We have discussed book primarily using the lenses of race, class, and gender. During our last session, I asked the 35 students to rate the 23 books they read from 1 to 23 based on which book they enjoyed the most. I have only rated the frequency in which the books appeared in the top five. I am happy to report that every book was placed in the top five at least twice. Hurray, it looks like I picked some winners. They are all books that I love and that I hoped these future teachers will love and find useful as well.
Four books pulled ahead of the others in terms of how often they appeared in the top five. They are Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine with 20, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie with 18, The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton with 16, and American Born Chinese by Gene Yang with 13.
Until next week.