Dystopian Reader's Response Assignments

So far grade 7/8, in ELA you have completed....

SECTION 1 - "MAKING PREDICTIONS"
 Reader's Response #1 on Kidblog. This connection to Section #1 reading. In your first reader's response, you were to focus on Section #1:"Making Predictions" (see the full description of what you are to complete on the handout given in class) and respond to the assigned questions.... 1 .What's your prediction for the the end of the novel? 2. Which character will experience the biggest change? 3. How will the book end? What are the clues from Section #1? 4. How does the setting show a dystopian society or dystopian control?

FAKEBOOK ASSIGNMENT - Create a Fakebook page for a character from your novel.  Be sure to include a Bio (hometown, likes, dislikes, favourite things, parents, when you were born), add "friends", start adding a few posts from your character's perspective that connect to events in Section 1 of the novel.
Remember to also create a Fakebook character and add it to Kidblog. This page will be added to this classroom blog, so that students (and parents) can check out your progress!


SECTION 2 "DEEP THINKING QUESTIONS"
Today, we explored questions that you may have as you read, as well as questions that I think you should think about (that connect to reading strategies). Compose responses to the questions below and other Deep Thinking Questions that you have. Write this response in Word, then copy/paste into kidblog.
*Identify - Author's message? Author's intent for writing the book? What is the main idea or theme? What kind of dystopian novel is it?
*Infer - What is the underlying message of the text? What is being said between the lines? Fill in the gaps about what you already know and what you've read.
*Connections - Make connections between Section 1 and 2 and other aspects of your life or the world we live in.
     **Make personal connections/TEXT TO SELF (characters and people you know... events and the impact on the character and how you can connect to it...);
     **Make world connections/TEXT TO WORLD (What events in this novel can you connect to in our world today or in history?? Remember we are studying a unit in Social Studies Which explores resources and quality of life... this should connect. Maybe explore the role of technology in our world with the role of technology in the novel. Is "Big Brother" watching our every move or are we freely posting our every move to social media sites like, Facebook and Twitter??;
    **Make connections to other texts, or movies, or novels, or tv shows/ TEXT TO TEXT. Is there something else that you have seen or read that reminds you of this book? Explain the connection with specific events from the novel.

FAKEBOOK ASSIGNMENT- Add details to your Fakebook for your character. Add more interactions between characters. Compose a "Rant" on behalf of your character. The main objective of the rant is to allow you to "tap" into the emotions of your character and what they feel. Your Rant must connect to the theme of the novel or the current state that your world is in. How did the actions of your "ancestors" (that's us) allow it to get to this point? What rights did they enjoy that you no longer enjoy? How was their world or environment different than theirs? What are they missing out on??

The following questions may help you compose your Rant. If you are reading...
1. The Hunger Games - Your rant should be about why you live in the districts. Why do you have no choice in jobs or what district you live in? Why do you not have any say in the government or how things are run? Why is there so little food in your district while the Capitol lives on plenty? Why is so much violence televised in a reality tv show considered "entertainment"? How did violence and suffering becoming entertainment? How did people become so insensitive to the plight of others?

2. Maze Runner - Your rant might be about how you are a "guinea pig" or a "hamster" in a maze and that  you can feel someone is watching you and messing with not only your life, but in your survival! How would you feel if the time when the sun rises and sets was controlled? How would you feel if you had no choice but to live in cramped quarters like the "buggin' Glade"? How did people give up control? How did people lose their rights so that they lost control over their lives and could be treated like a scientific experiment?

3. Divergent - Your rant might be about the lack of choice you have in the faction that you are sent to. How you have no choice but to pass the tests or join the pathetic ranks of the Factionless. You might be upset that you no longer can interact with your family if they are not part of your faction. You might be upset by the brutality of the tests, or the ruthlessness of other people in your faction. You might wonder why your ancestors encouraged this fragmenting of society. What lead to this?

4. Matched - Your rant might be that the computer is deciding not only what you eat, what you do for fun, what you study, what you become when you get older, but who you marry. Why did your ancestors allow it to get this point that a computer decided based on a questionnaire who you should be matched with? Why did choice disappear? Why did the people become so dependent on the computer making decisions? Why does the computer decide when people should die of old age? Why is everything so strictly scheduled?

5. Eleventh Plague - Your rant might be the current state of the environment? Why did governments push their anger to the point of a catastrophic war? Why did governments of the past release a virus that would wipe civilization? Why are you in  a state where there is no government? No economy? No industry? ... Nothing but vigilants who roam the countryside fighting over resources... How did things get to get so desolate? What were the warning signs of the past that your ancestors ignored? How do you feel about your life now??