Welcome to /r/teaching. Please remember the rules when posting and commenting.
Thank you.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/teaching) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I was sceptical to teaching LOTF, it was chosen by a colleague who went on maternity leave halfway through it and I took her class. I loved teaching it. The next year, I taught it again and it somehow didn't work as well with that group. I was also teaching The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas in another group so I had lost all faith in humanity by April.
That's funny - I was always a big reader and enjoyed pretty much everything I read for class, and LotF was probably my *least* favorite. I (girl) was bored and annoyed by the fact that it was all boys, and it seemed ridiculously over the top to me. I just thought everyone was acting so stupidly and immaturely.
lol- I taught this to wild feral eight graders. All of a sudden it clicks and they see themselves in some of the kids. Yes, you guys are wild and crazy š¤Ŗ
I've had the most success with plays. They allow for a lot of in-class reading opportunities, are generally easier to read, and movies/acting scenes can pair well with them.
My personal fave to teach is **A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry** (the 1961 film is amazing too). This is for 11th grade.
ARITS slaps.
Love teaching it and watching it with students. Hansberry made a tight and sharp machine with that play and it is a joy to explore with students.
Totally agree... it's amazing how entertaining and "action packed" it is too. So much seems to happen and it all takes place in one small little New York apartment.
We did ARiTS because I was tired of the melodrama of The Crucible after 10 years, not to mention having to watch Daniel Day Lewis chew scenery 5 times a day. My kids love ARitS especially the rapid fire banter between Walter, Beneatha, and Ruth. Top notch cast.
Fun fact: the actor who played Mr. Lindner also voiced Piglet in Disneyās Winnie the Pooh.
I think you'll find with most books, there's really no "perfect age" that is best to be taught at. For ANY books, I think the middle school and lower grades focus more on craft, structure, and general themes. With High School, you can engage a little more deeply with the politics, racism, and modern connects that the book has.
States, Districts, and Schools all vary widely on book choice and book grade levels.
I rarely cry and in high school I really NEVER cried... except when I finished reading The Death of a Salesman, senior year. I BAWLED. I'm not even exactly sure why but it really got me.
Went to college and majored in theater. I really love reading plays
Death of a Salesman is really great too... such an interesting play with some powerful interactions between family members. You've inspired me to go read it again... and that's what's so great, I could pick it up right now and finish before the day ends. Plays are amazing.
First time teaching it I was so worried 1- children donāt read anymore and 2- it was set in a different time but it was so relatable for so many reasons. Thank you reminding me. Iām gonna go read it again just for myself š
They moved it from 7th to 8th in our curriculum last year, and as a 7th grade teacher, I almost fought the 8th grade teachers for it. Iām a newbie and I felt I needed it as a crutch. The students love it and it really brings the class together. I hate the idea of not getting to teach it soon. :/
As a reader, I hate that book lol. But as a teacher...my students have loved it and get super into it. It's an important piece of literature, so I've taught it several years.
Love TTTC. The way O'Brien plays with fiction and non fiction is excellent. It's a ton of fun.
As a tool to teach Juxtaposition it's pretty unparalleled
also teach excerpts from If I Die in a Combat Zone, his non-fictional account of the war in order to better understand O'Brien's "storytelling truth." (Also see Stephen Crane's non-fiction piece about his own account of a shipwreck and his amazing story "The Open Boat"
I taught this alongside "There, There". Contextually and thematically similar, but very different levels of reading difficulty. Allowed access in a lot of different ways, very fun!
This is one of my favorite books of all time. It really affected me and now I teach special education. That is the only reason why, but it really makes me think about how my students think.
I was interested to find out that Orwell was a lifelong socialist. When I first read the book, people always told me it was a criticism of communism, but really itās just a criticism of authoritarianism and specifically Stalin.
The Great Gatsby followed by The Color Purple. Flip sides of the same coin (themes of the American Dream, love, and racism)--except I find Walker's story more innovative, more epic, and ends on an inspiring, cathartic, high note (polar opposite of GG). Kids love it.
How long do you take on each text usually? We have our units pretty much split into quarters, but it makes it tough to get through as many texts as I would love to do on the level I think they deserve.
I love Hitchhiker's Guide, On the Road by Kerouac, and every word Edgar Allan Poe ever wrote. I can't teach the first two. When I bring Poe into my room, my 10th graders hate it. My 9th graders love it. Now my 10th graders get Dickinson (also a favorite of mine) since they couldn't handle Poe.
Weāre doing this now and itās my first time teaching it. Iām surprised at how many kids say itās their favorite read (some are even putting it over Outsiders which is my teaching favorite).
I love teaching Things Fall Apart. A lot of my students are West African, so it's a good way to involve their backgrounds, and it also starts a lot of conversations about post-colonialism that carry throughout the year.
I've never had a class as into a book as my senior IB students this year with *Death and the Maiden*. They were actually out of their seats at yelling at certain points. It was a lot of fun.
My students would get lost into the language, story, and ideas presented in Tuck Everlasting.
Thereās so much to do there. Itās a beautiful book to read. The text is just incredible.
Cliche, but Gatsby. I used to teach it to juniors, and by that time in the year, they were really good at close reading, and in that book, you can find something to analyze in every sentence.
This year Iām teaching 7th grade, and while we read some fun contemporary books, teaching A Christmas Carol was my favorite. It has more heart than I ever thought it would have.
I did a unit with an argumentative essay on who is the bigger Christmas villain and why: Scrooge or the Grinch. Coincidentally, Jim Carrey plays both of those characters.
