1. Draw a map of Ruby Holler. Then try mapping an area of your town like Z mapped the holler. Choose to mark down all the stones, trees, flowers, or what ever you choose.

Maps of Ruby Holler can include Tiller and Sairy's house, their barn, Z's house nearby, plus the location of the tree the twins cut down, the bear bush, tickle-violets and the picnic tree. Maps may also incorporate the neighboring town of Boxton with the Trepids house, the dress shop, jewelry store and Cadillac dealership. Where is the river Tiller and Florida take the boat? Where is the hillside Sairy and Dallas hike?

When students are mapping an area of their own town, where might they put their own understone funds? What other things might they want to hide?

2. Pick any two characters and write a diary entry that each might have written the same day.

Which characters would write diary entries with the same point of view? Which ones would see things the most differently? Could two characters experience the same event as to disagree completely as to what happened?

3. Illustrate a timeline of Dallas and Florida's life before they lived in Ruby Holler, creating a picture for each place they've been.

Timelines may include being found in the box on the Trepids doorstep, and then variously the foster homes they stayed in (the Hoppers, the Dreeps, the Cranbeps, the Burgertons) until they come to Ruby Holler. Pictures might reflect an incident from each home, or perhaps illustrate the feelings the twins had in each place.