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One of my most successful units has been a Brown Bag Book Display I do
each Sept. in honor of Intellectual Freedom. Working from a list of
frequently banned books, I pull copies of those books from the
collection and display them, each "hidden" under a paper bag with the
reason they have been challenged printed on the outside of the bag. What
a conversation starter! Kids and adults come in and "peek" under the
bags to see Walt Whitman, the dictionary, Three Billy Goats Gruff etc.
It generates much discussion - what has been banned, challenged and
where and why.
Another idea - I have a glass display case where I display books that
have been banned. Then I cover the inside of the glass with paper,
leaving a few cut out "peaky" holes, inviting the passerby to peak into
the display to see the banned books. This works well too.
I know these aren't units - but they arouse curiosity and create
opportunities for teachers to bring their students to the library to
talk about the issues involved in censorship.
I made a display of the books that had been banned that were owned by
our library and using a bookmark for each, explained the reason for
their being banned. I began this unit with a brief discussion of
"First Amendment Rights" and "The Right To Read". I could not keep the
books on display because they were checked out so fast!
This is only a display idea, but our local bookstore had books
"behind bars" (wire portable dog kennels) draped w/b&w striped
material during Banned Books Week last year in the front window.
Of course read Farenheit 457
I have done a unit on censorship in the past. I have used the play
Inherit the Wind. I have also used the video The Day They Arrested the
Books (it is also a book by Hentoff). The writing project that I have
used is from National Council of Teachers of English - they have to
write a book rationale. They must read a book that has been banned and
then write a rationale on why it should not be banned.
I do several things with Banned Books and have found them very
successful. I begin my unit by bringing in the English class as if we
are going to do a regular book check out for book reports. Usually I
pick 5 "banned" books for book talks and begin my book talks, then as I
do each one, I suddenly come to something in the book, or whatever and
close the book up and say, sorry, I didn't know that was in there or
some excuse to pull it back from their consideration. I do this several
times and by then they are ready to kill me! Then we launch a
discussion about what a banned or challenged book is and I begin to list
the top 10 authors and books for challenges as well as
list top states for challenges. We have a display set up for banned or
challenged books and have kids pick out books they have read or authors
they may be familiar with. Then they read or reread them (try to do
this in groups of 2 or 3) so they can discuss them together and have the
kids try to identify what may have been challenged. Sometimes they
cannot figure it out and are quite amazed when we tell they reasons for
challenges. They too have to review books for class and pass judgement
as to what redeeming qualities are if any and if ban should be
enforced. This has worked for us.
I don't really do "units" because I only have each class once every two
or three weeks, so I have to move right along, but this activity about
banned books was very popular with my middle schoolers. I used lists
published by the ALA and searched our library for books that had been
challenged or banned. Using a fairly large font, I typed the comments
about the challenge of that book without giving the title, i.e., this
book was challenged in Colorado schools for being "lewd and inspiring
children to disobey parents." I numbered each comment and made a list
for myself of which books matched each number. Then I put each book in a
plain brown lunch bag and stapled the comment on the outside to close
the bag. After reading students the first amendment and discussing what
this could mean in terms of libraries, I passed out the bags with the
"dangerous" books and had each table read and discuss among themselves
the comment and see if they could imagine what kind of a book would be
in the bag. After about 5 minutes, I allowed each group to stand up,
read the comment aloud, say what they thought would be inside and then
open the bag and show the book to the class. All the kids were really
surprised to find some of their favorites and even some of their class
assignments in the bags.
Make lots of copies of the printed comments and have them paper clipped
in sets if you plan on doing this activity with one class after another,
because it's a bit of work to get the books back into bags and stapled
with the correct comment. Don't count on preserving either the bags or
comments, since they will get ripped up in the discovery process. You
might actually involve the students in putting their own book back into
a new bag and fixing it up for the next class. I didn't try that, but it
might work.
Penny Swartz pswartz@megsinet.net (home)
Niles West High School penswa@niles-hs.k12.il.us (school)
Skokie, Illinois 60077
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