B2 – Rereading books as adults

The recent release of the Polish movie Chłopi (The Peasants) based on a classic novel of the same title, written by Władysław Reymont, has sparked a lot of conversations in my classroom about revisiting obligatory readings as adults and seeing them from a different perspective. It made me think of all the other books we were forced to read as teenagers and whether our feelings about them would differ if we read them now.

I am pleased to say that I rediscovered this book before it was popular and felt I understood all the characters and the motives behind their actions. Many of my Polish students were excited to see this movie at the cinema and afterwards revisited the book they used to hate in high school and rediscovered it all over again. If you have no idea what I am talking about, have a look at the trailer below, and I hope that you will be able to watch this Oscar-nominated film online.

If you and your students had a similar experience of suffering while reading obligatory books at school, why don’t you talk about their most and least favourite books from their childhood/adolescence and discuss whether rereading books is worthwhile? Scroll to the end to get the presentation, the worksheet, and the teacher’s notes for free.

Start the class by writing on the whiteboard Think about three books – you loved and hated as a child or a teenager. Give them a minute or two to pick their books and think of some reasons to justify their choices. As a group, compare the books. If you teach groups from the same country, there is a high chance that some books will repeat, leading to an interesting discussion. Ask students to explain the reasons why they loved or hated the books mentioned and whether they have ever tried rereading some of their childhood books as adults. Speculate if it is possible to start loving the books we hated and hate the books we used to love as children.

Get ready for a discussion. Write on the whiteboard Is it worthwhile to reread books?, and divide students into two groups.

• Group A discusses the reasons for rereading books.
• Group B discusses the reasons against rereading books.

Once the groups create their lists with reasons, mix the groups and ask a student from group A to debate a student from group B and decide whether rereading books is worthwhile or a complete waste of time. Elicit some ideas from different pairs and compare the answers.

Say that students are about to read a short blog post from a blogger named Jenniely, titled Why Rereading Books is Worthwhile: Rediscovering Old Favourites. Students read the blog post quickly and decide whether the author believes rereading books is worthwhile. Discuss the answers and ask students to read it again and think of good headings for each paragraph. Compare and discuss the answers.

Proceed by reading three (AI-generated!) quotes from different speakers and matching them to each paragraph. Once again, as a group, discuss which quotes resonate with them and why. Discuss if they disagree with any of the quotes and ask them to justify their opinions.

Finally, head back to the list of the least favourite books students created at the beginning of the class. Let them discuss as a group if, after today’s class, they would like to revisit any of the books. If yes, which ones? If not, ask them to explain why they think it isn’t worthwhile. Think of some other books that didn’t make it to their lists or any other books that are usually universally hated. Do they believe they can be hated because they are read by people who aren’t ready to fully comprehend what they read?

If you find yourself with some spare time on your hands, you can divide students into small groups or pairs and ask them to go over four statements about reading books at school as teenagers and people’s general reading habits.

Have you ever revisited an old book? Has your perception of the book changed over time?