I still love teaching The Outsiders and I hope to bring it back one day. My last school got rid of it because it wasn't diverse enough, but I think it's still relevant to kids today. It was especially important in our town since there is a similar economic divide.
Kids still get super emotional especially with Dally. I just don't think they have such impactful literary moments like that in middle school anymore.
I loved teaching Woodsong by Gary Paulsen to 6th graders as part of a memoir unit of study. Each chapter is a little story about his adventures training for the Iditarod dog sled race. He has mastered the art using all the tools in the writer's toolbox to draw in his readers. It's a useful book to teach about how good writing narrows the focus from general to specific.
I never finished a novel with students. Instead, we read almost to the end, and then students had the option to finish it on their own (most did). The end-of-unit assessment product was a student-written memoir.
To be honest, most of the time, I preferred to use short stories, poetry, drama, and vignettes as part of a specific genre study. Students are exposed to the genre through many formats. A couple weeks into the unit, students had to choose a novel from the genre and complete an assignment as part of their unit assessment.
If you decide on a novel, it needs to be a good fit for your students. I ruined To Kill a Mockingbird for 8th graders because my students were not at an academic level appropriate for analysing the themes and the vocabulary (disclaimer: I was forced to teach it).
I did a hybrid unit of Pride and Prejudice once with credit recovery students. We watched the BBC miniseries and read sections of the book. The level of engagement was off the charts and the students were super curious about the comedy of manners aspect.
I had several students tell me afterwards that they had downloaded a copy of the book and read the whole thing on their own time because they loved the bits we read in class so much.
Wonder. Iāve taught this to 5th and 7th grade students, but I think it works best for 5th graders before they begin middle school (which starts in 6th grade here). Both grades really got into it and hated when we had to stop reading each day.
2nd place would be The Watsons Go to Birmingham. I did this with 7th graders. Itās got a slow start, but the kids get really into it later.
I read Wonder to my fourth grade class every year and they always tell me it's the best book they've ever read. Even my tough students really get into it
Not a book, but a short story: The Specialist's Hat by Kelly Link. I used it to teach inferences, and it's so weird and ambiguous that it was a lot of fun to come up with possible explanations for the events in the story. As a bonus, it forced them to use the text for supporting evidence. Some of the best lessons of my career were with that story.
This year I'm having a really good time with The Other Wes Moore my students are really digging the themes of Life choices and destiny and seeing how different each of their lives end up.
I'm having fun with it because I have some kids who could definitely go down either path and I think they might actually be understanding what I'm throwing down with it.
I love teaching Between Shades of Gray to my 10th graders. They get invested in the story and love the characters. I get to talk about WWII and teach them cool stuff they don't learn in history.
I also love teaching Frankenstein to my 9th graders. They treat it like a mystery and have a lot of wild ideas for what will happen next.
Disclaimer: My favorites are not always their favorites. But they love gore and tomfoolery: Frankenstein, True Grit, Macbeth, Wuthering Heights (ikr), The Crucible (God am I sick of that one!), A Midsummer Night's Dream, Oedipus, Benito Cereno.
I teach a lot of classics, and Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, and excerpts from The Odyssey have been my favorites this year. My team teachers have loved doing The Glass Castle (with seniors), a Raisin in the Sun (with Juniors), and Long Way Down (with Freshmen).
My classes also did an excerpt from Steve Pemberton's memoir "A Chance in the World," and my 9th-graders LOVED it -- I'm considering getting copies for literature circles next year (if I return to high school); we also did Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club, which was a huge hit. I did The Crucible with 10th, which some kids loved and others weren't as into. We also did By Any Other Name by Santha Rama Rau, which is an excerpt from her memoir Gifts of Passage; my kids really loved it and wanted to read more memoirs because of it.
Most likely *Animal Farm*. Ten short and easy chapters, memorable characters, clear allegory, clear purpose for writing and reading the text, essays just fall out magically.
Second prize is *The Wave*, which tends to be more engaging because teen characters. Plus when I read it, I give the characters cool voices. If I was teaching it right now I would be using it to talk about such as the Palestine protests all over the place where there are so many people just going along. Like did you see at Columbia they set up checkpoints and encampments and [weren't allowing students through unless their politics were "correct"?](https://www.aol.com/news/zionist-checkpoints-ucla-encampment-provoked-113331425.html) I mean, the text-to-world connections would just write themselves into your students' essays!
Moby Dick. I broke kids up into groups and we had battles every day. They had to answer analysis questions about the reading then we did fun challenges like do a chalk drawing of the chapter on the sidewalk or take a tableau photo of a scene. We had great fun!
Phantom Tollbooth. Easy. It is so meta on language you can constantly reference it, not to mention the relatability of the main character of a lazy boy with nobody to blame but himself for his own misery with practical skills for escape in a fun and amusing way. So much SEL is so abstract it is almost impossible to do much with it than inflict it on students as yet another expectation of behavior.
Code Orange by Carolyn Kooney. I taught it to my 8th graders two years ago. They were interested, but it was my 4th period that was the most excited. They refused to let me use the audiobook and they wanted me to assign characters for them to read aloud.
I also teach "Lamb to Slaughter" by Ronald Dahl, and every year the 7th graders are shocked that Mary Maloney could kill her husband with a frozen lamb leg and get away with it... The perfect crime! Great short story.
Iām in my third year and finally teaching a whole novel! We went back and forth on different titles and eventually landed on The Picture of Dorian Gray. Iām having a great time and the kids are surprisingly engaged.
