Young Adult Literature Questionnaire

Background Information

Name _Jacob Johnston

_________________________________________________________________

Teaching Experience; How many years have you been teaching and in what
grades/subject areas?
_____I have taught for five years now. I taught 7th-12th grade at an alterative school in
Rome, GA for my first two years and have taught the last four years at a rural high school
in south Georgia teaching mainly 10th graders.
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
____

Why are you taking this particular course?

___I am taking this course in part because it’s required for the degree I need to be a school
librarian. It will also be useful for when I become a media specialist for obvious reasons.
I also hope to work in a high school media center, so the young adult literature is a much
more appropriate course for me as I will be working with young adult literature in my
future media centers. I also haven’t read anything that would qualify for young adult
literature in years.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________

Young Adult Literature

How would you define young adult literature?

__It’s literature that is at a reading level appropriate for students in middle and high
school, but may still contain challenging topics and deal with real world issues.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________

Please list some of your favorite young adult authors and/or titles:
__The favorite title I taught is The Giver which deals with some definitely serious topics.
When I was actually a young adult, my favorite books ever were the Lord of the Rings
and Ender’s War series.
_______________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
______________________________

How often do use young adult literature in your own classroom? Can you describe a
positive teaching experience using young adult literature from your classroom?
___As a high school literature teacher, I use it on a regular basis, although more in the
form of short stories in our textbook than in novels. I typically teach A Long Way Gone, a
memoir by a former child soldier from Sierra Leone, as my long piece. With the semester
system we’re on and our focus on preparing for the graduation writing test, I don’t have
as much time to teach other long
works.__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________

Have you ever felt or encountered resistance to teaching/reading young adult literature
rather than more classical pieces from the canon or junior canon? ___In our school, no. In fact, when I
started teaching at the school, they were still teaching books like Holes, in the lower level
literature classes. The push to increase the level of the literature taught happened after my
first year, but we rarely reach for the classics until the senior
year.____________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
_______________________________

Many young adult novels today are what some call the “problem novel” and deal with
sensitive or controversial topics. The topics listed below are featured in many young
adult books. Using the spaces below, please indicate which topics you would feel
comfortable addressing through young adult literature.

Comfortable Not Comfortable Unsure

• Teen Pregnancy __X__ ____ ____

• Homosexuality ____ __X__ ____
• Racism __X__ ____ ____
• Sexual Abuse ____ __X__ ____
• Date Rape ____ __X__ ____
• Drug Abuse __X__ ____ ____
• AIDS/STDs __X__ ____ ____
Comments: Please include any comments about your answers regarding controversial
issues in young adult literature. _A teacher in my school once had problems with parents
for teaching Something Wicked this Way Comes because she was accused of teaching
devil worship or something of the like, so I really would not feel comfortable teaching
something that dealt with homosexuality or other sexual topics in this community,
although within the contexts of this course, I’d have no problem with that. I already deal
with some of the other topics in my normal literature
course.__________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
__.

Goals for the Future

What are some goals or outcomes you personally have for the class? How can the course
content best improve your knowledge and practice? _I’d mostly like to be exposed to
more quality young adult literature so that I can have a better idea of how to stock my
future media center.
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
____.

Any other comments or concerns?

__None._________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
________.
Thank-you!!