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The One and Only Ivan
Trailblazers · 4th–6th
Ivan’s billboard brings crowds, a newspaper story and new names like the Ape Artist. But Ruby still plods through the sawdust at two, four and seven. Has Ivan’s plan worked?
The tension Julia hopes that people who see the sign will understand: “they’ll know this isn’t where Ruby belongs.” The next morning Mack tells a caller, “It was my idea.” He drapes his arm around Ruby for the newspaper camera, and Ivan’s gift-shop pictures go up to sixty-five dollars.
Who reads Ivan’s picture and who acts on it, who gains once it is up on the billboard, and how Ruby’s days look at the end.
The reading moves through twelve short titled sections, over one night and the days after. Too nervous to nap, Ivan waits to show Julia his giant puzzle, sure an artist will truly look; if he fails, he thinks, nothing will happen. Julia sees only pretty pieces and gets ready to go home, and George calls them blobs. Ivan, sure now that Ruby will never leave, beats his chest. Julia and George drop everything and the pictures scatter, and looking down at them, Julia sees an H. She and George spend an hour fitting the pieces together in the ring while Ruby, Bob and Ivan watch: Ruby in a zoo with other elephants, and the word home. Julia decides it belongs on the billboard. George refuses, afraid Mack will fire him, until Julia puts Mack’s claw-stick in his hands and pleads, last of all asking what if Ruby ends up like Stella. The next morning Mack rages, then, during one phone call, claims the idea; a man from the paper Julia called takes pictures, and Mack poses with his arm around Ruby. Crowds come, Ivan’s pictures sell for more and he gets new names, but Ruby’s shows and her bad dreams go on, and Ivan tells Bob he is tired of being patient.
Start with two short sections side by side, “angry” and “mad human”. Read both aloud and ask the student what each kind of anger gets done. Then go back to the start and read on, stopping at each new section to ask who has seen Ivan’s picture so far, and what that person does about it.
Retell The student tells the reading back in order, in three parts: before the chest-beating (Ivan’s nerves, showing Julia, the pictures through the window crack); the night of the puzzle (the chest-beating, the H, the hour in the ring, George’s choice); and the days after (Mack’s morning, the phone call, the crowds, Ruby’s bad dreams). Ask for each part in two or three sentences of the student’s own.
Imitate the author After copying, the student writes three sentences of their own about a moment when someone suddenly notices something. Ask for one that joins two actions with “but then”, one very short sentence about a small movement, and one that ends with a “where” clause after a comma, the way Julia stares at her feet.
Debate Take sides on the last written question. First make two lists from the reading: what the billboard changed, and for whom (Julia, George, Mack, the visitors, Ivan), and what it left the same for Ruby. Then each side says what the plan was for before saying whether it worked. Each side gives one reason and answers one reason from the other side. No one may use what happens in later chapters.
Purpose Close by setting the first section beside the last. The reading opens with Ivan’s fear, “Nothing. Nothing will happen.” Its last section turns on “But nothing’s changed for her.” Ask why the author might come back to the same word near the end. Leave open whether anything will change; the reading ends with Ivan tired of being patient.
Easier Read the sections titled “showing julia”, “puzzle pieces” and “the ape artist” aloud together. Retell the night of the puzzle in order. Talk through the first and fourth discussion questions, then answer the last written question aloud.
On level Talk through all five discussion questions in order, then have the student write answers to the three written questions in complete sentences, each with a reason and a line from the reading.
Harder Ask the student to write the last written question as an argument: a claim, the strongest reason against it, and an answer to that reason. Then have them set Julia’s hope, that people will “know this isn’t where Ruby belongs”, beside George’s warning, and say what in the reading each of them could point to.
1. Ivan picks Julia because “She’s an artist.” But at first she only calls his pictures pretty. Did being an artist help Julia see Ivan’s picture, or get in the way?Character
What it asks It asks the student to weigh one thing about Julia from two sides. Ivan picks her because “She’s an artist.” He is sure she will “look, truly look”, and not mind the smudges and tears. When he holds up the pieces, she smiles, and then she says, “It doesn’t matter. It’s pretty just as it is.” She tells George, “He puts his feelings into them.” That is how an artist might enjoy a painting: for its colors and its feeling, without asking what it says. Later, with the pictures scattered on the floor, she is the one who sees an H, and when George asks how she knows what Ivan wants, she says, “Because I’m an artist, and he’s an artist.” The student decides whether Julia’s artist’s eye is what let her read the picture, or what kept her on “pretty” the first time. It opens the hinge at its first step: a picture can be admired without being understood, and by the end Ivan is called the Ape Artist while Ruby’s shows go on.
It helped. Julia is the one who sees letters where her dad sees only blobs, and she says herself that she knows what Ivan wants because they are both artists.
That’s an H , Dad.
I see blobs.
Because I’m an artist, and he’s an artist.
It got in the way at first. An artist can love a picture for its colors and feelings without asking what it says, and that is what Julia does. She is ready to go home with “pretty”.
It doesn’t matter. It’s pretty just as it is.
He puts his feelings into them.
Julia doesn’t understand.
A strong answer A strong response might say being an artist helped: Julia sees “an H” where George sees “blobs”, and she explains, “Because I’m an artist, and he’s an artist.” Another might say it got in the way at first: an artist can love a picture for its colors and feelings, and Julia does just that. She says, “It’s pretty just as it is.” Then she gets ready to go home. A careful answer may say both are true: her artist’s eye kept her on “pretty” the first time and let her read the picture the second.
2. Julia says Ivan is still upset: “Look at his eyes.” George calls it a temper tantrum. But he can’t blame Ivan, “stuck in that tiny cage all these years.” Which of them sees Ivan more clearly?Inference
What it asks It asks the student to set two readings of the same outburst side by side. After the chest-beating, Ivan sits quiet and panting. Julia says, “Something’s really wrong,” and then, “He’s still upset, Dad. Look at his eyes.” George calls it “Probably just a temper tantrum,” and in the same breath adds, “Can’t say I blame the guy, stuck in that tiny cage all these years.” The reader knows what neither of them does, because Ivan has told us: “I have someone to protect.” Julia reads his feeling; George names a cause, the cage, but makes the outburst sound small. The student decides who comes closer, or whether each sees half. It bears on the hinge because this is the first time a human truly looks at Ivan in this reading, and right after it Julia looks down and sees the pieces. The card should not settle the chest-beating as only a tantrum, George’s word, or only a brave plan.
Julia. She looks at Ivan, not at the mess, and sees that he is still upset. She is the one who takes him seriously, and right after, she is the one who sees the H.
He’s still upset, Dad. Look at his eyes.
I’ve never seen Ivan act this way.
She stares at her feet, where my pictures lie in disarray.
George, at least in part. The word “tantrum” makes it sound small, but he gives a real reason for Ivan to be angry: the tiny cage, all these years. Julia only sees that something is wrong.
Can’t say I blame the guy, stuck in that tiny cage all these years.
Something’s really wrong
A strong answer A strong response might say Julia sees Ivan more clearly: she looks at his eyes and knows “He’s still upset,” and she is the one who then looks down and sees the H. Another might say George sees something Julia misses: he calls it a tantrum, but he gives a true reason for it, Ivan “stuck in that tiny cage all these years.” A careful answer may notice that neither of them knows what the reader knows, that Ivan has “someone to protect.”
3. Ruby sees herself in the picture and asks, “Where am I supposed to be?” Ivan tells her it’s a zoo. What does Ruby think the picture is for?Character
What it asks It asks the student to look at the picture through the eyes of the one it is for. Julia and George spend an hour fitting the pieces together in the ring, and Ruby, awake now, watches with Ivan and Bob. She asks whether it is a picture of her, then where she is supposed to be, then who all those other elephants are. Ivan tells her it is a zoo, and that she has not met the others, “Yet.” She calls it “a very nice zoo” with an approving nod. The humans are the ones who read the word. The student decides what Ruby takes the picture to be: a place she is meant to go, or a nice picture of herself in a nice place. The card does not say whether Ruby will ever go to a zoo; the reading does not.
A place she is meant to go. She finds herself, asks where she is meant to be, and learns there are elephants she has not met yet. Her approving nod sounds like someone saying yes to a plan.
Where am I supposed to be?
You haven’t met them
“It’s a very nice zoo,” Ruby says with an approving nod.
A nice picture of her. She asks about it the way anyone looks at a picture, and Ivan has to tell her it is a zoo. No one tells her the picture is meant to get her there.
Ruby squints. “Who are all those other elephants?”
That’s a zoo, Ruby. See the walls and the grass and the people looking at you?
A strong answer A strong response might say Ruby takes it as a place she is meant to go: she asks, “Where am I supposed to be?”, and she nods at “a very nice zoo” once Ivan tells her she has not met the others “Yet.” Another might say she sees a nice picture and not a plan: Ivan has to tell her it is a zoo, and nobody tells her what the picture is for. A careful answer may notice that Ruby asks about everything in the picture except the word.
4. George says no again and again: “Mack’ll fire me, Jules.” In the end he never says yes. He tells Julia, quietly, where the ladder is. Why doesn’t he just say yes?Moral reasoning
What it asks It asks the student to read how George gives in. He refuses three times: “No. I’m not doing that. No billboard, no way.”, then “No,” and then “No way.” He names the cost: “Mack’ll fire me, Jules.” Julia tries publicity, hands him Mack’s claw-stick without a word, says Ruby is just a baby, admits she is not sure how the sign would help, calls it a matter of principle, and last asks, softly, what if Ruby ends up like Stella. George runs a finger along the blade, sighs, looks at Ruby, corrects Julia’s spelling, looks at Ivan, Ruby and Julia, and drops the claw-stick. Then, instead of yes, he says quietly where the ladder is. Julia began her plan with “I’ll get the ladder,” so his answer takes it up without agreeing out loud. Earlier he said there has to be “a logical explanation” for the picture, and he never takes that back. The student decides why he answers this way: because part of him still cannot agree, or because pointing to the ladder says more than yes would. Keep the cost in view; this is not a simple lesson in doing the right thing. It bears on the hinge: Julia can read the picture, but a person with something to lose has to act before anyone else can see it.
He cannot say yes out loud. He is still afraid of Mack, and he never says he believes Ivan meant the picture. He gives in to Julia, quietly, and lets the plan stay hers.
Mack’ll fire me, Jules.
I’m just saying there has to be a logical explanation.
“The ladder,” he says quietly, “is in the storage locker.”
The ladder says more than yes. Julia’s plan began with the ladder, so telling her where it is means he is already helping. George jokes his way through the night; he answers with what he does, not with a speech.
I’ll get the ladder,
George looks at me, at Ruby, at Julia.
He drops the claw-stick.
A strong answer A strong response might say George still cannot say yes: he is afraid (“Mack’ll fire me, Jules.”), and he never takes back that there has to be “a logical explanation.” So he gives in quietly and lets the plan stay Julia’s. Another might say the ladder says more than yes: Julia began with “I’ll get the ladder,” and when George tells her where it is, he is already helping. A careful answer keeps the cost in view and uses what George does, not only what he says: he “drops the claw-stick” before he speaks.
5. A man from the paper comes to take photos of Ivan. Mack asks for one more: himself with his arm around Ruby. What does Mack want that photo to say?Inference
What it asks It asks the student to read Mack. That morning he stares at the billboard with his jaw open, then throws chairs and breaks the cotton-candy machine. During one phone call he goes from red-faced to smiling and tells the caller, “Come on down, have a look.” He calls the billboard “A work in progress.” An hour later he asks the man from the paper to take one of him “with the elephant”, drapes his arm around Ruby’s back, and grins. “Perfect,” says the man, and Mack agrees. The student decides what Mack wants people to see in that photo, set beside a billboard that shows Ruby in a zoo with the word home. The card must not say Mack has changed his mind about Ruby, and must not make him a cartoon: the reading shows a man quick to see what the attention can do for him. It goes to the hinge’s fault line, who gains once the picture is seen.
Come and see her. Ruby is the elephant from the sign, and Mack has just told a caller to come on down. Standing beside her, grinning, he looks like the man who runs the show, and the photo brings people to his mall.
Come on down, have a look.
How about you take one of me with the elephant?
That Ruby is fine where she is. The sign shows her in a zoo under the word home. A grinning Mack with his arm around her says something else: here is a man who looks after her.
There it is: H-O-M-E.
He drapes his arm around Ruby’s back, grinning as the camera clicks.
A strong answer A strong response might say Mack wants the photo to bring people in: he has just told a caller, “Come on down, have a look.” Now he poses with “the elephant” from the sign like the man who runs the show. Another might say he wants it to answer the sign: the billboard shows Ruby in a zoo under “H-O-M-E”, and a grinning Mack with his arm around her looks like someone who takes care of her. A careful answer may notice that he asks for a photo with “the elephant”, not with Ruby by name.
1. Ivan pictures Ruby’s life if his plan fails, and he sounds like a billboard: “conveniently located off I-95”. Why might he think about Ruby in the words of an ad?
What it asks It asks why Ivan’s worst fear comes out in the voice of an advertisement. In the section titled “nervous”, Ivan asks what will happen if he cannot make Julia understand, and answers, “Nothing. Nothing will happen.” Then he says Ruby will remain “the main attraction at the Exit 8 Big Top Mall and Video Arcade, conveniently located off I-95, with shows at two, four, and seven, 365 days a year,” and he ends, “year after year after year.” Most of that sentence could be painted on a sign; its last words could not. Later, on the phone, Mack uses the same words to bring people in: “We’re open 365 days a year. Can’t miss us. We’re right off I-95.” The student decides, in writing, why Ivan thinks of Ruby’s future this way: because the mall’s ad is the only way her life there gets told, or because he is turning its cheerful words against what they sell. It bears on the hinge: Ivan’s picture becomes a sign too, and once it is up, Mack uses the old ad’s words to sell the same shows.
Because those are the words of the place. Ivan has lived at the mall so long that its ad is how Ruby’s life gets told. To the mall she is the main attraction, and if nothing changes, that is all she will ever be.