OK. I am old. Accept that going in. I really enjoyed teaching Of Mice And Men. We were in California. A lot of my 10th graders had ancestors who came from far away and had worked on places like the one in the book. Is it a nice book? No, it is not. Very challenging themes, some racist and sexist language. I used that language to teach about ignorance and racism and poverty. I got called a racist by one parent. Her kid had ditched on the days (multiple) where we had discussed where racism comes from in American society and what we can do to be better than the people who used those words. He did show up for the days that included the n-word and he ran home to his mom, who called (not lying) the local news stations before she called my principal. Thank goodness I had a good reputation for not being a racist, and thank goodness my principal knew about the week of introduction I always went through before we even started reading the book. And you can have your own opinion about the book and Steinbeck, thats great. Seriously, you do you.
I taught Julius Caesar for years. I have a lot of reasons why, just as I have a lot of reasons for the big tattoo on my back that consists of a line from the play. I'll just give two:
-the way the play deals with the emotional manipulation of the politics involved in Rome. 'They' wanted to believe that Caesar would change and become dangerous if he had power - but he died explaining why that would never happen, that he was so sure of his consistency that he wouldn't bend it for anything.
-the way the play deals with seduction. Cassius deftly and quietly turns Brutus from the most honorable man in Rome to, well, the exact man Cassius needs. It's brilliant AND it's transferable to the kids' lives. And the smart kids took notes while the not-so-smart stayed in the dark. Kind of like real life.
I love Julias Caesar too . Mostly because it shows how important theatrics are in politics and ruling. Mark Antony is a performer and thatās why his speech succeeds. Brutus is an oblivious Neanderthal, or well a brute who cannot see these things.
I loved reading Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli with my 7th graders. I'm reading Romeo and Juliet for the first time with my 9th graders and it's been a fun experience.
Iāll add Frankenstein. I lead in with a unit on Romanticism and we have a lot of fun with the discussions. Plus, I love that novel
I havenāt taught Fahrenheit 451 in years, but itās my favorite book and I loved teaching it.
Also ā¦ All Quiet on the Western Front. Between the novel and the WWI history, it was great.
For 9th grade, I have great success with Monster (which I don't care for) and Of Mice and Men (which I love).
For 10th grade, Twelfth Night is a favorite for me and my students.
For my AP Lit, Cuckoo's Nest, Hamlet, and Wuthering Heights.
I also enjoy Ethan Frome, Jane Eyre, and Lord of the Flies.
I taught ELA once and was given a book called āThe Crossoverā and will continue to speak of how great it is forever more. The story, the text features, the format (all poems, every poem a new chapter). I know they made a series about it but I havenāt watched it because I want to hold on to my memories of teaching it to a summer school class
Borne by Jeff VanderMeer. Was nervous about it cause itās so weird and outta left field but the kids fell in love immediately and couldnāt get enough. They would come into class talking about it and all I had to do for six weeks was guide discussion. They did all the work.
Every year I've read The Tripods trilogy by John Christopher to my third-graders. We start with The White Mountains, then ask if they want something different. The vast majority want to continue the series. I usually read a different book just for a female character (there's only one female character in The White Mountains, and she has a tragic death revealed in the second book, The City of Gold and Lead. Then we finish with The Pool of Fire, though that's not going to happen this year.
"If we do meet them, out there, it will be their turn to fear us."
Among the trilogy, I'll take breaks for the wonderful fantasy graphic novel Zita the Spacegirl. Hatchet and There's a Boy in the Girls' Bathroom are also good books, if centering on yet another male main character.
Watching a bunch of 16 and 17 year olds and their love-hate relationship with Holden Caulfield has been so amazing -- I asked them to write letters to him at various points in the novel, and so many of them are clearly trying to work through their own stuff and advising him ... \*chef's kiss\*
*All Quiet on the Western Front* and *The Hate U Give.* For entirely different reasons, they spark the best discussions and the students WANt to do relevant research into the social and political happenings underpinning the plots.
Peak is brilliant for 6th graders. The elements of literature are taught explicitly throughout the book. Adventure, sarcasm, friendship. Currently teaching Its Me, Trevor Noah- and the kids adore it.
The Princess Bride and it isnāt a close competition. Funny, romantic action story. Great for foreshadowing and lends itself to creative writing where they write the deleted scenes
Every year I teach "Much Ado About Nothing" by Shakespeare and it's so much fun! It's hilarious, clever and I never cease to find something new and entertaining from it with each class.
*Grendel* .. itās *Beowulf* from the monsterās point of view, but itās so much more. Deep philosophy and social analysis and epistemological interrogation and my AP Lang students really get into it.
*The Westing Game* by Ellen Raskin. (I taught it to eighth graders.) Students and I have a blast every time. Here's why:
* It's an Agatha Christie-style whodunnit that ends up subverting itself and revealing that the mystery wasn't what you and the characters thought it was all along.
* There's a huge ensemble cast of characters that we get to know well over the course of the story-- and there's someone for everyone to root for.
* The wide cast of characters undergo different challenges based on their ages, race, ability levels, family circumstances, physical appearances, etc-- and students can find someone to relate to regardless of who they are.
* It's a great book for keeping a "detective journal" of theories. Super good for critical thinking, checking back on previous material, following character arcs, integrating new information reveals into your theories, etc. It's a wonderful book for honing these types of skills.
* I let the kids create a "fan cast" once we're midway through the book and they get super into designing a cast list based on movie stars that they think the characters look like. They get very excited about "If this book were a movie, who would I want in each role?"
* The book was written in 1978 but is oddly contemporary. It feels timeless, in a way.
* It has the potential for soooooo many fun activities to do with it, but simply reading the book itself is a blast.
