Why You Need to Teach Annie John by Jamaica Kincaid

I first started teaching Annie John in the early 2000s, and it’s always been a surprise to me that it’s not more of a staple in high school English Classes. With themes of growing up and coming of age, it’s such a classic choice for teens, and yet it doesn’t focus on white boys and their problems, and so it’s refreshing and compelling. (Now that I think about it, maybe that’s the real reason why it isn’t taught more often….)

Teaching The Great Gatsby: Discussion Questions, Unit Plan Ideas, and Historical Context

Just about every American Literature class in the country will read F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel on the American Dream, but that doesn’t mean that your lesson plans on Gatsby should be like all the others. It’s one thing to fulfill a requirement or simply “cover” the book and it’s quite another to teach an impactful unit on The Great Gatsby that will really make a difference in the way your students view their world. II first started teaching this