Use these essay questions as writing and critical thinking exercises for all levels of writers, and to build their textual analysis skills by requiring references to the text throughout the essay. 

Scaffolded/Short-Answer Essay Questions

Student Prompt: Write a short (1-3 paragraph) response using one of the below bulleted outlines. Cite details from the text over the course of your response that serve as examples and support.

1. Choose one of the four “keys” to freedom that Doyle talks about in Part 3, and show how this concept is central to the liberation of a famous female leader.

• Which “key” to freedom changed the life of which female leader? (topic sentence)
• What does this key to freedom mean, exactly? Define it in your own words and give an example of it from Doyle’s text.
• How did this principle operate in the life of the female leader you have chosen? Give at least two details from this person’s life that demonstrate this “key” to freedom in operation.
• Finally, discuss in your concluding sentence or sentences how the life of this female leader relates to Doyle’s theme of Society’s Influence on Gender.

2. Doyle writes that “The voice I heard that day was my own—the girl I’d locked away at ten years old, the girl I was before the world told me who to be—and she said: Here I Am.