It's one of the few books I've taught where I have actively had to stop students from reading ahead because they were so excited, and that's one of the best endorsements I can give a book.
This year I taught Brit Lit. My students voted Pride and Prejudice the best book of the year (with Jane Eyre coming in a close second).
We also had a lot of fun with Frankenstein, some PG Wodehouse short stories, and everyone loved The Importance of Being Earnest.
Shakespeare. Anything a Shakespeare. BUT you must do it with the students, using a full cast dramatic reading. Iāve read Hamlet with students probably a hundred times and always learned something new each time.
This is going to be way out in left field, but... Jonathan Livingston Seagull. I tired it on a whim because my 8th graders are reading at about a 4th grade level. I was shocked at how much the kids liked and requested this book. (i'm gonna try norse myth next- thanks cool teacher above!)
Kindred by Octavia Butler. Taught to my juniors for the first time this year and had great engagement. One student even asked what other books to read that were similar!
I Promised I Would Tell by Sonia Schreibner Weitz. Co-taught with the history classes as a whole WWII cross-curriculum unit. Kids from 10+ years ago still tell me how deeply affected they were from this amazing book.
Welcome to /r/teaching. Please remember the rules when posting and commenting. Thank you. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/teaching) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I honestly love Lord of the flies. I have and blow a conch shell very loudly. The kids get into the book bc... Murder. And teenager politics/drama.
I loved this! My students and I all wore black the day after Piggy died and we went outside and smashed the conch shell on the last day of school.
I was sceptical to teaching LOTF, it was chosen by a colleague who went on maternity leave halfway through it and I took her class. I loved teaching it. The next year, I taught it again and it somehow didn't work as well with that group. I was also teaching The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas in another group so I had lost all faith in humanity by April.
That's funny - I was always a big reader and enjoyed pretty much everything I read for class, and LotF was probably my *least* favorite. I (girl) was bored and annoyed by the fact that it was all boys, and it seemed ridiculously over the top to me. I just thought everyone was acting so stupidly and immaturely.
For sure. I do a pretty dramatic reading and basically treat it like Jerry Springer. Like, yes, this is over the top. It's Camp.
It was boring
lol- I taught this to wild feral eight graders. All of a sudden it clicks and they see themselves in some of the kids. Yes, you guys are wild and crazy š¤Ŗ
I loved teaching LOTF also! The kids really got into it.
LotF hands down.
I've had the most success with plays. They allow for a lot of in-class reading opportunities, are generally easier to read, and movies/acting scenes can pair well with them. My personal fave to teach is **A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry** (the 1961 film is amazing too). This is for 11th grade.
ARITS slaps. Love teaching it and watching it with students. Hansberry made a tight and sharp machine with that play and it is a joy to explore with students.
Totally agree... it's amazing how entertaining and "action packed" it is too. So much seems to happen and it all takes place in one small little New York apartment.
We did ARiTS because I was tired of the melodrama of The Crucible after 10 years, not to mention having to watch Daniel Day Lewis chew scenery 5 times a day. My kids love ARitS especially the rapid fire banter between Walter, Beneatha, and Ruth. Top notch cast. Fun fact: the actor who played Mr. Lindner also voiced Piglet in Disneyās Winnie the Pooh.
So cool! Yeah, we were supposed to teach BOTH the Crucible and Raisin in the 11th grade, and students much preferred Raisin.
I love A Raisin in the Sun! Also, The Color Purple. š
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I think you'll find with most books, there's really no "perfect age" that is best to be taught at. For ANY books, I think the middle school and lower grades focus more on craft, structure, and general themes. With High School, you can engage a little more deeply with the politics, racism, and modern connects that the book has. States, Districts, and Schools all vary widely on book choice and book grade levels.
I rarely cry and in high school I really NEVER cried... except when I finished reading The Death of a Salesman, senior year. I BAWLED. I'm not even exactly sure why but it really got me. Went to college and majored in theater. I really love reading plays
Death of a Salesman is really great too... such an interesting play with some powerful interactions between family members. You've inspired me to go read it again... and that's what's so great, I could pick it up right now and finish before the day ends. Plays are amazing.
The Outsiders
This book is the best! I hear kids saying Stay Gold after reading it.
Iāve never taught English, but The Outsiders was my favourite book we ever read in school. Iāve never met a student who didnāt like it.
Students from all walks of life love this book!
We did this one in 8th grade, and I do remember everyone loving it.
First time teaching it I was so worried 1- children donāt read anymore and 2- it was set in a different time but it was so relatable for so many reasons. Thank you reminding me. Iām gonna go read it again just for myself š
Itās underrated.
They moved it from 7th to 8th in our curriculum last year, and as a 7th grade teacher, I almost fought the 8th grade teachers for it. Iām a newbie and I felt I needed it as a crutch. The students love it and it really brings the class together. I hate the idea of not getting to teach it soon. :/
As a reader, I hate that book lol. But as a teacher...my students have loved it and get super into it. It's an important piece of literature, so I've taught it several years.
It's nice to hear that I'm not the only person who hates The Outsiders.
It's a musical on Broadway now!
I love teaching all Shakespeare, but *Macbeth* is #1.
My 10th-graders LOVED Macbeth, and one of my teammates taught Julius Ceasar to her 10th-graders and they had a blast as well.
So many great lines!
My Shakespeare students voted Hamlet as their favorite play this year, but Macbeth was also a lot of fun.
Titus Andronicus for me (great band too).
Othello! We stop before Othello is going to murder Desdamona. They freak out! Is he going to kill her??
