Holes

Holes

• Genre: Fiction; young adult magical realism
• Originally Published: 1998
• Reading Level/Interest: Lexile 660L; grades 6-8
• Structure/Length: 50 chapters; approx. 233 pages; approx. 4 hours, 30 minutes on audio
• Protagonist and Central Conflict: Fourteen-year-old Stanley Yelnats is sent to a juvenile detention center in the desert after being wrongly accused of stealing a pair of sneakers. The boys there must dig a hole five feet wide and five feet deep every day, supposedly to build character, but the truth involves entangled family histories and the troubled history of Camp Green Lake.
• Potential Sensitivity Issues: Abusive treatment of minors; historical racism

Louis Sachar, Author

• Bio: Born in 1954 in East Meadow, New York; moved to California at age nine; became an avid reader in high school; earned a degree in economics from UC Berkeley and later a law degree; earned college credits for helping out in an elementary school, which inspired his first book, Sideways Stories from Wayside School; worked part-time as a lawyer until he could make a living writing children’s books; wrote screenplay for film adaptation of Holes (released in 2003); lives in Texas
• Other Works: Sideways Stories from Wayside School (1978); There’s a Boy in the Girls’ Bathroom (1988); Small Steps (sequel to Holes; 2006); Fuzzy Mud (2015)
• Awards: National Book Award for Young People’s Literature (1998); Newbery Medal (1999); Time magazine 100 Best YA Books of All Time (2021)

CENTRAL THEMES connected and noted throughout this Teaching Unit:

• Fate Is Powerful
• True Friendship Is Lifechanging
• The Past Has a Strong Influence on the Present

STUDY OBJECTIVES: In accomplishing the components of this Unit, students will:

• Develop an understanding of the social and cultural contexts of juvenile camps that incite Stanley’s conflict.
• Study paired texts and other resources to make connections via the text’s themes of Fate Is Powerful, True Friendship Is Lifechanging, and The Past Has a Strong Influence on the Present.
• Plan and design a nonprofit organization that supports the experience of Stanley and Zero based on details from the novel.
• Analyze and evaluate the plot and character details to draw conclusions in structured essay responses regarding flashbacks, friendship, and other topics.