Statement of Rationale
I have chosen Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak as my novel of focus point for this teaching guide. Having read this novel at a young age, its merits are deeply implemented into my life today and will continue to be. The subject is one that may seem a bit avant-garde to the classrooms of today. Despite the ever-changing and ever-progressing world that students live in, there is still some type of fear surrounding books of a controversial nature being taught in the classroom. However much stories like the one of Melinda Sordino excite us, disturb us, or scare us, these are the stories of human life. There is no substitute for the importance of making sure that students don't feel cheated or slighted when it comes to the tough stories.
I read the novel Speak at a young age. I remember checking it out in the library when I was in middle school and I remember not being able to stop reading it. A few years later, while watching Lifetime movies with my mom, I saw the adapted version of the novel and remembered thinking, hm. I believe I've heard that story before. Now, in my twenty-second year, I have been touched by the story a third time. How interesting that this story has entered my life in three very different periods of development and growing up.
In A.C. LeMieux's article, "The Problem Novel in a Conservative Age," she addresses the importance of these stories to our bookshelves. When we are young, we aren't quite jaded by the world around us. It is easier for us to be open, to see things with clear eyes. When I was hardly in my teens and reading Speak for the first time, it scared me. I was scared of high school anyway and even more so. I just didn't believe that people, people who were supposed to be someone's friend, could be that horrible and what did she do? I read on and on and on, desperately wanting to know what Melinda did that could cause such a notorious, yet silent uproar.
In a novel that begs its reader to speak up, it would be a complete contradiction to keep it from anyone. Rape is probably something that we want to keep quiet. It is a problem. Keeping it quiet does nothing to solve it. If the Greeks, according to LeMieux, regarded that word as "thing thrown forward," then that is what we are to do with problems. We should throw them forward, out into the open. I agree with LeMieux that we should, as adults, throw students forward into their truth, but in order to do that, we must be truthful ourselves. Being truthful about problems that we feel should be hush-hush takes a great amount of bravery.
I am often reminded of the world of being a girl, specifically. Any gender can be brutal, but it seems like the world of high school girls might be one of the toughest. Nowadays, on any reality show, girls consider "being real" as telling another girl that she's a four letter word to her face, instead of behind her back. We're enabling young people to believe that keeping things secret, but actually manifesting them behind closed doors into a gossip he-said-she-said battlefield is the only way to interact. And of course, it isn't true for all young people, but what does it matter if they aren't all doing it? Sure, one bad apple doesn't spoil the whole bunch, but it might make the whole barrel smell bad.
This is why schools of today are so important. If they (students) have to worry about these things everywhere in the world, even if we can't fix it anywhere but, it has to be okay at school. Students should always, always feel safe in their school. And yet, this is the exact place where these horror stories of mean girls and mean boys get their breeding grounds.
In the Youtube interview featured in this webpage under the About the Author section, Laurie Halse Anderson mentions that writing the hardest books are the ones most worth writing. Maybe that's how life should be in general. Maybe if we start speaking about the hardest things, making them the ones most worth speaking, they will be easy to speak.
Which brings this statement to its points of how this tough story, and stories like it, can be beneficial and make a huge impact in the classroom. The novel Speak would be appropriate in elementary, middle, high school, or college settings. It's all about the way the material is presented. In fact, Laurie Halse Anderson has specific grade levels pertaining to the novel on her main webpage, which can be accessed in this project on the Additional Resources link under the Resources heading.
Because this book lends itself to incredibly important, yet tough, psychological and physical traumas, it can seem scary or uncomfortable. Despite these understandable initial reactions, neither the instructor or the student should feel nervous about this subject. In fact, that could be said to be some of the problem.
It's no surprise that our society can be a lot like the students in Speak. When we hear something out of the ordinary, it begins to get gossipy and feelings are hurt, and worse. With a topic like rape, a novel of controversy can become a sitting post for challenges and censorship, but this is where instructors would be doing their students a disservice.
Specifically, because this is a web-based project, these topics can seem even more difficult to address, but the answer is still the same: nothing should be off-limits. If students have questions, there should always be answers. Furthermore, students should feel completely safe in asking the questions that a novel like Speak raises. There can be questions and there can also be confessions. It is up to an instructor to be professional, compassionate, and honest.
In regards to this project, however, I feel that the best-suited target audience is late middle school to early high school, simply because that's when the novel itself is set and I believe that Laurie Halse Anderson's decision to pick that time of development proves that it will have the largest impact on students of that similar age and demographic. It is therefore the intent of this webpage to reach that level.
Just as I was changed, just as millions of readers were changed, so will be the students who act as the future readers of this novel. Perhaps a student has never been raped, perhaps a student has never felt fearful of school, perhaps a student has never lost his or her friends, but anyone can see themselves in Melinda Sordino. Her character impacts a reader and leaves he or she feeling different, feeling a bit more understanding, and feeling proud that they witnessed the story of a young girl finally having the courage to speak.
This project is set up to provide an instructor or a student with a myriad of useful, thoughtful, and impactful resources pertaining to Laurie Halse Anderson's novel, Speak. There are insights from the author, background information, a summary of the novel, memorable quotes for questioning, handouts and resources for sexual assault, the novel in cultural contexts - historical, current, and future impacts, an exploration of the main character, an examination of symbols and themes, and engaging presentations that offer different viewpoints.