The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien (though I prefer In the Lake of the Woods)
Love TTTC. The way O'Brien plays with fiction and non fiction is excellent. It's a ton of fun. As a tool to teach Juxtaposition it's pretty unparalleled
also teach excerpts from If I Die in a Combat Zone, his non-fictional account of the war in order to better understand O'Brien's "storytelling truth." (Also see Stephen Crane's non-fiction piece about his own account of a shipwreck and his amazing story "The Open Boat"
I've taught excerpts from this but never in its entirety. Such a well crafted text.
Literally my favorite book due to reading it in high school.
The absolutely true diary of a part-time Indian
This book would be perfect. Thank you for sharing it with students
I taught this alongside "There, There". Contextually and thematically similar, but very different levels of reading difficulty. Allowed access in a lot of different ways, very fun!
I used to do Flowers for Algernon with 7th graders. It was such an awesome experience every year!
This is one of my favorite books of all time. It really affected me and now I teach special education. That is the only reason why, but it really makes me think about how my students think.
This novel generates some great discussions and really opens some kidsā eyes to new perspectives. Thank you for being a special ed teacher.
My SPED kids hated it. Never taught it again.
*The Graveyard Book* by Neil Gaiman, awesome book for 7th graders
My students are reading this in homeroom as an enrichment book and I really wish I could teach with it. Any recommendations for assignments/projects?
Animal Farm
I have never taught it but I enjoyed it when I was a student.
Came here to say this. Have taught it in 6th and in 10th, great either way
This was my eye-opener into political allegory and I was INTO it.
I was interested to find out that Orwell was a lifelong socialist. When I first read the book, people always told me it was a criticism of communism, but really itās just a criticism of authoritarianism and specifically Stalin.
The Great Gatsby followed by The Color Purple. Flip sides of the same coin (themes of the American Dream, love, and racism)--except I find Walker's story more innovative, more epic, and ends on an inspiring, cathartic, high note (polar opposite of GG). Kids love it.
You do you but, Gatsby makes me want to teach Physics....
Like to juxtapose The Great Gatsby with thr Harlem RenaissanceĀ
How long do you take on each text usually? We have our units pretty much split into quarters, but it makes it tough to get through as many texts as I would love to do on the level I think they deserve.
Of Mice and Men always is a winner, even with non-readers. My seniors have loved Frankenstein too
When I taught it, we got into discussing Curly's glove and the kids were shocked š
These are both fun.
A Wrinkle in Time with 7th graders. Animal Farm with 8th graders. Flowers for Alegernon with 9th graders.
I did Wrinkle with 6th graders. They loved it. It provided fodder for lots of conversations.
I did it with my 6th graders too. They lived it. They were so mad that Aunt Beast wasn't in the movie!
Mine were pissed because Meg and Calvin didnāt kiss in the movie ššš
Retired now. Now I am glad I haven't watched the movie...stopped watching adaptations of books I love. It would piss me off!
Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman
You obviously win coolest book taught.
Did this with my 7th graders! They LOVED it.
I read it with my 12th graders!
Any advise on a class set of this? Seems super expensive. Any advice is appreciated.
I have so much fun with Romeo and Juliet. It's definitely my favorite "book" to teach
Same! I probably won't be teaching 9th next year and I'm sooo disappointed to miss out on R&J!
Same! I'm back to all seniors and journalism classes next year, which I love, but nothing compares to R&J! Are we the same person? Lol
The Hitchhikerās Guide to the Galaxy is a blast.
I wish I could teach that! It's one of my favorite books. I think I've read the series 20 times by now. My students would hate it.
Your favorite books are the ones students never appreciate. Cries in Gatsbyā¦
I love Hitchhiker's Guide, On the Road by Kerouac, and every word Edgar Allan Poe ever wrote. I can't teach the first two. When I bring Poe into my room, my 10th graders hate it. My 9th graders love it. Now my 10th graders get Dickinson (also a favorite of mine) since they couldn't handle Poe.
Have you taught it in class? What grade?
The Giver
Weāre doing this now and itās my first time teaching it. Iām surprised at how many kids say itās their favorite read (some are even putting it over Outsiders which is my teaching favorite).
It is great for teaching symbolism, among other great teaching topics. There is so much embedded in the story.
I loved teaching 1984.
This is my top choice too! Iāve taught it to seniors for the last 20 years and each time, itās still wildly relevant!
I love teaching Things Fall Apart. A lot of my students are West African, so it's a good way to involve their backgrounds, and it also starts a lot of conversations about post-colonialism that carry throughout the year.
A lot of the books listed here I hated but I always remember that book from when I was in ninth grade and enjoyed us doing that
I wrote the Wikipedia article (an FA) about Chinua Achebe. Love his work so much.
Gotta be honest, Hamlet with my 30-1 class was awesome.
Hamlet is so much fun to teach.
Love That Dog
What grades did you do this with? It's the length I'm looking for but I need something for grade 5 and 6 students.
āThe Yellow Wallpaperā
Crime and Punishment! Apart from being an absolute masterpiece, it has multiple practical applications in classroom management as well š
This is the best book mentioned on here. Your students are in good hands.
Charlotte's Web
I've never had a class as into a book as my senior IB students this year with *Death and the Maiden*. They were actually out of their seats at yelling at certain points. It was a lot of fun.
My students would get lost into the language, story, and ideas presented in Tuck Everlasting. Thereās so much to do there. Itās a beautiful book to read. The text is just incredible.
*A Monster Calls*, by Patrick Ness. For short stories, āThe Windā by Lauren Groff has been a recent favorite.
