Burning Up/The Watcher by Caroline B. Cooney/James Howe

Burning Up is a modern-day exploration of a hate crime committed in 1959. Macey and her classmates, who have grown up in an exclusive suburban enclave, visit the inner city, a place they have been taught to fear and avoid. Macey meets an impressive young woman named Venita and begins to see the gross inequities that separate the girls’ neighborhoods, schools, and houses of worship. On the same day, the students narrowly escape an arsonist’s fire, a reference to an incident that consumes Macey and leads her to discover her town’s racist past. Later in the novel Venita is killed by a street gang, and Macey’s commitment to the issue intensifies. As the novel closes, the reader sees the positive outcomes of Macey’s disturbing discoveries about her town as she and her friends are moved to action. Themes include racial prejudice, family issues, peer relationships, and social class. The civil rights movement and civil rights leaders are also discussed.

The Watcher is a disturbing portrait of three troubled teens, set on an island in modern times. Themes include alienation, abuse, loss, family problems, truth, and escape. It is a groundbreaking novel with wide appeal and important social and emotional messages. In the novel, the characters’ individual stories unfold in puzzling bits and pieces, much like the allegorical fantasy the narrator writes as she sits on her perch above the beach.

About the Series:

Novel/Drama curriculum units contain complete lesson plans with preliminary and follow-up work, teacher notes with plot summary, background, and rationale, ready-to-use worksheets, and suggested answers for student questions. These study guides encourage the development of thinking, reading, speaking, research, and writing skills as well as critical thinking skills such as analysis, synthesis, and evaluation.