It's been a while! I've made a big decision in my life to go back to school to earn my educator's certificate to be a High School English teacher! I know, I know... crazy, right? That's all I've been hearing! Anyways, since I've had to read dozens of books, why not share them with you all? Two birds with one stone, right!? Some might have spoilers in them, but I'll make sure to mention that before you read on! Anyways, I'm in a Young Adult Literature course, where we read and dissect some YA novels and grade them via a rubric and certain criteria, so you will see Excellent, Adequate and Poor mentioned in some of my posts.
Earlier on in the semester, we read The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton, a classic YA book.
The Outsiders was, in my opinion, a book worth reading for a young adult. It is full of certain issues that may not be known to most teens, such as gangs, fights, parent-less children and death. It puts light on those subjects and seems to do an adequate job of bringing them to life. While doing the rubric, I really thought about how this book would be viewed by a teenager and if it was worthwhile for them to read it, and if it would be easy for them to fall into the story and be interested by it.
When we look at the characters we see the main character is the main voice of the story, with the author following Ponyboy’s story through a short but momentous time in his life. It also helps that the characters are flawed, as it gives a certain realism to the story, so that readers can realize that nobody is perfect. I especially liked that there were minor characters who went through changes, such as... (Spoilers ahead!)
Earlier on in the semester, we read The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton, a classic YA book.
The Outsiders was, in my opinion, a book worth reading for a young adult. It is full of certain issues that may not be known to most teens, such as gangs, fights, parent-less children and death. It puts light on those subjects and seems to do an adequate job of bringing them to life. While doing the rubric, I really thought about how this book would be viewed by a teenager and if it was worthwhile for them to read it, and if it would be easy for them to fall into the story and be interested by it.
When we look at the characters we see the main character is the main voice of the story, with the author following Ponyboy’s story through a short but momentous time in his life. It also helps that the characters are flawed, as it gives a certain realism to the story, so that readers can realize that nobody is perfect. I especially liked that there were minor characters who went through changes, such as... (Spoilers ahead!)
...Randy, a Soc who didn’t want to fight after his friend was killed by Johnny, albeit accidentally (Hinton 117). Seeing even a small, minor character have such a change in his life gives the reader a sense of hope, seeing that even the people portrayed as cruel and heartless at the beginning of a story can have a change of heart.
The plot of the story seemed adequate. It was a little jumpy to me, and there were certain small parts of the story that confused me as to why they were mentioned, as there was no real point of these little bits of information being there. For example, we read that Soda liked horses and he even took care of a horse when he was younger, and the horse was sold. Ponyboy does make mention that he had wanted to make money to buy the horse for Soda as they got older, but there is no importance to this piece of the story (Hinton 40). There is also another part where Ponyboy mentions that Darry took acrobatic lessons when he was younger, and in turn, Darry taught the others some acrobatic moves. They do some flips and jumps off of the front porch and in the yard, but that’s about it for that little piece of information. (Hinton 135-136). I feel like these pieces of information only added a question to the story, since we do not know, or truly learn, the significance of these pieces of information.
The conflict of Ponyboy not being happy with his situation in life was adequate, since that coincided with the other conflict he had which was his believing that his brother, Darry, didn’t care about him. We see that the conflict with Darry becomes slightly resolved after Ponyboy is released from the hospital, and their situation changes by the end of the book, with Ponyboy realizing that Darry had been harder on him than his parents were, and with both of his brothers caring about him and wanting him to not give up on life and to hopefully go to college because both Soda and Darry knew that Ponyboy wouldn’t like his life if he dropped out of school (Hinton 175-176). This conflict also tied into the theme of the book, which I believe to be “You are more than what life gives you.” In other words, just because Ponyboy was dealt a difficult hand in life, it doesn’t mean that he has to give up. His brothers are helping him to become aware of that, and to hopefully get Ponyboy to become a college graduate so he can be more than just a greaser.
The format and language were both easy to follow and worked in this book, making it easy for a young adult to read. I think that the language used was suitable for the characters and for anyone reading it to understand. However, there were a few words that could have used some explanation, such as “heater” which was alluded to being a gun, but was not truly explained until much later in the story (Hinton 140). The format was excellent for a young adult book, being a first person narrative and following just one character’s story. I think that having the one main character makes this story easy to follow and also gives the reader a certain emotional attachment to Ponyboy.
Overall, I would recommend this book to readers of young adult literature and, if able to, I would like to use it in a classroom setting myself one day. I know that this book has been used in English curriculum for years, but I would like to see it used in the future as it was a wonderful and fast-paced read that I believe younger students would enjoy.
The plot of the story seemed adequate. It was a little jumpy to me, and there were certain small parts of the story that confused me as to why they were mentioned, as there was no real point of these little bits of information being there. For example, we read that Soda liked horses and he even took care of a horse when he was younger, and the horse was sold. Ponyboy does make mention that he had wanted to make money to buy the horse for Soda as they got older, but there is no importance to this piece of the story (Hinton 40). There is also another part where Ponyboy mentions that Darry took acrobatic lessons when he was younger, and in turn, Darry taught the others some acrobatic moves. They do some flips and jumps off of the front porch and in the yard, but that’s about it for that little piece of information. (Hinton 135-136). I feel like these pieces of information only added a question to the story, since we do not know, or truly learn, the significance of these pieces of information.
The conflict of Ponyboy not being happy with his situation in life was adequate, since that coincided with the other conflict he had which was his believing that his brother, Darry, didn’t care about him. We see that the conflict with Darry becomes slightly resolved after Ponyboy is released from the hospital, and their situation changes by the end of the book, with Ponyboy realizing that Darry had been harder on him than his parents were, and with both of his brothers caring about him and wanting him to not give up on life and to hopefully go to college because both Soda and Darry knew that Ponyboy wouldn’t like his life if he dropped out of school (Hinton 175-176). This conflict also tied into the theme of the book, which I believe to be “You are more than what life gives you.” In other words, just because Ponyboy was dealt a difficult hand in life, it doesn’t mean that he has to give up. His brothers are helping him to become aware of that, and to hopefully get Ponyboy to become a college graduate so he can be more than just a greaser.
The format and language were both easy to follow and worked in this book, making it easy for a young adult to read. I think that the language used was suitable for the characters and for anyone reading it to understand. However, there were a few words that could have used some explanation, such as “heater” which was alluded to being a gun, but was not truly explained until much later in the story (Hinton 140). The format was excellent for a young adult book, being a first person narrative and following just one character’s story. I think that having the one main character makes this story easy to follow and also gives the reader a certain emotional attachment to Ponyboy.
Overall, I would recommend this book to readers of young adult literature and, if able to, I would like to use it in a classroom setting myself one day. I know that this book has been used in English curriculum for years, but I would like to see it used in the future as it was a wonderful and fast-paced read that I believe younger students would enjoy.