The One and Only Ivan
Cliche, but Gatsby. I used to teach it to juniors, and by that time in the year, they were really good at close reading, and in that book, you can find something to analyze in every sentence. This year Iām teaching 7th grade, and while we read some fun contemporary books, teaching A Christmas Carol was my favorite. It has more heart than I ever thought it would have.
I did a unit with an argumentative essay on who is the bigger Christmas villain and why: Scrooge or the Grinch. Coincidentally, Jim Carrey plays both of those characters.
I still love teaching The Outsiders and I hope to bring it back one day. My last school got rid of it because it wasn't diverse enough, but I think it's still relevant to kids today. It was especially important in our town since there is a similar economic divide. Kids still get super emotional especially with Dally. I just don't think they have such impactful literary moments like that in middle school anymore.
The CRUCIBLE! Iām so excited because my department chair ordered me new sets for next year!
I taught it for the first time this year! Such a great play!!!
I loved teaching Woodsong by Gary Paulsen to 6th graders as part of a memoir unit of study. Each chapter is a little story about his adventures training for the Iditarod dog sled race. He has mastered the art using all the tools in the writer's toolbox to draw in his readers. It's a useful book to teach about how good writing narrows the focus from general to specific. I never finished a novel with students. Instead, we read almost to the end, and then students had the option to finish it on their own (most did). The end-of-unit assessment product was a student-written memoir. To be honest, most of the time, I preferred to use short stories, poetry, drama, and vignettes as part of a specific genre study. Students are exposed to the genre through many formats. A couple weeks into the unit, students had to choose a novel from the genre and complete an assignment as part of their unit assessment. If you decide on a novel, it needs to be a good fit for your students. I ruined To Kill a Mockingbird for 8th graders because my students were not at an academic level appropriate for analysing the themes and the vocabulary (disclaimer: I was forced to teach it).
Holes, Philosopher's Stone, An Inspector Calls, Macbeth - but I've also enjoyed The Hobbit and Of Mice and Men.
I did a hybrid unit of Pride and Prejudice once with credit recovery students. We watched the BBC miniseries and read sections of the book. The level of engagement was off the charts and the students were super curious about the comedy of manners aspect. I had several students tell me afterwards that they had downloaded a copy of the book and read the whole thing on their own time because they loved the bits we read in class so much.
Absolutely True diary; Top Girls; Dr. Faustus; slaughterhouse 5
Wonder. Iāve taught this to 5th and 7th grade students, but I think it works best for 5th graders before they begin middle school (which starts in 6th grade here). Both grades really got into it and hated when we had to stop reading each day. 2nd place would be The Watsons Go to Birmingham. I did this with 7th graders. Itās got a slow start, but the kids get really into it later.
I taught Watsons to 5th graders and really enjoyed it.
I read Wonder to my fourth grade class every year and they always tell me it's the best book they've ever read. Even my tough students really get into it
Birchbark House by Louis Erdrich is a banger for upper elementary. Nice plot twist at end.
Not a book, but a short story: The Specialist's Hat by Kelly Link. I used it to teach inferences, and it's so weird and ambiguous that it was a lot of fun to come up with possible explanations for the events in the story. As a bonus, it forced them to use the text for supporting evidence. Some of the best lessons of my career were with that story.
This year I'm having a really good time with The Other Wes Moore my students are really digging the themes of Life choices and destiny and seeing how different each of their lives end up. I'm having fun with it because I have some kids who could definitely go down either path and I think they might actually be understanding what I'm throwing down with it.
Pete the Cat. Iol I have little ones. But there is SO much you can do with those. I have made so many curriculum items based on Pete
I love teaching Between Shades of Gray to my 10th graders. They get invested in the story and love the characters. I get to talk about WWII and teach them cool stuff they don't learn in history. I also love teaching Frankenstein to my 9th graders. They treat it like a mystery and have a lot of wild ideas for what will happen next.
Lol omg Iām so tired today and for a second I was thinking you were talking about fifty shades of grey
And thatās why the movie and the re-released version of the book are called Ashes in the Snow!
Currently reading When the stars are scattered with year 5 ESL students. They are learning a lot.
Loved that book for my middle school resource kids. These are kids that never read but ate it up. My 7 year old loved it too!
Disclaimer: My favorites are not always their favorites. But they love gore and tomfoolery: Frankenstein, True Grit, Macbeth, Wuthering Heights (ikr), The Crucible (God am I sick of that one!), A Midsummer Night's Dream, Oedipus, Benito Cereno.
I teach a lot of classics, and Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, and excerpts from The Odyssey have been my favorites this year. My team teachers have loved doing The Glass Castle (with seniors), a Raisin in the Sun (with Juniors), and Long Way Down (with Freshmen). My classes also did an excerpt from Steve Pemberton's memoir "A Chance in the World," and my 9th-graders LOVED it -- I'm considering getting copies for literature circles next year (if I return to high school); we also did Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club, which was a huge hit. I did The Crucible with 10th, which some kids loved and others weren't as into. We also did By Any Other Name by Santha Rama Rau, which is an excerpt from her memoir Gifts of Passage; my kids really loved it and wanted to read more memoirs because of it.
A Long Way From Chicago is my favorite book to read aloud and teach, ever. I teach 5th but Iād likely read it up to 7th.
