The Brainstorm Vol 46: Dystopia books for K-12 classrooms

I saw in a BookRiot post this week, that it's Post-Apocalyptic Survival Month. I've had an idea to talk about some atypical Dystopias for some time, and it seems like it is quite fitting right now. So here's three Dystopias that don't fit the typical mold and could be used in K-12 classrooms.

(And if you're curious, here's the link to the post. And no, the post wasn't a list of Dystopia books like I thought it would be, it was much more practical.)

Picture Book Resource

The Numberlys by William Joyce, ill. by Christina Ellis
The Numberlys live in a world where all communication is done with numbers. But one day, five friends start to wonder if there could be more than numbers. Eventually, they develop the alphabet, which brings color (and jellybeans) to their world.

Activity Tie-ins:

• Alphabet: For those working on their letters, this is another book option to help them practice.
• Letters, Words & Meaning: This book not only introduces the alphabet, it also talks about how letters join to form words and words join to form meaning. So it would be a good book to use when talking about the structure of language.
• Linguistics: The Numberlys pretty much invent a whole new language, so this is a good book to use when talking about how languages develop and change, or different types of languages.
• Counting & Number Recognition: Obviously there's numbers in this, and they aren't necessarily always in numerical order, so it's a good book to use to test whether kids actually can recognize their numbers.
• Art, Design & Mood: The artwork in this book has a huge role in setting the mood of the story. It starts off very stark, art deco-influenced, and all in gray scale. As letters enter the world, color starts to infiltrate the pictures. It would be a fantastic book for middle and high school art classes to analyze and discuss why the architecture and color palate was chosen. Also, many of the pages are printed in a non-traditional direction, and art classes could talk about why the illustrator and designers decided to do this.
• Community Improvement: The main characters aren't anyone really special in the society, but they dream up something that helps improve the entire community. Like the Numberlys, students can probably see areas of their communities that need help. Challenge them to think of ways, even small ways to help make their community a better place.

Chapter Book Resources

Sky Jumpers by Peggy Eddleman

WWIII’s green bombs left unexpected side effects on earth, like patches of denser than normal atmosphere called Bomb’s Breath which proves fatal to anyone or anything that breathes it (but is super fun to jump through), and Shadel’s Sickness, a disease that only appeared after the war and is cured with medicine made from a mold that only grew after the war. Cities are now few and far between on the Earth, and all are vigilant against the bandits who prefer to raid cities than grow their own food. 

Hope lives in the city of White Rock, which thanks to the crater formed by a bomb, has a natural wall. Everyone in White Rock is heavily encouraged to invent since another side effect of the green bombs was the scrambling of the electromagnetic field so magnets and electronics from before the war no longer work. Hope always tries really hard to invent something for the yearly festival, but she only seems to be good at failing more miserably than anyone else in town. She despairs of ever being useful, until the unthinkable happens and bandits come to White Rock not for food, but for their precious antibiotics. Hope is one of the few people in town adventurous enough to know of another way out of the city, so she knows it is up to her to escape from the bandits, get over the mountains, and get help from the next town before the bandits start killing people with their guns or the theft of the antibiotics.

Activity Tie-ins:

• Magnets & Electronics: The premise of the book says that all inventions based on magnets and electronics no longer work. Students could start to brainstorm all the things they use everyday that wouldn't work. They should quickly realize how much they rely on these things they don't usually think about. Students could also discuss which new inventions in the book they liked the best and why. Along the same lines, students could be challenged to think of non-electrical way to do something they normally use an electric device for.
• Density: The Bomb's Breath is an important part of the story, and provides an opportunity to talk about the theoretical physics and chemistry about why it works the way it does.
• Antibiotics in History: The discovery of antibiotics for Shadel's Sickness mimics the discovery of penicillin. Students could research how the two are similar and different, and how antibiotics work.
• Inventions: There's a lot of focus on inventing in White Rock. It's a good opportunity to discuss the importance of inventions in real life, and the various ways inventions come about.
• Self-Worth: Hope struggles with feeling unimportant because she isn't good at inventing, and it is one of the things her society values most. It's a good opportunity to talk about where we get our self-worth.
• Values & Ethics: Most Dystopias focus on what a society values for good or evil. It provides a good opportunity to open up discussions with students about their values, how others view those values, and the relationship to philosophy and ethics.
• Problem Solving: White Rock's survival is heavily dependent on the problem solving of it's citizens. Even though Hope isn't good at inventing, she does prove to be a problem solver in others ways. Have students discuss what problem solving skills various characters use and how they themselves use problem solving in their lives.
• Dystopia for Middle Grades: The typical Dystopia has a lot of violence. This one has only one gun shot wound and one injury from a fall.  It is one of my go-to Dystopias for middle grade readers. It's still an exciting and adventurous read, but without the more mature content. And if students like it, there's a second book in the series that is just as fun and safe.

Atlantia by Ally Condie

Rio's world shattered with one simple phrase from her twin sister's mouth. Rio had dreamed of going Above for ages, but only one family member is allowed Above, so Bay's choice seals Rio to Atlantia, the world Below. And beyond Bay's choice, Rio just can't believe that her sister could have done this. Bay made her promise to stay Below with her and then all of a sudden Bay ups and chooses to leave? The secrets in Atlantia seem to only multiply after Bay's departure. Rio is determined to make it Above some other way, even though everyone tells her it is impossible, but as she seeks a way out and some sort of answer to Bay's choice, Rio just stumbles on more and more secrets. From the sister she thought she knew, her mother's mysterious and sudden death, her aloof and odd aunt, the history of the sirens, the current Minister's plans, the origin of Atlantia and the gods, and even the truth about the Above, nothing is as clear as she thought it was. With the help of True, a young man also devastated by the choice of someone to go Above, Rio builds her plans to escape Atlantia and to find some much-needed truths.

For much of the first half of this story, it seems to be mainly about Rio finding a way to escape Atlantia and get Above, but as the secrets start to multiply, the plot gains depth and so many layers it is really hard to write a summary that does it any justice. Condie manages to build a sci-fi futuristic setting that is entirely plausible and interesting. Rio and True are complex, flawed, wounded, but likable characters (and they don't get overly mushy or sappy!). But the two things that make this book stand out among all the YA Dystopias out there are that it is a stand alone novel (yep, no series), and a resolution is reached by...peace talks. Yes, you read that right, violence is not the answer.

Activity Tie-ins:

• Compare & Contrast: Because this book is so atypical for YA Dystopia, it makes a perfect candidate to be compared and contrasted with other more typical ones.
• Paths to Peace: Many Dystopias rally the characters to fight for peace with weapons and forget that sometimes there are less-violent options. Have students discuss or investigate how this works in real life or students could debate which they think is more effective.
• Values & Ethics: Like I mentioned for Sky Jumpers, Dystopias provide a good opportunity to open up discussions with students about personal or societal values, philosophy, and ethics.
• Cleaner Dystopia option: There is still some death and bits of violence in this book, but the language is clean and there's no sexual content. Among the YA options out there, this is one of the cleanest, so if you're on the hunt for a less gritty YA read, this is a good one. And don't be worried that that means students won't like it, because this one is hardly ever on the shelves. It's super popular.