It is the ultimate intent of this project to truly capture the immeasurable importance of the novel Speak. It is a topic of the past, the present, and the future and certainly merits discussion for the classroom.
-Katie Beth Byerley
6 July 2012
I read the novel Speak at a young age. I remember checking it out in the library when I was in middle school and I remember not being able to stop reading it. A few years later, while watching Lifetime movies with my mom, I saw the adapted version of the novel and remembered thinking, hm. I believe I've heard that story before. Now, in my twenty-second year, I have been touched by the story a third time. How interesting that this story has entered my life in three very different periods of development and growing up.
In A.C. LeMieux's article, "The Problem Novel in a Conservative Age," she addresses the importance of these stories to our bookshelves. When we are young, we aren't quite jaded by the world around us. It is easier for us to be open, to see things with clear eyes. When I was hardly in my teens and reading Speak for the first time, it scared me. I was scared of high school anyway and even more so. I just didn't believe that people, people who were supposed to be someone's friend, could be that horrible and what did she do? I read on and on and on, desperately wanting to know what Melinda did that could cause such a notorious, yet silent uproar.
In a novel that begs its reader to speak up, it would be a complete contradiction to keep it from anyone. Rape is probably something that we want to keep quiet. It is a problem. Keeping it quiet does nothing to solve it. If the Greeks, according to LeMieux, regarded that word as "thing thrown forward," then that is what we are to do with problems. We should throw them forward, out into the open. I agree with LeMieux that we should, as adults, throw students forward into their truth, but in order to do that, we must be truthful ourselves. Being truthful about problems that we feel should be hush-hush takes a great amount of bravery.
I am often reminded of the world of being a girl, specifically. Any gender can be brutal, but it seems like the world of high school girls might be one of the toughest. Nowadays, on any reality show, girls consider "being real" as telling another girl that she's a four letter word to her face, instead of behind her back. We're enabling young people to believe that keeping things secret, but actually manifesting them behind closed doors into a gossip he-said-she-said battlefield is the only way to interact. And of course, it isn't true for all young people, but what does it matter if they aren't all doing it? Sure, one bad apple doesn't spoil the whole bunch, but it might make the whole barrel smell bad.
This is why schools of today are so important. If they (students) have to worry about these things everywhere in the world, even if we can't fix it anywhere but, it has to be okay at school. Students should always, always feel safe in their school. And yet, this is the exact place where these horror stories of mean girls and mean boys get their breeding grounds.
In the Youtube interview featured in this webpage under the About the Author section, Laurie Halse Anderson mentions that writing the hardest books are the ones most worth writing. Maybe that's how life should be in general. Maybe if we start speaking about the hardest things, making them the ones most worth speaking, they will be easy to speak.
Which brings this statement to its points of how this tough story, and stories like it, can be beneficial and make a huge impact in the classroom. The novel Speak would be appropriate in elementary, middle, high school, or college settings. It's all about the way the material is presented. In fact, Laurie Halse Anderson has specific grade levels pertaining to the novel on her main webpage, which can be accessed in this project on the Additional Resources link under the Resources heading.
Because this book lends itself to incredibly important, yet tough, psychological and physical traumas, it can seem scary or uncomfortable. Despite these understandable initial reactions, neither the instructor or the student should feel nervous about this subject. In fact, that could be said to be some of the problem.
It's no surprise that our society can be a lot like the students in Speak. When we hear something out of the ordinary, it begins to get gossipy and feelings are hurt, and worse. With a topic like rape, a novel of controversy can become a sitting post for challenges and censorship, but this is where instructors would be doing their students a disservice.
Specifically, because this is a web-based project, these topics can seem even more difficult to address, but the answer is still the same: nothing should be off-limits. If students have questions, there should always be answers. Furthermore, students should feel completely safe in asking the questions that a novel like Speak raises. There can be questions and there can also be confessions. It is up to an instructor to be professional, compassionate, and honest.
In regards to this project, however, I feel that the best-suited target audience is late middle school to early high school, simply because that's when the novel itself is set and I believe that Laurie Halse Anderson's decision to pick that time of development proves that it will have the largest impact on students of that similar age and demographic. It is therefore the intent of this webpage to reach that level.
Just as I was changed, just as millions of readers were changed, so will be the students who act as the future readers of this novel. Perhaps a student has never been raped, perhaps a student has never felt fearful of school, perhaps a student has never lost his or her friends, but anyone can see themselves in Melinda Sordino. Her character impacts a reader and leaves he or she feeling different, feeling a bit more understanding, and feeling proud that they witnessed the story of a young girl finally having the courage to speak.
This project is set up to provide an instructor or a student with a myriad of useful, thoughtful, and impactful resources pertaining to Laurie Halse Anderson's novel, Speak. There are insights from the author, background information, a summary of the novel, memorable quotes for questioning, handouts and resources for sexual assault, the novel in cultural contexts - historical, current, and future impacts, an exploration of the main character, an examination of symbols and themes, and engaging presentations that offer different viewpoints.
It is the ultimate intent of this project to truly capture the immeasurable importance of the novel Speak. It is a topic of the past, the present, and the future and certainly merits discussion for the classroom.
-Katie Beth Byerley
6 July 2012