Ender's Game

Use this activity to engage all types of learners, while requiring that they refer to and incorporate details from the text over the course of the activity.

“Ender’s Game”

In this activity, students will utilize the themes, characters, and main plot points of the novel Ender’s Game to plan and create a board game that demonstrates their understanding of the text.

Throughout the novel, Ender must play a series of games, such as “society’s” game, the battle room, the Giant’s Drink game, and the war simulations.

Utilizing the novel’s themes, key plot points, and characters, create a board game based on the novel Ender’s Game.

Requirements:

• Create or repurpose a board on which to play your developed game along with game pieces.
• The game’s “paths” and/or playing cards must include quotations or paraphrases relating to the main themes of the novel.
• Develop specific instructions for gameplay.
• Write a short game manual detailing the main strategies for playing your game.
• Revise and edit your instructions and manual after sharing them with a peer for comments and critique.

After briefly playing the completed games in class, choose one of your peers’ games to review: Analyze the efficiency and effectiveness of the game in relation to understanding the novel.

Teaching Suggestion: Providing examples of board games such as Sorry and Monopoly and identifying the main components of the games may help provide a schema for students to brainstorm their own games. Furthermore, using trivia cards as “mentor texts” may help students imbed the main analysis of the text within their games and instructions.

Differentiation Suggestion: For a more scaffolded approach, it may help to have students work in pairs or small groups to complete the project.

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

Differentiation Suggestion: For English learners or struggling writers, strategies that work well include graphic organizers, sentence frames or starters, group work, or oral responses.

Scaffolded Essay Questions

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

1. Throughout the novel, Ender’s siblings Valentine and Peter create the online profiles Locke and Demosthenes that correspond with each other’s political beliefs and are mirrored by various plot points in the narrative.

• How are Locke’s and Demosthenes’ political ideas portrayed in their online articles and viewed throughout the novel’s society? (topic sentence)
• Explain the political profiles’ beliefs, then compare Locke’s and Demosthenes’ views. Include analysis of at least one plot point per online persona that best reflects these views and elaborate on how they connect.
• In your concluding sentence(s), critique the effectiveness of Locke’s and Demosthenes’ online political articles on the narrative arc.

2. Ender consistently encounters and responds to a variety of antagonists on Earth, in the battle stations, and during war.

• How is Ender’s personality reflected in the theme Understanding the Enemy? (topic sentence)
• Identify and analyze a minimum of three different antagonists and describe how Ender reacts to them. Then, connect each piece of evidence to the theme Understanding the Enemy.
• In your concluding sentence(s), assess Ender’s choices in regard to this theme and evaluate why his decisions were or were not effective.

3. As Ender is pushed into battle school, the war games, and the simulations on Eros, he exercises the idea of altruism, or Self-Sacrifice for the Greater Good.

• Were all of Ender’s choices involving self-sacrifice necessary for “the greater good?” (topic sentence)
• Develop an argument for or against the given statement. Provide examples that support your argument, analyze the chosen evidence, and explain how it supports your claim.
• In your concluding statement(s), evaluate Card’s overall narrative choices to promote the theme Self-Sacrifice for the Greater Good and briefly summarize Ender’s involvement in supporting (or detracting from) this theme.

Full Essay Assignments

Student Prompt: Write a structured and well-developed essay. Include a thesis statement, at least three main points supported by text details, and a conclusion.

1. Consider Graff’s words to Ender: “Welcome to the human race. Nobody controls his own life, Ender. The best you can do is choose to fill the roles given to you by good people, by people who love you” (Chapter 15). Evaluate the truth behind this statement. How and in what ways does this quote support the theme Trickery, Manipulation, and Choice? In what ways does Valentine and Peter’s online political personas contradict this quote? Utilizing a minimum of three key plot points, specific quotations, and paraphrases from the novel to support your points of discussion. Cite your evidence with chapter and page numbers from the text.

2. Consider the different army leaders at the battle school. Identify two leaders to compare. Analyze their traits and actions and explain how their actions directly or indirectly correlate with the main themes of the novel. Then, compare Ender’s relationship with both characters and hypothesize Card’s purpose of including these different leaders in Ender’s life. Cite your evidence, specific quotations, and paraphrases with chapter and page numbers from the text.

Multiple Choice and Long Answer Questions create ideal opportunities for whole-text review, exams, or summative assessments.

Multiple Choice

1. Considering Valentine’s main character traits, how does her role affect Ender’s decisions?

A) She encourages Ender to be more aggressive.

B) She provides emotional support and acts as his conscience.

C) She pushes him to be more like Peter to undermine his success.

D) She has limited impact on his choices.

2. Which idea best describes the difference between Ender and Bonzo’s leadership strategies?

A) Ender is more authoritarian while Bonzo is more collaborative.

B) Ender is popular with his peers while Bonzo is praised by his instructors.

