Joanne Winter Teacher-Librarian (Posted Dec 6 2005)
The First Stone by Don Aker. Our
10 Applied classes are
going to start using this as their core novel either next semester or next
September. It's an excellent book. I think both boys and girls could
read and become engaged with it, which is always a plus in a co-ed class!
Also, the prequel to Bone, which is called Rose.
I personally like it
even better than Bone. It lends itself beautifully to discussions of
whether the heroine made the morally correct choice, and even if she did,
it was cheating on the deal she made, so will it work, or will there be
catastrophic repercussions (don't use those words with your 9P's).
Writing the next chapter would be a good assignment. Yes, it's a female
protagonist, but there's lots of action, swords, and some blood, so I
think the boys will be able to engage with it. Our ESL teacher is using
it with his group right now.
On another note, if you're looking for humour for the boys
to read (I'm
not sure how you'd use this in a class, but I'm getting them for our
library) -- the books of the Darwin Awards. These
are awards that are
granted to people for improving the gene pool by removing themselves (or
at least their ability to reproduce) from it in spectacularly stupid
fashion. It's really kind of macabre to be making a joke about how people
have managed to get themselves killed, but they do have a certain appeal.
My own 14 year-old son was in hysterics over them. Our favourite is the
man who wanted to know the gender of the bear in the zoo, but couldn't see
because the bear was asleep and had its back to the spectators, so the man
climbed into the cage. He still couldn't tell because of the position of
the bear, so he KICKED the bear. Boys (and many girls) seem to find this
funny!