I am a big advocate of using as many visuals as possible to help my students understand ideas and stories in as many ways as they can. Because of this, I like to show films that have the same themes as the novels we are reading at the end of each unit. I often have my students compare themes or messages between the novel and the film.
For To Kill A Mockingbird I like to show The Help and have students discuss if America made any progress in the 30 years between the settings of both stories. ( the answer is usually a resounding no)
For the Great Gatsby, when I was student teaching, I showed GATTACA. This was a great way to get students to question if Gatsby was really after Daisy, was it a love story, or was he after something more elusive.
For The Freedom Writers Diary, I have shown the film version, but have also shown Stand and Deliver, as it covers the same type of students and prejudice seen in the novel. I think it's eye-opening for my students to see the mistreatment of kids their age.
This year I'm teaching Speak for the first time and can't decide what film I'd like to show with this novel. At first, I was thinking Mean Girls, to add to the discussion of fitting in and cliques. Also, my students will be reading excerpts from Queen Bees and Wannabes, the novel Mean Girls is based on. But I was flipping through channels today and came across The Breakfast Club. I know for a fact most of my students have not seen this movie and it also deals with the same themes as Speak: crazy teachers, group dynamics, teen issues and so on. I'm so torn! I can't decide what to do, but I think I'm going to make assignments to go with both movies and see what has the most teaching potential. If you have any movie suggestions let me know in the comment section!
Additional movie novel pairings:
Night - Hotel Rwanda
Night- Schindler's List
The Sun Also Rises- Midnight in Paris
To Kill A Mockingbird- A Time To Kill - language warning!
To Kill A Mockingbird- The Secret Life of Bees
The Crucible- X-men
Speak - Easy A
Speak- The Pregnancy Project
The Scarlet Letter- Easy A
Freedom Writers Diary- Sister Act (Two..I think....)
Montana 1948- A River Runs Through It
I'll add more as I think of them! Suggestions welcome!
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