Tuesday, August 24, 2021

A Fire Story Teaching Guide

I'm excited and proud to announce that Pop Culture Classroom has created a Teaching Guide for A Fire Story that I think is excellent.

The guide is a six-page (free!) PDF meant for teachers who want to teach the book to students. It sums up settings, characters and key themes, and suggests research, discussion questions and essay ideas for the students. The guide also connects A Fire Story to Common Core standards for grades 11 and 12, and finally provides a list of books, games, and online information related to the topic.


I had a chance to review a draft of the guide and was blown away by how carefully and perceptively they'd read my book. I think I made three minor suggestions, all of which were incorporated. And it's challenging! There are questions like "Why do you think the author did this?" and "Why do you think the author didn't address that?" that I wish I knew the answers to!  

Nothing would be more gratifying than to see A Fire Story taught in schools. (I think it's a fine book for high schoolers; there's one naughty word that probably disqualifies it for younger students.) This guide makes that much more likely. Thanks to Pop Culture Classroom for doing such a terrific job!