YA Lit Review: 'Matched' by Ally Condie

In my effort to be in the habit of posting more regularly, I'm going to start sharing my reviews on the various young adult books that I've been reading as a part of the classroom-library/book-reading-culture-building that I'm working on with my 11th graders. We always had Silent Sustained Reading time at my last school, but here I am really trying to commit to make the SSR time sacred--no grading or email-checking for me, and in general I'm trying to make sure the kids see me reading books that they would be interested in reading (though once in a while I slip in a book just for me into the rotation!). If you're already my friend on Goodreads, then these reviews might be a re-read for you, but otherwise, hope you enjoy my humble thoughts!

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[Review embedded from Goodreads.com] 

  Matched by Ally Condie
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Matched is the first in a trilogy (trilogies are THE way to go in YA lit, apparently) set in a futuristic society where The Society (with ominous capitalization) makes decisions for all its citizens based on science and probability to maximize happiness and healthiness: what to eat, where to work, where to live, whom to marry, when to have children. If you were any sort of reader at all as a child, you'll recognize--this is basically the world from Lois Lowry's The Giver.

Add a teen love triangle and intriguing cover art, and you've got a book that appeals pretty well to YA readers (likely girls). You can tell Condie loves literature and poetry and language, which I can appreciate. The romance was a little... melodramatic for me. I probably would have appreciated it more when I was a teen. As it was, it felt a little overwrought to me (at the ripe old age of 26). Mostly this book makes me want to read The Giver again. Perhaps I should now that the series is complete.

With all that said, I wrote this in my journal midway through reading this book. Perhaps it is enough of a recommendation:

Whatever else I feel about the strengths and weaknesses of this book, I will love it forever for giving teenage girls (and me) this line: "Then, the question I asked myself was: Do I look pretty? Now the question I ask is: Do I look strong?"

View all my reviews

Books, books, books!

One of my favorite new things that I've implemented this year is my classroom library. I always had a small one before, mostly old library discards and miscellaneous books from home, yard sales, etc., but this year I invested some money at the end of year Scholastic Book Sale and have been hitting up Goodwill on the 50% off weekends to find newer, popular books that kids actually want to read. 

 (Please excuse the embarrassing, cluttered mess that is my classroom...)

It hasn't been cheap, but I've seen it pay off in students who willingly, excitedly, and regularly READ. We take 10-15 minutes at the beginning of class two days a week (on a block schedule, we meet 3 days a week) just for reading, any book they want. One of the things I love about this school is that there seems to be a reading culture. Aside from some minor (and very rare) grumbling, all the students seem to take SSR as a matter of fact. It's just something we do. They even ask for it on the rare occasion that I have to push it from the schedule for a special event.

Now that we've established SSR time as a regular routine, my goal is to push students to read books that are a little more challenging, books that will stretch their minds a little, whether classic literary fiction or modern popular nonfiction and memoir. I'm calling this the College Bound Reading Project. Students have to self-select a book that will in some way "prepare them for college and college-level reading," complete three easy tasks related to the book, and finish by December. No time for too many details now, but if it goes well, I might post about it here.

 

POEM: Things I Learned Last Quarter

At the end of the quarter, I asked my students to write a poem modeled off William Stafford's "Things I Learned Last Week" as a sort of review/sharing activity. (I previously wrote one modeled on this poem over the summer during CAWP. You can read it here. Even though I probably should come to expect it by now, whenever I give these kids a chance to write creatively, I am astounded by their thoughtfulness and honesty. Their words belong to them, but here's the poem I wrote with them as a model.

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Things I Learned Last Quarter - A Poem Written on September 30th, 2013.

My dog Oliver really likes
to pull the stuffing out of things--
his new toys, my new couches.

In football, the "red zone"
is the part of the field
20 yards or less from the goal line.

Walking up and down
stairs in high heels
is
terrifying.
And no--
you don't get used to it from practice.

Phoenix freeway traffic
at 7:30 AM on a weekday
is wildly unpredictable.
It is best to leave a few minutes
earlier than you need.

There is a restaurant in Scottsdale
where they bring you
plates of filet mignon and lobster
using skateboards as serving trays.
The food is good,
but I still don't get it.