BACK TO THE 50s

As part of our 9th grade Honors Literary Genres novel unit, Mr. Hittle and his classes have been covering Ray Bradbury's 1953 dystopian classic Fahrenheit 451. While it is fascinating and a little creepy to note how accurately he predicted the future (AirPods! Reality TV! iPad kids! The slippery slope of censorship!) we've also been taking the opportunity to look back to the 1950s and the cultural pivot points that spurred Bradbury to write his sci-fi masterpiece.

Working in small groups, the students have been researching topics such as WWII-era book burnings, the atomic age, the Red Scare, suburbanization, consumerism, and the rise of television. The research will then culminate in fun TikTok-style explainer videos teaching the rest of the class about each mid-century topic - and maybe discovering that history often repeats itself.