I love teaching novels. Probably because I love reading novels. So there is nothing more rewarding than exposing my students to good literature and being a part of the magic that happens when a whole room full of kids exhales after a tense scene or laughs or groans when we end a chapter and I say that's it for the day.But preparing to teach a novel? It's a ton of work.
I begged my principal a few months ago to let me teach this amazing book called MOON OVER MANIFEST. It won the Newbery a year or two ago and quite simply, it's brilliant. Because I have a great administrator, he dug up a few hundred bucks somehow and I got a class set.
Then, the work began.
First, I had to cull through that puppy and find all the words that kids in sixth grade may or may not know. Then, I had to write good, solid, context clues-type activities for those words, because that's what our standards call for.
Then, I had to decide how to introduce the novel. And since it takes place in Kansas during the Great Depression, but there are numerous flashbacks and references to 1918 and World War I, my challenge was two-fold. I found some great images (thank you, Library of Congress), concocted a few short scenarios that forced my kids to think about how they might handle situations similar to what MOON's characters would be facing, and then wrote up some short history blurbs to give some background on the setting.
I was several hours in, but nowhere near done.
The new Common Core standards ask our students to really be text-savvy as they read. So I had to develop questions that would force my students to analyze characters' motives and dissect plot and explain point of view. I had to find ways to incorporate grammar, as well, by pulling out examples of how the author used intensive pronouns and figurative language and punctuation.
And then, I had to create a final Performance Task that requires my students to synthesize what they've read with information from new texts and sources and write something--in this case a first-person narrative.
It was a long arduous process, but well worth it.
This week, we started our journey through this book. And by page ten, I had thirty-five noses buried in books in a hushed classroom. When we ended, they cried out in frustration--which was my hope all along. We'll have wonderful, thoughtful discussions throughout the next weeks, and moments where our hearts ache for these characters.
That's what literature does. And a good Teacher's Guide should be the GPS system that guides everyone through it.
To check out the Teacher's Guide to MOON OVER MANIFEST, see our Sample Guides page.
