Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. What is PTSD? How can trauma affect a person?

Teaching Suggestion: Claudia experiences PTSD throughout the novel, to the point where she dissociates and confuses the timeline of events. Having some background about the effects of PTSD could help students understand the novel more fully. Discussing this topic before reading could help the class remember the gravity of the issues in the novel as they read and discuss, even when some parts of the reading are uncomfortable.

• “The Many Forms, Faces And Causes Of PTSD” from NPR includes an 11-minute listen and a shorter article about PTSD.
• This document from the National Child Traumatic Stress Network contains two pages of background, facts, and ways to help a person dealing with traumatic stress. It focuses more on young people and dissociation.

2. How important is a physical home and community? How does gentrification affect neighborhoods?

Teaching Suggestion: The gentrification of Monday’s neighborhood provides a central focus in the setting, plot, and theme. Monday’s family and neighbors are being forcibly pushed out of their homes. This immense stress contributes to multiple deaths and abuse. Studying the complexities of gentrification can help students more fully understand the novel. The Teen Vogue article could be a chance for additional research using the included links. The article from The Guardian offers a more personal exploration of the topic and focuses largely on the city in the novel: Washington, D.C. It also includes images, which could help students visualize the setting.

• In The Guardian’s “The Gentrification of Washington DC: How My City Changed Its Colours,” Uzodinma Iweala reflects on gentrification in Washington, D.C. from both a personal and societal lens.
• “What Is Gentrification? How It Works, Who It Affects, and What to Do About It” is a Teen Vogue article exploring gentrification. It includes links to other resources for additional research.

Short Activity

What makes a good friend? Spend some time individually researching friendship. You may use the resources here or others you find and trust. Prepare to discuss in your small group.

Teaching Suggestion: The friendship between Claudia and Monday is at the heart of this novel. Taking some time to research, reflect on, and discuss friendship can provide students a chance to evaluate their own relationships and give the class some common language to discuss the friendships in the novel.

• In “What Makes a Good Friend?” Kidscape offers friendship advice to young people, including ways to handle an unhealthy relationship.
• “Good Friends (for Teens)” from Nemours Teens Health explores some aspects of friendship that can be frightening, including running away, suicide, and addiction.

Differentiation Suggestion: Learners with executive functioning differences might benefit from conducting the research whole-class. Alternatively, chunking the research into smaller pieces might help. Each person could get a different specific section from the websites and a specific question to answer. For example, the first page of the Kidscape resource includes a list of 10 ideas about friendship; these could be divided among 10 students. Additionally, the Teens Health resource has options to listen to the links.

Personal Connection Prompt

This prompt can be used for in-class discussion, exploratory free-writing, or reflection homework before reading the novel.

What are specific ways in which we might make our school a kinder place?

Teaching Suggestion: Claudia and Monday experience bullying. Exploring this topic and how to lead with kindness offers a chance to build community in the class and larger school. It can also lead to a clearer discussion of key scenes in the book. StopBullying.gov offers a chance to include additional research.

• Stop Bullying.gov includes links with information about different types of bullying and how to improve the school climate.