Lesson Plan for Claudette Breaux’s “Books”
by Laurie Williams

This is a good poem to begin a discussion on reading habits and books that have inspired and bored students over the years.

Have students write down a list of at least five books that they have really enjoyed at some point. Have them think of the first picture book they really enjoyed and see if they can include a more recently read title in their list.

Have students write down how they feel about books in general. This can be adjectives and adverbs and phrases and clauses.

Include what books they have the most contact with (text books, library books, fiction, poetry, etc.)

Include the last book that they really enjoyed reading,
the last book they actually learned something from,
the last time they really wanted to read a book.

From this have them write a poem about a specific book—one they really loved or really hated. Use Claudette Breaux’s poem as a model.

Have them also write a *list poem of their own reading history. Have them include as much of the information on their lists as possible. I generally ask for a minimum of twenty lines. This is a good exercise to use early in the year to see the reading interests and levels of your students.

* a list poem is group of similar items (in this case books) that are arranged to include a visual and/or emotional component associated with each “item” on the list. List poems are often not arranged chronologically, but go from one item to the next in a seemingly random order or one image or emotion leads to the next one.

Lesson Plan for Claudette Breaux’s “Books”
by Laurie Williams

This is a good poem to begin a discussion on banned and censored books throughout history and the governments that either allowed or disavowed censorship.

Read the poem aloud.

Look at books and writings across history—this can be as brief or as in-depth as you choose and can cover a wide time period or a narrow one.

Look at censorship across history—this can be as brief or as in-depth as you choose and can cover a wide time period or a narrow one.

Have time periods written on slips of paper.

Have them then choose a time period.

You could also have them choose numbers from 1-5 or 1-10 depending on the number of students in class and the number of time periods.

In groups of two or more, students with the same time period will research how books were treated during that time period making note of which books were challenged and where and which places worked against book censorship.

In their research, have them answer these questions:
What criteria was used in censoring, banning, and/or destroying books?
How did the general population react to the censorship—did they partake or try and save books?
What major figures purported the censoring, banning, and/or destroying of books?
What major figures fought against the censoring, banning, and/or destroying of books?
Were items other than books also part of the censorship?
What type of government did the places where censorship was most prevalent have (monarchy, oligarchy, theocracy, democracy, etc.)
What type of government was in place where there was little to no censorship?

Ask them to look at the reasons why censorship was happening—include economic realities and any shifts, prevalent religious beliefs of the region and any shifts, any conflicts in the region that have led to fighting, and any other instances they can find that they feel is helping to drive the censorship.

Have them look at the list of recently challenged books in the U.S. Are there any surprises?

With this research, they can then write an essay on their findings.

They could also write a position paper on censorship.

Banned Books week begins Saturday, September 25. Their website, www.bannedbooksweek.org , has lists of recently challenged titles in America. As does the American Library Association’s website, http://www.ala.org/ala/issuesadvocacy/banned/index.cfm

Lesson Plan for Claudette Breaux’s “Books”
by Laurie Williams

This is a good poem to use to get some great quotes and images to use in displays in the library.

Have students write down a list of at least five books that they have really enjoyed at some point. Have them think of the first picture book they really enjoyed and see if they can include a more recently read title in their list.

Have students draw a book jacket to go along with each of the five books and include on the jacket “blurbs” about the book that will entice other readers.

Have students write down how they feel about books in general. This can be adjectives and adverbs and phrases and clauses.

Include what books they have the most contact with (text books, library books, fiction, poetry, etc.)

Include the last book that they really enjoyed reading,
the last book they actually learned something from,
the last time they really wanted to read a book.

From this have them write a poem about a specific book—one they really loved or really hated. Use Claudette Breaux’s poem as a model. They can write as many of these poems as they would like.