AUDIO & DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

NOTE: When you click on a link for a chapter, your device may prompt you to DOWNLOAD the audio file in order to listen to it. 

White Fur Flying
Discussion Questions

Click HERE for Chapter 1 recording:

• Describe what Zoe’s house is normally like. Would you like to live in a home like that? Why or why not?
• How are the two families in the story different?
• Which family would you rather live with --- Zoe's and Alice’s family or the “new neighbors”? Why?

Click HERE for Chapter 2 recording:

• How does Mrs. Croft feel about the dogs?
• Why is Phillip living with his aunt and uncle? Have you ever known someone like Phillip who doesn’t say much? What would you do to help someone who is really shy?
• Mama says that Mrs. Croft is “scared of dogs. And I think… I think maybe she’s scared of Phillip.” Why would she be afraid of Phillip?

Click HERE for Chapter 3 recording:

• Why do you think that Phillip does not talk?
• Phillip seems to enjoy spending time with May and Kodi. Why do you think that is?

Click HERE for Chapter 4 recording:

• Zoe wonders what mealtime is like at Phillip’s house. What do you and your family talk about during meals?
• How tall are the Great Pyrennees dogs, May and Kodi, if they can reach the food on the table? If you have a measuring tape or ruler, see if you can estimate how tall they are.

Click HERE for Chapter 5 recording:

• How does Alice feel when May is adopted? How does Kodi feel? 
• Why is it happy and sad when one of their rescues gets adopted?
  Do you think it would be easy to rescue animals and send them to new homes?

Click HERE for Chapter 6 recording:

• Why do you think Phillip speaks to Kodi, the dog, but not to his family or neighbors?
• Alice writes a poem titled “You Cahn’t Know”. Do you ever write poetry?

Click HERE for Chapter 7 recording:

• Why doesn’t Phyllis know anything about children?
• Zoe and Alice’s mom is going to pick up a young dog. She tells them to “make sure everything is up off the floor”. Why do you think she said that? Have you ever taken care of a young animal before?

Click HERE for Chapter 8 recording:

• How do you know that Phillip spoke to Lena when they were in the yard together alone?
• When Mama arrives with Callie and Jack, what do we learn about the way to meet a new dog?
• Mama says Jack is nervous. At the end of the chapter, how can we tell that he’s relaxed a little bit?

Click HERE for Chapter 9 recording:

• Mama rescues animals that need a safe home. How is that similar to what Phyllis is doing for Phillip?
• At the end of the chapter, Zoe says, “It was the next day that life changed for all of us.” How does this sentence create suspense? What do you think is going to happen?

Click HERE for Chapter 10 recording:

• Have you ever had a pet to go missing? What did you do to try and find it?
• What kind of emergency could Zoe’s dad have been involved in?
• How did Zoe comfort Callie?

Click HERE for Chapter 11 recording:

• Who else is missing?
• Why does Phyllis think it is her fault that Phillip is missing?
• How do we know that Phyllis loves Phillip?

Click HERE for Chapter 12 recording:

• How is Zoe like a detective when she is out looking for Jack and Phillip?
• How does Jack react when Zoe finds them? Why do you think this is?

Click HERE for Chapter 13 recording:

• What do you think is the biggest reason why Phillip started talking?
• How did Zoe’s dogs have such a tremendous impact on the way Phillip’s behavior changed? Do you think it’s possible for an animal to have a huge impact on people in real life like that?

Click HERE for Chapter 14 recording:

• Phillip calls Jack (Zoe’s dog) a hero. Do you agree with Phillip? Why or why not? How would you define the word “hero?”
• How has the crisis changed Phyllis? What surprising things does Phyllis do when Phillip returns?

Click HERE for Chapter 15 recording:

• Zoe says, “But both Phillip and Jack turned out to be different than I thought they were.” What do you think?
• Do you think what Alice wrote at the end of her poem is true?
  You can’t know, ever, but you should,
  That a dog will save you.

Click HERE for Chapter 16 recording:

• Zoe says at the beginning of the last chapter, “Sometimes you think you know more than you really do—people, events, things that are true and things that are not.” Discuss what she means.
• In what ways were Zoe and Alice wrong about Phillip’s aunt and uncle? What else do you think Zoe’s talking about?
• In her journal, Alice calls Zoe a hero for going out to find Phillip and Jack. How does Zoe show courage? Who else in the book shows courage, and how?
• “Things change. Things don’t change...You can’t know.” What does that mean?

Click here to learn about the author,
Patricia MacLachlan