could feed.
8-Part Novel Study
Choose a Part
VocabularyReading IntelligenceLiterary ElementsThink DeeperBig QuestionAcademic Reading Challenge
Progress
PT1
Part 1 · Chapter 1
Two men at a pool by the Salinas River on a Thursday evening, a dead mouse in a pocket, a plan for tomorrow, and a dream of land told for the hundredth time.
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PT2
Part 2 · Chapter 2, first half
A bunkhouse on a Friday morning, an old swamper with one hand, a boss who wants answers, and the boss’s son who picks a target the moment he walks in.
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PT3
Part 3 · Chapter 2, second half
A woman in the doorway, a jerkline skinner whose word is law, a man with a pistol who hates the smell of an old dog, and a litter of pups in the barn.
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PT4
Part 4 · Chapter 3, first half
A quiet talk in the bunkhouse about a town called Weed, a pup smuggled in under a coat, and an old dog led outside while the men wait for the sound.
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PT5
Part 5 · Chapter 3, second half
The dream said out loud, an old man’s savings that make it real, a third partner, and a fight in the bunkhouse that ends with a hand crushed.
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PT6
Part 6 · Chapter 4
Saturday night in the stable hand’s room: a man who reads alone, a visitor who is not supposed to come in, a dream that tempts him, and a threat that ends it.
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PT7
Part 7 · Chapter 5
Sunday afternoon in the barn, a game of horseshoes outside, a pup that will not wake, a woman who talks about the pictures, and a silence that empties the ranch.
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PT8
Part 8 · Chapter 6
The pool by the river at sunset, a heron and a water snake, a man who comes back to the place where the story began, and the dream told one last time.
Start →
📄 Printable Teacher & Student PDFs — see all Workbook PDFs →