"Only this book is so former!" Sound familiar? Never fear! Here are some foolproof means to continue the classics fresh for the modern-day student.

1. Pair contemporary poetry and short stories with the classics. Invite students to read mod brusk stories and poetry and make thematic connections to a classic you are reading in grade. Enquire students to compare and dissimilarity these supplemental pieces with their master text—what views do they share regarding central topics and themes? How are they unlike? Poets.org is an excellent resource for this, as you can search for poems by topic.

Examples of connective texts:

  • 1984, George Orwell – "The Censors," short story by Luisa Valenzuela.
  • Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare – "Blood," poem by Naomi Shihab Nye.
  • The Dandy Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald – "Otherwise," poem by Jane Kenyon.
  • The Enkindling, Kate Chopin – "In the Dark We Trounce," verse form past Julia Cohen.
  • Hamlet, Shakespeare – "A Primer for the Punctuation of Heart Disease," short story by Jonathan Safran Foer.

2. Get social. Have students choose a character from the classic they're reading and create a Twitter account (on paper!) for that character. They so create an original Twitter handle, like @TheRealWanderlust for Odysseus or @IndependentWoman for Jane Eyre, and write 6 to 10 tweets that carry throughout the arc of the story. Create different rules, like they have to tweet at two other characters or need three original hashtags throughout their tweets. Have fun with it!

3. Brand personal connections. Sometimes students can get so bogged downward in the older settings, antiquated language and complicated plot details of the story that they forget there are transcendent themes in these classics. Before reading, enquire students some questions the volume examines. The students give their personal responses, and later reading, they compare their responses to the book'due south answers to those questions. This is ofttimes called an anticipation guide, and information technology highlights the real-world connections the books offers.

Examples of essential questions:

  • The Enkindling: Is information technology ever moral to cheat on i'southward spouse? How far would you get to keep your identity?
  • The Neat Gatsby: Can one truly reinvent oneself? Is it possible to leave the past behind?

4. Recast the classics. This activity emphasizes how culturally specific stories can still be universal by "recasting" the book into the modern twenty-four hours. Get-go, students identify cultural specifics from the story (like setting, time period or organized religion) versus large, universal ideas (such as family disharmonize or the desire for independence). So, the students recast the details into a modern setting. Hither's an example of some guiding questions from Hermann Hesse's Siddhartha that could be adjusted for your book to help students with their recasting.

  1. Instead of being a Brahmin priest, who is the father of Siddhartha? Think that he would have to be a very loftier-profile, powerful member of society.
  2. Instead of a Hindu society, what social club is your "recast Siddhartha" function of?
  3. Why might the "recast Siddhartha" desire to escape that social club? Why is it unfulfilling for him/her?
  4. Hesse'south Siddhartha leaves his opulent lifestyle to join the ascetics, a group of people that leads an extremely elementary lifestyle and rejects life's normal pleasures and cloth satisfaction. What group does the "recast Siddhartha" join upon leaving his/her own society?

5. Host a Socratic seminar. Milkshake up the ho-hum back-and-along Q-and-A tennis match with a student-led Socratic seminar. Instead of having students complete questions on their ain, have them read the chapter at home and take notes. In class, students sit in a circle, then receive the questions and discuss them, referring to the text and their notes. Take one person record the group'southward answers—this volition crave appropriate pacing and a healthy group word to arrive at a consensus. Having the students complete the questions as a grouping as opposed to individually allows teens to consider multiple perspectives in improver to their own. Print out a course roster and note the quality and quantity of each class member'southward contributions for a participation grade.

vi. Effort literature circles. Instead of having all students read the aforementioned book, allow them to course pocket-sized, involvement-based groups and cull their ain classics! Select the era—Renaissance, Reconstruction, what accept yous—and allow students library time to scan and choose a title that appeals to them. In their small groups, they can create reading goals and ideas for structuring their discussions. Your full-class lessons would focus on reading strategies and supplemental materials from the era, such equally a complementary verse form that the class discusses before breaking into volume groups and applying it to their own book.

7. Analyze just a short passage. Often students become bogged down by the sheer length of classic novels and works of literature. So go along things smaller—try projecting the richest passage (one or 2 paragraphs) from their latest chapter on your lath. If you lot don't take project technology, run off a handout of the passage and then anybody has a copy. Read the passage, and and so conduct a full course analysis by: one) identifying where the passage appears in the chapter, 2) summarizing what is beingness said (comprehension) and iii) analyzing the text past identifying different literary techniques and examining their effects.

For instance, if there are many words with negative connotations, what outcome does that have on the tone of the passage? What kinds of metaphors and similes are being used, and what does this figurative language communicate to the reader across the literal? In this way, you will be using the classics to teach skills that will work for all types of reading and media. In one case you have done this a few times equally a grade, try breaking up students into small groups and letting them try information technology on their own. Eventually, they volition be strong plenty to do information technology independently!

8. Borrow classic techniques for students' own writing. This works especially well for satire, like Marker Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn or Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal." As you read with students, identify not just what but how the author satirizes. Later identifying the technique, students use it by creating their ain satires. For example, in Huckleberry Finn, Twain establishes the character of Pap every bit an untrustworthy "bad guy" with his drunkenness and his physical abuse of Huck. Therefore, when Pap launches into his racist tirade in affiliate vi, the reader is forced to question these mean attitudes. Because they come from Pap, Twain shows that racism is wrong. Students can apply this technique—communicating a view through an unreliable vocalisation—to an issue they personally care nigh, be it a school policy, community consequence or something more global.

ix. Teach your favorites. No teaching strategy is more constructive than simply sharing your passion. Information technology's contagious! Sharing your favorite classic books, authors, passages and lines volition assist ignite a spark in your students. Postal service awesome book quotes around your room; talk nearly your memories of reading these books for the first time. At the end of the day, genuine enthusiasm and a personal endorsement go a long way in keeping the classics fresh!

Learn how you can get copies of classic literature for equally low as 99 cents with Literary Touchstone Classics from Prestwick House. Each Literary Touchstone Classic features reading pointers and a vocabulary guide!
9 Ways to Make Classic Literature Fun