What if your choices were taken away? What if taking your choices away made you safer, and healthier? The freedom to choose is one of the important ideas covered in the Newberry-Award-winning novel, by Lois Lowry, named The Giver.

I have taught this book every year I've been in middle school, since 1997, and it is one of my favorites. One of the best things about this book, by accident, is that there is no clear answer for what happens here. If you think that the book meant something specific...the sequels and movie say something else, so there is no clear answer. This may be frustrating, but it makes for good discussions, not just about the book itself, but also about choices...those that the author made as she wrote the book. Why would she change her mind?

We will use The Giver to discuss society along with what the author might be trying to say as she wrote it. Is it important to be unique? And at what price?

Connected texts to accompany The Giver:

Frost, Robert. "The Road Not Taken." 1916
McBirney, Jessica. "Total Control in North Korea." 2016
Ornes, Stephen. "Drones Put Spying Eyes in the Sky." 2014
Owen, Wilfred. "Dulce et Decorum Est." 1921
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. "Nazi Germany's 'Euthanasia' Program." 2016



The Giver will be the first book of the year, in the first few weeks.

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