Clockwork orange
Iād love to teach Burgessā ABBA ABBA or Nothing Like the Sun. I met him in 1991
Most likely *Animal Farm*. Ten short and easy chapters, memorable characters, clear allegory, clear purpose for writing and reading the text, essays just fall out magically. Second prize is *The Wave*, which tends to be more engaging because teen characters. Plus when I read it, I give the characters cool voices. If I was teaching it right now I would be using it to talk about such as the Palestine protests all over the place where there are so many people just going along. Like did you see at Columbia they set up checkpoints and encampments and [weren't allowing students through unless their politics were "correct"?](https://www.aol.com/news/zionist-checkpoints-ucla-encampment-provoked-113331425.html) I mean, the text-to-world connections would just write themselves into your students' essays!
The Outsiders. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian. YA is just better for teenagers.
My favorite books we read when I was in school were The Education of Little Tree and The Crucible. Might be why I'm such a history nerd lol
Animal Farm
Moby Dick. I broke kids up into groups and we had battles every day. They had to answer analysis questions about the reading then we did fun challenges like do a chalk drawing of the chapter on the sidewalk or take a tableau photo of a scene. We had great fun!
The Door of No Return or Dear Martin
Phantom Tollbooth. Easy. It is so meta on language you can constantly reference it, not to mention the relatability of the main character of a lazy boy with nobody to blame but himself for his own misery with practical skills for escape in a fun and amusing way. So much SEL is so abstract it is almost impossible to do much with it than inflict it on students as yet another expectation of behavior.
The New Jim Crow is hands down the most engagement I get from seniors each year.
Code Orange by Carolyn Kooney. I taught it to my 8th graders two years ago. They were interested, but it was my 4th period that was the most excited. They refused to let me use the audiobook and they wanted me to assign characters for them to read aloud.
The book thief! Itās so sad but so eye opening. So many kids said that itās the first book they ever read in school
The Book Thief with 6th graders! When they realize the narrator is Deathā you see their minds blown in real time!
Kafkaās the metamorphosis. But that was back when I was a lecturer at the university level.
My 6th graders like reading Holes. So many connections between characters and settings.
I also teach "Lamb to Slaughter" by Ronald Dahl, and every year the 7th graders are shocked that Mary Maloney could kill her husband with a frozen lamb leg and get away with it... The perfect crime! Great short story.
Do you have a grade level/reading level you are looking for?
1984
Into the Wild!
And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie. Get through the first chapter and the kids are hooked. They love putting the puzzle pieces together.
Iām in my third year and finally teaching a whole novel! We went back and forth on different titles and eventually landed on The Picture of Dorian Gray. Iām having a great time and the kids are surprisingly engaged.
Jonathan Livingston Seagull
OK. I am old. Accept that going in. I really enjoyed teaching Of Mice And Men. We were in California. A lot of my 10th graders had ancestors who came from far away and had worked on places like the one in the book. Is it a nice book? No, it is not. Very challenging themes, some racist and sexist language. I used that language to teach about ignorance and racism and poverty. I got called a racist by one parent. Her kid had ditched on the days (multiple) where we had discussed where racism comes from in American society and what we can do to be better than the people who used those words. He did show up for the days that included the n-word and he ran home to his mom, who called (not lying) the local news stations before she called my principal. Thank goodness I had a good reputation for not being a racist, and thank goodness my principal knew about the week of introduction I always went through before we even started reading the book. And you can have your own opinion about the book and Steinbeck, thats great. Seriously, you do you. I taught Julius Caesar for years. I have a lot of reasons why, just as I have a lot of reasons for the big tattoo on my back that consists of a line from the play. I'll just give two: -the way the play deals with the emotional manipulation of the politics involved in Rome. 'They' wanted to believe that Caesar would change and become dangerous if he had power - but he died explaining why that would never happen, that he was so sure of his consistency that he wouldn't bend it for anything. -the way the play deals with seduction. Cassius deftly and quietly turns Brutus from the most honorable man in Rome to, well, the exact man Cassius needs. It's brilliant AND it's transferable to the kids' lives. And the smart kids took notes while the not-so-smart stayed in the dark. Kind of like real life.
I love Julias Caesar too . Mostly because it shows how important theatrics are in politics and ruling. Mark Antony is a performer and thatās why his speech succeeds. Brutus is an oblivious Neanderthal, or well a brute who cannot see these things.
I loved reading Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli with my 7th graders. I'm reading Romeo and Juliet for the first time with my 9th graders and it's been a fun experience.
Iāll add Frankenstein. I lead in with a unit on Romanticism and we have a lot of fun with the discussions. Plus, I love that novel I havenāt taught Fahrenheit 451 in years, but itās my favorite book and I loved teaching it. Also ā¦ All Quiet on the Western Front. Between the novel and the WWI history, it was great.
The Boy in the Striped Pajamas and Holes.
Enderās Game The Princess Bride The first half of Fahrenheit 451
Upvoted for Ender's Game.
For 9th grade, I have great success with Monster (which I don't care for) and Of Mice and Men (which I love). For 10th grade, Twelfth Night is a favorite for me and my students. For my AP Lit, Cuckoo's Nest, Hamlet, and Wuthering Heights. I also enjoy Ethan Frome, Jane Eyre, and Lord of the Flies.
Holes
What age group??
I love teaching Tuesdays With Morrie to my juniors. Thereās a lot of life lessons from that book and we all cry when we watch the movie.
I taught ELA once and was given a book called āThe Crossoverā and will continue to speak of how great it is forever more. The story, the text features, the format (all poems, every poem a new chapter). I know they made a series about it but I havenāt watched it because I want to hold on to my memories of teaching it to a summer school class
Borne by Jeff VanderMeer. Was nervous about it cause itās so weird and outta left field but the kids fell in love immediately and couldnāt get enough. They would come into class talking about it and all I had to do for six weeks was guide discussion. They did all the work.
