By Bryan Adkins and Carmelita Dallaire
For the Carter County Times
As a middle school teacher, it’s hard to get students excited for any assignment. Most of the time, they are just seen as the next bit of drudgery until they can get to a break somewhere in the year. The exception to that rule is when we read The Outsiders, S.E. Hinton’s quintessential novel about class struggle in 1960’s Oklahoma. This novel always grabs their attention because every middle school student feels like an outsider.
After reading this story, my students have the choice of several final projects to express their understanding of the story and the ideas behind it. Some students write timelines, some create paintings, and some write reviews of the story. This year, one of my 8th grade English Language Arts students at East Carter Middle School, Carmelita Dallaire, submitted the following review of this classic novel which I am proud to share with you here:
This year the 8th grade class read the book “The Outsiders”. This book was a heartfelt story that was told from a teen boy’s point of view and tells the many events in his life and the story of his friends and family. While reading this book it projects a great deal of feeling and has relatable emotions intertwined in it. The book is narrated by the main character “Ponyboy Curtis.” Ponyboy and the gang (his friends) live on the side of town that has less money. The people in this side of town are called “greasers.” The kids on the other side of town are wealthier and are called “Socs.” The Greasers and Socs don’t get along which causes many fights and other problems.
I noticed when reading this story with my classmates everyone took this book a different way. Some saw the emotional side of it, others saw the funny sides, but out of all the sides that this book could be looked at, everyone saw how hard these kids had it. Everyone noticed the heroic scenes along with sad parts of this book. While my class was reading this book we all were invested in what was going on and wanted to know what happened next. Most of us didn’t want to stop reading when we got started.
When our teachers first started telling us about reading this book I was a bit skeptical. I’m not the type who gets into reading books from school but, while reading this book I stayed interested the whole way through. I love that we read this in 8th grade while we are going through changes in our lives. This book talks about being outsiders or outcasts in their neighborhood and how big events change their lives. As an 8th grader I know that around my age is when kids start changing and start finding out who they want to be. So, this story is perfect to read for the first time in 8th grade but is great for any age. I noticed that while our teachers were reading to us the words in this book were understood more in depth to them. Some of them were emotionally hit hard while reading. I believe that reading this as an adult would pass off different emotions and have a bigger impact on people’s lives. I hope by reading this article the urge will arise to read this wonderful book and get the experience that our East Carter Middle School 8th grade students have experienced this year.
