Gregor the Overlander by Suzanne Collins

Collins, Suzanne. Gregor the Overlander. Scholastic, 2003.

Lexile Level: 690L

Gregor the Overlander is a lovely, challenging book that surprised me many times. What I found particularly interesting about the book was the sense of scope that was developed by the author, Suzanne Collins. The Underworld feels massive, and is populated by, both shockingly and completely reasonably, enormous rats and insects. It's interesting to see the humans living in fear of the animals, for a change. The story line, that of a boy who is the hero of prophecy, is a bit trite, but it works well within the context of the book. If I were trying to hook a child into reading this book, I would consider telling them that this is a story about a boy who falls into an underground world and is destined to save those he finds. Or I might tell them that it's from the same author as The Hunger Games.

Learning Activity

For this learning activity, students will be asked to create either a map of Regalia, or an image depicting part of the city of the Underlanders. There are numerous descriptions of the city and its buildings, particularly in chapter 5, as Gregor first enters the city.

Learning Standards

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.4.1
Refer to details and examples in a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.4.3
Describe in depth a character, setting, or event in a story or drama, drawing on specific details in the text (e.g., a character's thoughts, words, or actions).

Goal

The goal of this activity is to encourage students to use the information given by the text in order to convey their understanding of one of the key environments in this story.

Objective

This activity will engage the students' psychomotor and cognitive abilities, as it requires both an understanding of the text, and the ability to transfer that understanding to an image.

Outcome

The outcome of this activity is that students will have created a drawing depicting the city of Regalia in some form.

Activity originally found at http://www.teachinginroom6.com/2014/03/responding-to-literature-gregor.html