Ruby will remain the main attraction at the Exit 8 Big Top Mall and Video Arcade
with shows at two, four, and seven, 365 days a year, year after year after year.
Because he is turning the ad against itself. The cheerful words make the shows sound like fun, and his ending shows what they hide. His own picture, once it is on the billboard, says something else.
conveniently located off I-95,
year after year after year.
There it is: H-O-M-E.
A strong answer A strong response gives a reason and a line. A student might argue that the ad’s words are the only words the mall has for Ruby: to the mall she is “the main attraction”, with shows “365 days a year”, and Ivan cannot picture her life any other way if nothing changes. Another might argue that Ivan is using the ad against itself: the cheerful words end in “year after year after year”, which no sign would say, and that shows how long a life of shows really is. A careful answer may notice that Mack says nearly the same words on the phone, “We’re open 365 days a year.” He says them to bring more people to the same shows.
2. Mack tells a caller, “It was my idea.” It wasn’t. So whose idea was the billboard?
What it asks It asks the student to decide, in writing, who the billboard really belongs to. Ivan made every piece and made it huge, and he wanted Julia to see it, but in this reading he never mentions a billboard until it is up; then he calls it “my billboard”, and at the end, “my idea”. Julia is the one who says, “I have an idea. A big idea.” She also says, “Billboard big.” Yet she tells George, “That’s what Ivan wants.” She talks George into it, and the newspaper man is from the paper she called. The student decides what counts as the idea: making the picture, or seeing what to do with it. It bears on the hinge, because once the picture is seen the credit goes to Mack, who had no part in making it.
Ivan’s. He made every piece, and he made it big. Julia worked out what he meant, and she says so herself. At the end Ivan calls it his idea.
Look how big this is.
That’s what Ivan wants.
my idea isn’t working.
Julia’s. Ivan made a picture, and Julia saw it could go on the billboard. She is the one who says she has an idea, gets her dad to help, and calls the paper.
I have an idea. A big idea.
I think this is meant to be on a billboard.
He is from the local paper, the one Julia called.
A strong answer A strong response takes a side and gives a reason. A student who says Ivan might point out that he made every piece, and that Julia herself says, “That’s what Ivan wants.” At the end, Ivan even calls it his: “my idea isn’t working.” A student who says Julia might argue that Ivan made a picture, but Julia is the one with the plan. She says, “I have an idea. A big idea.” Then she talks George into it and calls the paper. A careful answer may say the billboard needed both of them, and notice that the one who takes the credit is the one who had no part in making it.
3. Ivan’s billboard brings crowds, a newspaper story and new names like the Ape Artist. But Ruby still plods through the sawdust at two, four and seven. Has Ivan’s plan worked?
What it asks It asks the whole question of the reading. The reading opens with Ivan’s fear that if Julia does not understand, “Nothing will happen.” By its end the picture has reached humans: Julia reads the word home, George helps put it on the billboard, a newspaper story runs, and curious people park, take photos and buy Ivan’s paintings, now sixty-five dollars. Ivan is called the Ape Artist, and Mack has claimed the idea. Ruby has visitors from morning till night, but she still does her shows at two, four and seven and has bad dreams every night, and Ivan tells Bob, “my idea isn’t working.” The student judges whether the plan has worked, and first what it was meant to do: to be seen, to be understood, or to get Ruby out. Ivan’s own verdict is one piece of evidence, not the answer. The earlier questions gathered the pieces: whether being an artist helped Julia see the picture, who saw Ivan more clearly after the chest-beating, whether Ruby knows what the picture is for, why George never says yes, what Mack wants his photo with Ruby to say, why Ivan’s fear sounds like an ad, and whose idea the billboard was. The card does not say the billboard will free Ruby or bring the zoo.
No, not yet. The plan was for Ruby, and nothing has changed for her. Ivan says so himself. The attention went to Ivan and to Mack.
But nothing’s changed for her.
Every night she has bad dreams.
my idea isn’t working.
Partly. The picture’s first job was to reach people, and it has. Julia read it, it went up, it is in the paper, and Ruby has visitors all day. That is the first step Julia hoped for.
There it is: H-O-M-E.
A photo of my billboard is in the newspaper.
I have visitors from morning till night, and so does Ruby.
A strong answer A strong response takes a side, gives a reason and answers the other side. A student who says no might point out that the plan was for Ruby, and “nothing’s changed for her”: she still plods through the sawdust three times a day and has bad dreams, while the crowds bring Ivan new names and buy his paintings. A student who says partly might argue that the picture has done what a picture can: Julia read “H-O-M-E”, the sign went up, and a photo is in the newspaper, which is what Julia meant when she said, “Everybody would know about Ruby.” A careful answer asks what the plan was meant to do before judging it, and does not decide from later chapters.