Jeff+C.

=Book Summaries:= Jeff Cole

3. Date of Publication: 2009
 * 1) Book Title: Lockdown:Escape from Furnace
 * 2) Author: Alexander Gordon Smith

4.What is the book about? Give brief plot summary in your own words.

Alex Sawyer, a fourteen year old bugler, is sentenced to life in prison for a murder he did not commit. The prison, known as Furnace, is guarded by malicious silver-eyed giants dressed like gangsters, patrolled by giant demon dogs, and its Warden may be Satan himself. In this phantasmagoric SuperMax, Alex is forced to survive among viscous gangs and his own hopelessness. Luckily the young sarcastic Sawyer finds himself among friends; Donavan, veteran of the evils of Furnace and Zee, another wisecracking teen framed for murder. These three, with help from others, risk their lives to plan a daring escape from the inescapable.

5.How could a teacher use this book in the classroom? What instructional strategies might you choose to incorporate with this particular title?

In a Social Science class I would use the book to discuss the concepts of due process, and the role of prison systems in our society as well as the importance of hope in our lives. Since the book describes things that do not exist in the reality I would assign students to create visual representations of these. The representations may be drawn of painted, or even collage or contracted from found materials.

6.Write three higher level thinking questions that you might use in a culminating discussion of this book.
 * 1) a. Alex is a bully and admits to terrorizing and stealing from weaker kids, even though he is framed for murder, does Alex deserve to be in Furnace? What if Alex was guilty of murder would he then deserve the horrors of Furnace?
 * 2) b. Hope is often a theme in stories about prisons. How does hope effect the characters? Who displays hope, how do they display it, and what happened when they lose hope?
 * 3) c. What characters are evil? Are the guards truly evil, science they did not choose to be guards? Can a system, or place be evil, or is evil something that only humans can display?

Jeff Cole

1.Book Title: How to Steal a Car

2.Author: Pete Hautman

3.Date of Publication: 2009

4.What is the book about? Give brief plot summary in your own words.

//How to Steal a Car// is the story of fifteen year old Kelleigh and her obsession with stealing cars. Faced with a home that appears ideal but actually holds some deep seated problems, difficulties balancing friendships, and romances, and a summer assignment to read Moby Dick, Kelleigh begins to look for ways to assert her independence and have some fun. The treat of getting caught and watcher her life fall apart terrifies and exhilarates Kelleigh as her summer shortens.

This book's themes of suburban malaise, identity, obsessions and how we rationalize them, and self destructive behavior; reminded me of one of my favorite adult writers Chuck Palahniuk.

5.How could a teacher use this book in the classroom? What instructional strategies might you choose to incorporate with this particular title?

This book is strong on character and voice and would be an excellent example to teach these concepts. Students could list the strengths and weaknesses of Kelleigh (and other characters) then do the same for themselves.

6.Write three higher level thinking questions that you might use in a culminating discussion of this book.

a. (After a summery of Moby Dick) Compare Ahab's obsession with finding and killing the white whale and Kelleigh's obsession with stealing cars. What do you think motivates the obsession, what purpose do the obsessions serve? b. Is Kelleigh a thief? Why? Do the things we do define us? If so, how? Or, are we more than what we do? Explain why you think so. c. Kelleigh steals cars, her Dad lies, and her mom smokes. Why do these characters do things that they know are wrong? What could these behaviors be a response to? Why do you do things that you know are wrong or hurtful? Are there better ways to respond to these things?

Jeff Cole 1.Book Title: Blank Confession 2.Author: Pete Hautman 3.Date of Publication: 2010

4.What is the book about? Give brief plot summary in your own words. This novel begins at the end, with a murder confession. The story is told from the perspectives of Detective Rawls, the cop taking the confession, and Mikey, the diminutive friend of the many character, and confessor, Shanye Blank. Echoing Jack Schaefers's 1949 western novel Shane, the aptly named Shanye Blank is a mysterious newcomer who literally rides to the high school, befriends the bullied Mikey and takes on the school bad guy. Presented in the manner of a Dashiell Hammett novel the narrative switches between Rawls' and Mikey's perspective as the story of drug dealing motorcycles and a stun gun unfolds.

5.How could a teacher use this book in the classroom? What instructional strategies might you choose to incorporate with this particular title? This novel could be used to teach the conceit of the unreliable narrator. The author uses two narrators to tell the story of the protagonist. Although one of the narrators is more reliable that the other neither is omscient and the read must rely on both to construct the events of the plot into a cohesive story.

To facilitate a discussion on the use of the unreliable narator, an instructor could follow the lesson ideas presented below from a blog with the fortuitous title //The Unreliable Narrator (http://amelanniza.blog.com/tag/lesson-plan/).//
 * 1) Ask your students to study the individual work before class.
 * 2) They need to decide whether the narrator is reliable or not based on the evidence from the prose or the movie.
 * 3) Do not explain the theories until they have presented their arguments. They can either research the guidance themselves, or approximate the definition of an unreliable narrator.
 * 4) Start the class discussion when everyone has completed their analyses and you guide them with points of the unreliable narrator. Have students agree, disagree, criticize, or add to one another’s findings.
 * 5) Make a class list of which narrator is the most believable to the most misleading.
 * 6) A creative production of the lesson may come in a form of a class story or a role-play. For the story, students take turns in writing one line to complete an interconnected short story with the most unreliable character. For the role-play, ask them to perform dialogs or monologues to illustrate an unreliable narrator (a jealous lover who commits a crime of passion, for example)

6.Write three higher level thinking questions that you might use in a culminating discussion of this book. a. Mikey says that he wore suits to distance himself from others, and that Marie used her makeup, Jon used his smile, and Shayne distanced himself by dressing in black and never telling people wear he was from. Why did they do that? Why did Mikey stop wearing the suits? How do you distance yourself from others? b. Trey acts like a bully sometimes and other times acts kind, the same goes for Marie. What causes them to act mean toward others? What about what causes them to act kind? How do the people we hang out with effect our behavior? c. What do you think will happen to Shayne in near future? As an adult?

