Goals

To introduce the Banned Books Reading Process Project, Quote Journals, Responses to Literature, and hand out the banned books students chose to read.

 

Details

Duration: 60 minutes

Assessments: Student reflections/journals, Student discussions, Student writing

Materials: Banned Books library (we had ours donated from Donors Choose).

 

Description

1. We first gave students the handout, "Banned Books Reading Process Project Description" to give them a big picture scope of what they will accomplish through the course of reading their banned book. We read through the handout to make sure the expectations were clear and fielded any student questions about the handout.

2. The next handout we gave students was, "Banned Books Quote Journal" which outlined that students were required to keep track of quotes that struck them through the course of reading their banned book. Eventually, this was a tool students could use to write their banned book persuasive essay.

3. The last handout we gave students was, "Banned Books Responses to Literature" which was a set of questions that ask students to think critically about what they were reading and write a response to a specific question of their choice. The response to literature questions were organized into categories: "Making Connections", "Points of Interest", "Strictly in Character", and "Careful Reflections". We told students that they would have to answer at least one question from each category through the course of the reading process project.

4. The last activity on the agenda was to pass out banned books each student chose to read.

Handout - Banned Books Quote Journal
Handout...
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Handout - Banned Books Reading Process Project Description
Handout...
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Handout - Banned Books Response to Literature
Handout...
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Author Reflections

Although this day involved many handouts, it was a way to give students a process to reading their banned books. We wanted to make sure students picked a book they enjoyed, but also wanted to be clear as to what was supposed to be done through the course of reading their banned book. Another way to do this could be to give students their banned books first and have a SSR (sustained silent reading) session and then proceed to give them the handouts so that they have a more clear idea on what needs to be done through the course of their reading process project.