The First reading assignment for the tenth-grade English class was the classic short novel
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck which tells the story of two men named Lennie Small and George Milton and their struggle through the Great Depression. In this time in History, the American Depression caused a lack of steady jobs and immense amounts of itinerant workers swarming towards the west coast to find work in order to survive. For George and Lennie, they had a harder time keeping a job due to Lennie Small's mental disorder. George, because of this reason, tried to keep it hidden from others while starting off in a new town with a new job. With the completion of this book, we found out that Lennie had killed Curley's Wife (who happened to be the wife of the boss's son); which caused George to make the decision of killing his only friend in life, Lennie Small.
For the project at the end of this book, we had our annual mock trial to decide whether or not George Milton was guilty. Each child was assigned a different role; for example, a character from the book, being apart of the jury, lawyers, and or the journalists. In some cases we even got faculty and students to join in as being apart of the jury! The kids really had a fun time getting to play the role that they could really get into in order to really bring this court case to life!
Below are some photos of the 6th hour English class:
