Teaching students in an effective, fun and informative way has been the challenge of educators for decades. I had a lightbulb moment when I realized that my passion could be used to bring a richer understanding of social studies. I love reading historical fiction, so today I am talking about using historical fiction books to supplement textbooks. For starters, I want to talk about what a historical fiction book is. Sarah Johnson writes in her article “Defining the Genre: What are the rules for historical fiction?” that “the usual generic definition – “fiction set in the past” — is true for the most part… my journal, the Historical Novels Review, has a working definition..To us, a “historical novel” is a novel which is set fifty or more years …show more content…
Historical fiction may be misinterpreted by students or cause biased opinions; however, I say that historical fiction books should be part of the curriculum because students will feel more connected to history, will be more interested in it and historical fiction crosses a lot more subjects than just social studies.
Lets look at an example of a historical book. A Million Shades of Grey by Cynthia Kadohata. This book follows a young boy, Y’Tin, and his elephant, Lady. Lady flees into the jungle when the North Vietnamese attack Y’Tin’s village. Y’Tin is captured by the NVA but manages to escape with his best friend. They meet up with the elephants and another trainer, Tomas. Y’Tin feels frustrated as they become a “we”. He feels left out but remembers his Father’s philosophy: “The jungle changes a man.” This book taught me about the Vietnam War; however, maybe more importantly, I learned a lot of ethics and life lessons. Things that they don't teach in school. Also, A Million Shades of Grey has a lot of action. Kids will be interested in reading books that have adventure and action. In just this book, you get history, geography, life lessons, politics, science and more. You could use historical fiction books to teach science, say a book about a famous