RESOURCE COLLECTION: Teaching 'Frankenstein' With The New York Times

[Ryan Goble]

Another great resource collection from the New York Times Learning Network

August 4, 2010, 12:26 PM

Teaching ‘Frankenstein’ With The New York Times

By HOLLY EPSTEIN OJALVO AND SHANNON DOYNE

Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesIt’s alive! Go to related theater review »

There are many discoveries to be made when students read “Frankenstein” for the first time – that “Frankenstein” is the name not of a created “monster” but of the scientist who creates him, that the nameless creation himself is a sympathetic, lonely nature-lover, and that the novel raises ever-relevant questions about a range of issues including bioethics, the meaning of life and “the deepest mysteries of creation,” as Mary Shelley herself put it.

Whether you’re introducing Shelley’s gothic masterpiece in a literature, science, ethics and/or philosophy context, here are some resources to complement the reading of the novel. And may you and your students continue to make discoveries as you read it.

Lesson Plans

Lessons About “Frankenstein” and Related Literature:

• Behind the Cover: Researching the History and Context of a Written ...
• The Plot Thickens?
• Space: The Familiar Frontier
• It’s the Same Old Story
• The Horror! The Horror!
• What a Character! Comparing Literary Adaptations
• That’s a Different Story? Considering Narratives By and About Women
• No More Moldy Oldies: Appreciating Classic Texts

Lessons About Cloning, DNA and Scientific Research:

• Scientific Scenes: Creating Plays That Allow Scientists to Observe ...
• Replicating Controversy: Exploring the Human Cloning Debate
• Science Under Control: Analyzing Reasons to Support or Contest Gove...
• Talking ‘Bout Regeneration: Examining Animal Regeneration and its I...
• Cracking the Genetic Code: Exploring the Potential Outcomes of DNA ...
• Cloning Around: Investigating the Ability to Create Human Embryos f...
• Your DNA: What Can You Afford (Not) To Know?: Assessing the Effects...

Selected Resources From NYTimes.com

• Are Scientists Playing God? It Depends on Your Religion
  Article on Western and Eastern religious perspectives on genetic research.
• How Much of the Body is Replaceable?
  Interactive feature on how virtually all parts of the body can be fixed, augmented or replaced.
• A Man-Made Monster in Grand Guignol Film Story
  Review of the 1931 movie “Frankenstein,” with a short film clip.
• A Brain on Ice, a Dead Toad and Voila!
  Review of the 1994 movie “Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein,” with a short film clip.
• Bride of Frankenstein
  Shelley biography book review.
• Frankenstein, Meet Your Forefathers
  Review of a History Channel special, “Decoding the Past: In Search of the Real Frankenstein,” about the sources of the Frankenstein myth.
• Dire Wounds, a New Face, a Glimpse in a Mirror
  Article about the case of a French woman who underwent a partial face transplant, which raised many ethical questions. Includes a multimedia graphic.
• Raising the Dead
  Review of Peter Ackroyd’s 2009 novel “The Casebook of Victor Frankenstein.”
• The New Prometheus and His Spurned Creation
  Review of one of two theatrical productions based on “Frankenstein” which appeared on New York stages in 2007.
• On Language: Franken
  William Safire column about the rise of “franken” as a suffix to genetically modified foods.
• Our Life, Between Sea and Oil
  An Op-Ed comparing the Gulf oil spill disaster to the plot of “Frankenstein.”

Check the entire resource collection here.