Teaching literature to first year students

Reading in class

In Norway during the first year of high school, we have two competency goals concerning literature

1. Discuss and elaborate on English texts from a selection of different genres, poems, short stories, novels, films, and theater plays from different epochs and parts of the world
2. Discuss literature by and about indigenous peoples in the English-speaking world
3. Literature by and about indigenous people

This year the choices are limited to two different books, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian and About a boy. To be able to make a good decision the students are asked to do these tasks to prepare.

Lesson plan

1. In groups of 4 work together first in pairs and find information about the two authors, Sherman Alexie and Nick Hornby. Make a list of 5 interesting facts about each to present in your group. Use Twitter as one of your sources by following the authors and reading their tweets.
2.  Listen to the video below. And read this review about the book “about a boy” here.  Based on the video and the article write a short paragraph about your impressions of the authors and the books
3. Based on your impressions decide on which book you want to read and write a short paragraph on your blog explaining your decision
4. Read the first chapter of the book and write a short paragraph on your first impression.
5. Send a link to your blog post to the author using Twitter and hashtag #1stg