Out of all the novels i have read so far in this course, I think the Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time and Life of Pi are probably the ones I find my students will be able to relate to the best. I feel that these novels are relate-able to students in terms of that longing teenagers have to find some sort of identity and independence. The reader sees this longing or struggle for independence from the main character Christoper in the Curious Incident… Christopher is like every other teenager in the sense that he wants to be able to do whatever he wants and when he wants; but I think a lot of students, especially those with any sort of learning disability would be able to relate to Christoper very well.  Christopher’s autism does not stop him from seeking independence and achieving great success on his A level math test acts as a deeper trigger to pursue independence.- his acceptance into college.

What is interesting is how Christopher’s condition makes him so unique and I think it would allow students to not only empathize with him, but also emphasize the that diversity is unique and special.  Regardless, the students will most likely enjoy the murder mystery but I think they would find it interesting to see how the story moves away from the mystery aspect and focuses more on developing the character of Christopher. The relationship between Christoper and his father and learning about his mother would be a great discussion topic with students. I think a lot of social issues could arise from discussing the many themes of the novel. Not only the relationship with family, the longing for independence but also the whole notion of dealing with loss. It would be interesting to discuss how the novel opens with death and ends with death and then tie the themes together and ultimately come full circle with the text. I find the way that the author constantly shifts from the main story line to discuss other issues like physics, but eventually finds its way to the main storyline and links its together with Christopher’s diverse personality is not only engaging but a great example to show students the different ways of storytelling. I think it is also a great idea to show the students the reality that the author evokes in the novel. By this I mean that all the issues that the characters deal with eventually are solved to some degree, but their lives still remain complicated and disorderly. This shows that as humans we need to stay positive and also aide in our attempt to endure whatever life throws at us.

Our groups discussion on Secret Life of Bees was quite interesting. We touched on many different topics and came to learn that not all of us felt the same way about the novel. Some of us highly enjoyed it, while other did not. Our discussion went in many different directions. We talked about if we thought male students would enjoy this novel. I particularly felt that they wouldn’t and it would be a struggle to engage them in this novel because it is very feminine. The story has a theme of the power the female community can have and almost a fantasy/storytelling aura to it that boys may just feel bored reading it.

We also found that we would not prefer to teach this novel to our students, we may teach it as a companion piece with To Kill a Mockingbird to demonstrate the very two different portrayals of the black characters. What I personally liked about this text was how Lily’s own prejudices of black people was changed over the course of the story. I would not go as far as saying that Lily is racist, but I do think at the beginning of the novel, we do see that she stereotypes Rosaleen in that she typically thinks that she is an uneducated woman who simply becomes a maid or housekeeper. When Lily meets August, who is this educated, caring, strong woman, her feelings change drastically. It is almost as if she could have never imagined a black woman to be so strong and unique. It would be very easy to relate a lot of social issues to this type of text as well and its sort of the only part I think you could engage the male students into. The novel does a great job in displaying the fact that it is human nature to possess some sort of racist feeling towards different ethnicities but we must recognize that as humans we all have very different personality traits and our skin colour should not matter because of it.

Another topic we touched on was the idea of family and what makes a family. This is particularly evident in the text as we see Lily longing for a mother like figure in her life. As a group we thought that it would be great to perhaps ask our students to discuss or write what they think constitutes as “family” Does family mean: a mom, dad, brother, sister, grandmother and grandfather? Rosaleen is a mother-like figure in Lily’s life but we still see her longing for her real mother. However when she arrives at the Boatwright house, she sees a strong female support system and by seeing the bond between the Daughters of Mary, she not only becomes a part of that female community, she starts to recognize that these women are her family.

I really enjoyed Elyse’s presentation on “Something Rotten.” I think she brought up some good points on how difficult it can be to teach Shakespeare to high school students. “Something Rotten” is definately something that they would enjoy and be able to interpret Shakespeare at so many levels. I was thinking another way to perhaps make the teaching of Shakespeare a little more appealing to high school students and give them a different perspective culturally, would be to show them Bollywood adaptations of Shakespeare’s works. I think showing students different interpretations of Shakespeare will only spark their interest in his works because it’d give them an opportunity to some how relate to the work through aspects of pop-culture. Some great Bollywood adaptations that I recommend for everyone to check out would be: Macbeth’-inspired ‘Maqbool’, Othello inspired ‘Omkara’ and Romeo and Juliet inspired ‘Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak.’