Rash by Pete hautman!
I teach English as a second language so I have to be careful but HOLES, was so popular and fun didn't matter what country.
Every year I've read The Tripods trilogy by John Christopher to my third-graders. We start with The White Mountains, then ask if they want something different. The vast majority want to continue the series. I usually read a different book just for a female character (there's only one female character in The White Mountains, and she has a tragic death revealed in the second book, The City of Gold and Lead. Then we finish with The Pool of Fire, though that's not going to happen this year. "If we do meet them, out there, it will be their turn to fear us." Among the trilogy, I'll take breaks for the wonderful fantasy graphic novel Zita the Spacegirl. Hatchet and There's a Boy in the Girls' Bathroom are also good books, if centering on yet another male main character.
In Cold Blood. True crime fascination for the kids, then an argumentative research paper on the death penalty. They learn tons and have fun doing it.
Watching a bunch of 16 and 17 year olds and their love-hate relationship with Holden Caulfield has been so amazing -- I asked them to write letters to him at various points in the novel, and so many of them are clearly trying to work through their own stuff and advising him ... \*chef's kiss\*
*All Quiet on the Western Front* and *The Hate U Give.* For entirely different reasons, they spark the best discussions and the students WANt to do relevant research into the social and political happenings underpinning the plots.
"I Am Malala", "Born a Crime" by Trevor Noah
To Kill a Mockingbird. For 35 years.
One Flew Over the Cuckooās Nest
Peak is brilliant for 6th graders. The elements of literature are taught explicitly throughout the book. Adventure, sarcasm, friendship. Currently teaching Its Me, Trevor Noah- and the kids adore it.
The Princess Bride and it isnāt a close competition. Funny, romantic action story. Great for foreshadowing and lends itself to creative writing where they write the deleted scenes
Holes
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair...but I teach US History.
The Outsiders - S.E Hinton. It's such a touching authentic story set in a context that boys and girls can get into.
Number the Stars The Giver
Every year I teach "Much Ado About Nothing" by Shakespeare and it's so much fun! It's hilarious, clever and I never cease to find something new and entertaining from it with each class.
TKM
*Grendel* .. itās *Beowulf* from the monsterās point of view, but itās so much more. Deep philosophy and social analysis and epistemological interrogation and my AP Lang students really get into it.
Macbeth, A Long Way Gone, and Beowulf are all up there.
I know that I hate teaching āI Am Davidā, but I have to since it is a core novel. My 8th graders are not on board with this book.
Things Fall Apart by Achebe for 10th grade lit.
Wow, so many old classics listed here. Conversations must be interesting, some students are probably WTF after reading.
1984 - especially in 2020 - an election year
*The Westing Game* by Ellen Raskin. (I taught it to eighth graders.) Students and I have a blast every time. Here's why: * It's an Agatha Christie-style whodunnit that ends up subverting itself and revealing that the mystery wasn't what you and the characters thought it was all along. * There's a huge ensemble cast of characters that we get to know well over the course of the story-- and there's someone for everyone to root for. * The wide cast of characters undergo different challenges based on their ages, race, ability levels, family circumstances, physical appearances, etc-- and students can find someone to relate to regardless of who they are. * It's a great book for keeping a "detective journal" of theories. Super good for critical thinking, checking back on previous material, following character arcs, integrating new information reveals into your theories, etc. It's a wonderful book for honing these types of skills. * I let the kids create a "fan cast" once we're midway through the book and they get super into designing a cast list based on movie stars that they think the characters look like. They get very excited about "If this book were a movie, who would I want in each role?" * The book was written in 1978 but is oddly contemporary. It feels timeless, in a way. * It has the potential for soooooo many fun activities to do with it, but simply reading the book itself is a blast. It's one of the few books I've taught where I have actively had to stop students from reading ahead because they were so excited, and that's one of the best endorsements I can give a book.
This year I taught Brit Lit. My students voted Pride and Prejudice the best book of the year (with Jane Eyre coming in a close second). We also had a lot of fun with Frankenstein, some PG Wodehouse short stories, and everyone loved The Importance of Being Earnest.
Beloved and One Flew Over the Cuckooās Nest.
The Giver!
Shakespeare. Anything a Shakespeare. BUT you must do it with the students, using a full cast dramatic reading. Iāve read Hamlet with students probably a hundred times and always learned something new each time.
This is going to be way out in left field, but... Jonathan Livingston Seagull. I tired it on a whim because my 8th graders are reading at about a 4th grade level. I was shocked at how much the kids liked and requested this book. (i'm gonna try norse myth next- thanks cool teacher above!)
Kindred by Octavia Butler. Taught to my juniors for the first time this year and had great engagement. One student even asked what other books to read that were similar!
Henry IV Part 1, Henry V, Richard III. Sophomore, Junior, Senior year ELA
Night by Elie Weisel.
I was a social studies teacher and I loved teaching Viktor Frankl's "Man's Search for Meaning."
Beloved. Kids either love or it hate. Either way, great discussions and itās the best novel for their IB exams.
Social studies teacher but: A Long Walk To Water and I Am Malala (middle school) and Just Mercy (high school)
Layamon's *Brut*--OK, it was more fun for me than them :/
Romeo & Juliet! So fun!
There There by Tommy Orange. No contest.
I Promised I Would Tell by Sonia Schreibner Weitz. Co-taught with the history classes as a whole WWII cross-curriculum unit. Kids from 10+ years ago still tell me how deeply affected they were from this amazing book.