To view the Study Guide, simply follow the links below. On each page of the Study Guide, there are gray arrows to click on which will take you to the next page (just like turning the pages of a book). If you use these arrows/links, you don't need to return to this particular page. Some of the information on these pages also is included under the main headings found on the homepage of the Mockingbird Website. The expanded elements suggested in the print version of the Study Guide are linked in light blue on each of the web pages.
SCOUT'S VISION:The vision to reunite the cast and creative team from the TKM movie, putting them in touch with today's students who were not born when the film was made, belongs to Mary Badham (Scout). Her concern was that the telling of the story of how the film was made -the oral history of the making of TKM- would be lost to this and subsequent generations of young people:"This film not only carries a message that is crucial to get across to each new generation of young people, but I want them to know that something very special went into the making of the film for each person who was part of the creative team. The film was made with a mission. And it is important that this story be told to this generation of students so that they can pass it on as part of how the film is remembered." Mary shared these words with Prince William County Schools during a 1994 presentation. Her strong belief in the power of this film to bring people together around the issues that are so hard to face and her desire to pass on the story of the making of TKM has led this 35th anniversary celebration of the film's realease and to this Lyceum on To Kill a Mockingbird: Then and Now. |
Many high
schools in America teach To Kill a Mockingbird (TKM) every year, and we are going
to celebrate it! One of our special guests for the lyceum is Claudia Durst
Johnson, noted Harper Lee scholar and author. Johnson has written the text,
Understanding To Kill a Mockingbird: A Student Casebook to Issues, Sources, and
Historic Documents, and she will share her ideas with us in Program 1. Johnson
has maintained a personal relationship with the very private author over the
years and will share her insights about Harper Lee. We begin the Study Guide with
her reminder of why TKM is deserving of this forum:
"Harper Lee's novel is one of the best-selling books in the nation's history. Within a year To Kill a Mockingbird had sold 500,000 copies. By 1975 11,113,909 copies had sold, and by 1982 over 15,000,000 had sold. By 1992 18 million copies of paperback editions alone had sold. It has never been out of print in 35 years. To Kill a Mockingbird is frequently cited by readers as the book that has made the biggest difference in their lives. The novel's enduring impact goes beyond the period when integration and the struggle for equal rights were paramount. Its influence has been enduring because it allows the reader, through the lives of children, 'to walk around in the shoes' of people who are different from ourselves. The novel challenges our stereotypes of the Southerner, the African American, the eccentric, the child, the young lady. At the same time that many people see characters and social situations in different ways after reading the novel, they also recapture some part of their own youth in the story with its characters. The novel's universal and lasting appeal comes in part from the reader's nostalgia for the time of innocence in which children live before harsh truths enter their lives." Read through this Study Guide. It offers a fresh approach to new information, ideas, and resources. You may photocopy any parts of the Guide that would be useful as handouts for your students in preparation for the teleconferences. You may videotape the live broadcasts for use within your school and use the tapes as a resource for one year. Permission to continue use after one year is required by written request to Prince William Network. |
