Books/stories you liked teaching in class

[Larry.]

Enough of the semi-disgruntled former (current?) high school students blathering about books they were "forced" to read (maybe most read the Cliff Notes like my classmates did?) ;) Maybe the few teachers who visit here can talk about books/stories you enjoyed teaching?

I have a few personal favorites. One was teaching Elie Wiesel's Night for a group of seniors. I alternated between reading certain key passages aloud and interweaving some of the research I did as a history grad student in to provide perspective as to why camps like Auschwitz were what they were. There were frequent mini-quizzes instead of longer ones covering the entire book and there was plenty of time for student Q&As about the material. Had a few tell me that they learned things they didn't expect to learn, so I suppose that's a compliment.

Same grade, different group: Taught Macbeth. While I had some students read aloud the parts, I also took the time at the beginning of each class to have the students work on summarizing each scene in their own words, followed by discussion (little lecture on my part) on what the characters were feeling, why they behaved the ways they did, etc. This brought Shakespeare's text down to their own experiences and again using short, frequent quizzes in lieu of longer tests, there was better memory retention and by combining writing, recitation, and critical thinking discussion (not that I ever called it such in class), they didn't seem too bored with it.

Most fun was teaching S.E. Hinton's The Outsiders and Lois Lowry's The Giver, I'll admit. Much easier for students to place themselves in the characters' situations, to imagine what they would do next. Had a few read too far ahead for me to do predictive text questions, but that's not quite a bad thing, I suppose.

There were others that I enjoyed teaching, but those were mostly short historical extracts that I used in my history classes or short passages for ESL years later. Wouldn't mind teaching lit again, although it's been a few years since I last did.

What about you? Any others taught any tales that you and your students enjoyed?

[Ebenstone]

A few of my favorites:

Fences by August Wilson...actually anything by August Wilson. He is the most important voice in American Drama.

A Raisin In The Sun by Lorraine Hansberry...I was actually almost driven to physical violence when I found out my school took it off of our book list.

Of Mice and Men...I notice something new every time I teach it.

Henry V....my favorite Shakespeare play. I used to teach the entire Henriad to my Honors 10 and HV to all my 10s. They took that off our list too.

The Jungle/Fast Food Nation....I used to teach them together and it stands as one of my favorite things I get to teach.

[Larry.]

To my shame, I haven't (yet) read Henry V. I hear you when it comes to school administrations/boards removing books that students might actually enjoy. I used a few excerpts from The Jungle in one of my US History classes and that certainly got their attention. Nice combo there to make it even more relevant to today.

[Ebenstone]

To my shame, I haven't (yet) read Henry V. I hear you when it comes to school administrations/boards removing books that students might actually enjoy. I used a few excerpts from The Jungle in one of my US History classes and that certainly got their attention. Nice combo there to make it even more relevant to today.

I would actually jigsaw FFN in groups and have them present it in class. One of my favorite units to teach.

Henry V is my favorite Shakespeare play.

[Ormond]

I'm a psychology professor, so I normally don't get to teach fiction. However, I have assigned Mary Doria Russell's The Sparrow when I teach my course in Psychology and Religion. I enjoy the book and the discussion -- though there are always some students who really dislike the fact the novel goes back and forth between two different timelines.