Student Question
Where can I find study guides or lesson plans for "About a Boy"?
Quick answer:
Finding study guides or lesson plans for "About a Boy" is challenging as few resources are published. While Enotes lacks a full study guide, exploring the novel with students and incorporating their feedback can be effective. Integrating the popular film adaptation into lessons might enhance engagement. A thematic approach focusing on discussions and personal connections, rather than traditional assessments, can make the teaching process more dynamic and interactive.
I'm sure you have already conducted a basic search-engine exploration and found that very little has been published or even journaled about in the way of teaching this novel in the classroom. Enotes has not yet published a full study guide for the novel either, but the links below will take you to a few resource pages that might help you get started. It also seems the movie is much more popular than the book, so finding a way to tie to the film back to the text might be interesting.
My best advice for creating lesson plans on a novel that is not only new to you, but not widely used, is to explore it with your students and build your lessons together. I will actually tell a class that this is my first time to teach a book, and that I would appreciate their help and input on a daily basis for developing my curriculum for future classes. (Most students love the opportunity to be part of the "teaching" side of things.) I always enjoy taking on a new text that isn't so "overdone" that nothing seems fresh and new (either to me as a teacher or to my students). Often, a thematic approach is the easiest for me to use in such unit planning. Instead of quizzes and exams which assess vocabulary, technical details, or fact recollection, I try to conduct discussions that lean toward personal responses, connections, and conclusions.
Then, as I teach the novel in subsequent years, I add components that come up with frequency and heighten lessons revolving around subjects (or chapters) that students seemed to enjoy.
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