C) Ender is more strategic while Bonzo is more impulsive.

D) Ender is naïve while Bonzo is more mature in his choices.

3. In what ways does Ender’s personality change throughout the progression of the narrative?

A) He worries about being like Peter but overcomes violent tendencies with empathy.

B) He begins as empathetic and kind but becomes ruthless and inhumane.

C) He starts as a skilled strategist but falls to impulsivity.

D) He begins as a leader but slowly learns to step aside and be a follower.

4. Why does Ender refer to his monitor as his “third”?

A) It is the third monitor he has to wear.

B) It monitors his thoughts, actions, and emotions.

C) It represents his third year wearing the technology.

D) It makes him feel like a third-class citizen, beneath his peers.

5. What is the most impactful consequence of Ender’s fight with Stilson at the beginning of the novel?

A) His actions and strategic reasoning behind them convince the battle school to recruit him.

B) He is suspended from school, forcing him to join battle school.

C) He is supported by Peter but chastised by Valentine.

D) He and Stilson become enemies throughout the entirety of the novel.

6. Which of the following character traits best describes Bean?

A) Submissive and demure

B) Intelligent and experimental

C) Confrontational and negative

D) Optimistic and generous

7. In what way does Demosthenes change Valentine’s mindset?

A) She realizes that her thoughts—demonstrated through Locke—were incorrect.

B) She begins to lean into a pro-Russian political mindset.

C) She learns that she can empathize with someone with diametrically different beliefs.

D) She becomes determined to rescue Ender from of the program.

8. Which of the following plot points best relates to the theme Self-Sacrifice for the Greater Good?

A) Ender refuses to shoot during the war games.

B) Ender meets Valentine on the lake.

C) Ender leads various Launchies while in Battle School.

D) Ender gives up his friends and family during Battle School.

9. “His sense of honor saved my life. ‘I didn’t fight with honor. […] I fought to win.’” (Chapter 12) Which of the following themes does this quotation best exemplify?

A) Self-Sacrifice for the Greater Good

B) Understanding the Enemy

C) Trickery, Manipulation, and Choice

D) Political Unrest

10. What best explains the significance of the “mind game” in Ender’s development, impacting his understanding of himself of the world around him?

A) The game helps Ender explore his subconscious fears and emotions, aiding in his self-awareness.

B) The game serves as a distraction with limited impact on his development.

C) The game causes Ender to become more violent and aggressive.

D) The game is used by the Formics to infiltrate and manipulate Ender’s abilities.

11. What qualities make Ender an effective leader?

A) Ender’s leadership is purely authoritarian, lending to an obedient military front.

B) Ender’s leadership style relies on manipulation and deception, gaining his soldiers’ trust—albeit in a negative way.

C) Ender emphasizes teamwork, adaptability, and strategic thinking which lends to many different battle contexts.

D) Ender focuses on optimism and tough love, lending to a kinder army.

12. What is the main reason for the existence of the Battle School program?

A) To recruit young adults and turn them into warriors

B) To develop young children into strategic fighters against an alien species

C) To create an effective army against foreign countries like Russia

D) To undermine Earth’s leaders and allow the aliens to take over

13. Which of the following quotes best relates to the theme Trickery, Manipulation, and Choice?

A) “‘You’re in a big boys’ army now. I’m putting you in Dink Meeker’s toon. From now on, as far as you’re concerned, Dink Meeker is God.” (Chapter 8)

B) “No matter what you do, it always helps Peter. Everything helps Peter, everything, you just can’t get away, no matter what.” (Chapter 9)

C) “And then [the voices] changed into Valentine and Alai, and in his dream they were burying him [. . .].” (Chapter 14)

D) “We kill ourselves, go crazy trying to beat each other, and all the time the old bastards are watching us, [. . .] deciding whether we’re good enough or not.” (Chapter 12)

14. What best describes the differences between Battle School and Command School?

A) Battle School trains seasoned officers while Command School trains new recruits.

B) Battle School focuses on mental training while Command School focuses on physical training.

C) Battle School relies on battles against the aliens while Command School utilizes war games.

D) Battle School relies on physical combat games while Command School relies on real battles.

15. “Never did we dream that thought could arise from the lonely animals who cannot dream each other’s dreams” (Chapter 15). How does this quote relate to the theme Understanding the Enemy?

A) The alien queen notes that her species and humans are highly different in biology and mind.

B) The alien queen realizes that her kind would be vanquished by inferior beings.

C) The alien queen comes to term that her enemies—humans—can be similar to her own species.

D) The alien queen decides to teach humans the ways of her kind.

Long Answer

Compose a response of 2-3 sentences, incorporating text details to support your response.

1. How does Ender’s realization about the true nature of the “simulations” at Command School underscore his commitment to upholding the idea of Self-Sacrifice for the Greater Good?

2. What role does empathy play in Ender’s ability to Understand the Enemy?