Becoming Naomi Leon

Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. What are the different structures a family can take? What makes a family a family? Develop a personal definition based on your own experiences and observations.

Teaching Suggestion: Students engaging with this open-ended question will begin to explore one of the novel’s central themes: Family: Ideal Versus Reality. The resources below might encourage students to discuss the more abstract ideas about family; they could be used to help generate ideas before answering the question, or they could be used to help students reflect on each other’s responses.

• This 2-minute YouTube video asks the question “What is family?” and includes responses from people of various backgrounds and ages.
• The first 10 minutes of this TED Talk focuses on expanding the definition of family to build better communities and a better world.

Differentiation Suggestion: For advanced learners, consider engaging directly with the notion of ideal versus reality with a graphic organizer, such as a T-chart, individually or as a class. On one side, students could describe what ideals people have about families and which media depictions fuel those ideals. On the other, they could discuss the realities of being in a family.

Personal Connection Prompt

This prompt can be used for in-class discussion, exploratory free-writing, or reflection homework before reading the novel.

A person’s first, middle, and last names can reveal a lot about who they are and where they came from. Names give us clues as to a person’s heritage, cultural background, and sometimes even their social status. Consider your full name. Why did your parents choose your first and middle names? What is the meaning behind them? What about the meaning behind your family name? Do you identify with any of these associations, symbols, or ideas? Do you feel that your full name has a meaning you can live up to? Why or why not?

Teaching Suggestion: Quiet classes who struggle with in-class discussion may benefit from having access to this Personal Connection Prompt the day before so they might ask their families questions about and have time to conduct independent research on the meaning, origin, and popularity of their names. It may be helpful to provide students with this name database or a similar resource in advance.