Jeff Cole

1.Book Title: Free? Stories About Human Rights

2.Author: Edited by Amnesty International

3.Date of Publication: 2009

4.What is the book about? Give brief plot summary in your own words. //Free?// is an anthology of short stories and poems written for teens and edited by Amnesty International, an organization dedicated to the preservation of human rights around the world. Each of the selections are authored by a prominent YA writer and cover themes that affect the rights of people around the world. These themes include political prosecutions and asylum, slavery, education, economics and citizenship. The fourteen stories and poems are knitted together by the 1948 United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights. At the end of each selection one or two articles from the Declaration are included.

5.How could a teacher use this book in the classroom? What instructional strategies might you choose to incorporate with this particular title? I plan to use this book in my Social Studies curriculum. It's inspiring short stories and poems are well suited to be used as element of a lesson that creates a personal or emotional attachment to concepts that may otherwise be difficult for American teen to understand not to mention empathize with. A story or poem could be used to introduce a lesson or reinforce a concept after it is presented. These stories could also used as an insertion or motivator to begin a class project such as a letter writing campaign, or community improvement project. This anthology is heavily concept driven and is relatively light on facts. I believe that this is a strength of the anthology as it lends itself well to an exploration of the concepts in a manner consistent with the Reader Response theory.

6.Write three higher level thinking questions that you might use in a culminating discussion of this book. 1. Why was the poem //After the Hurricane// included in an anthology about human rights? What is the connection between the hurricane and human rights? 2. How did the inclusion did the Articles from the 1948 U.N. Declaration of Human Rights change or influence your interpretation of the story? 3. Explain the role of conscience in //Klaus Vogel and the Bad Lads.// How did the various characters display a conscience or lack of; the narrator, Joe, Mr. Eustace, Klaus? How have you reacted in similar situations?

Jeff Cole Book Title: A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier Author: Ishmael Beah Date of Publication: 2007 What is the book about? Give brief plot summary in your own words. Ishmael shares his terror, sadness and confusion with the reader as he recounts how he struggled to survive in the jungle and was eventually forced to become a child soldier. This is a beautifully written story that is punctuated with passages of brutal violence, some of it committed by Ishmael. His story is a personal one but it is also a global story, as Ishmael, exposes the reader to the tragedy of child soldiers and the human rights abuses that have become almost routine in many parts of the world today. How could a teacher use this book in the classroom? What instructional strategies might you choose to incorporate with this particular title? 1. How did Ishmael Beah’s grandmother explain the local adage that “we must strive to be like the moon”? And why has Ishmael remembered this saying ever since childhood? What does it mean to him?
 * 1) Ishmael Beal was a 13 years old boy living happily with his family in a small village in Sierra Leone until the 1992 civil war tore his world apart. His family was killed and Ishmael was on the run with a small group of boys. Running for his life through the jungle, avoiding danger and starvation, hiding from the rebels that killed everyone in his village.
 * 1) This is a powerful story and is very likely to motivate students to learn more about human rights and the issue of child soldiers around the world. This book could be used in a History or Civics class. After reading the book students could use internet resources to compete a written report, PowerPoint presentation, movie or other project to produce a research project about child soldier issues.
 * 2) Write three higher level thinking questions that you might use in a culminating discussion of this book.
 * 1) Write three higher level thinking questions that you might use in a culminating discussion of this book.

2. Explain how Ismael and his friends are moved from witnesses and victims of war to perpetrators of brutal violence.

3. Explian how the story told by the mother to her children at the end of the book echos the themes of violence, family, story- telling, childhood, and African village life in Ishmael Beah's story.

Jeff Cole 1.Book Title: Maus II: A Survivor's Tale 2.Author: Art Speigalman 3.Date of Publication: 1986

4.What is the book about? Give brief plot summary in your own words. Maus II is a graphic novel that chronicles the Holocaust experiences of the author's father. In the sorry the Jewish characters are portrayed as mice while the Nazis are drawn as cats. Maus II is a sort of meta-graphic novel as the story is told as the author struggles with how to tell his father's story as well as his own feelings about his father and the holocaust. Maus is a story of survival, showing the brutality of humanity and contrasting it with the will to survive.

5.How could a teacher use this book in the classroom? What instructional strategies might you choose to incorporate with this particular title? This is an excellent resource for teaching about World War 2 and the Holocaust. It's graphic novel form is intriguing and would be effective as a high intrest material especially for reluctant readers. This novel could be used to spark important discussions on history and its impact on the present.

6.Write three higher level thinking questions that you might use in a culminating discussion of this book. What qualities does Vladek have that helped him survive? What qualities do you share with Vladek? What is different about you? Why did the author deiced to portray the Jewish characters as mice and the Nazis as cats? What about the other characters, the pigs and frogs? What would you have done if you were a Jew in Europe during WW2? What if you were a German?