"American Born Chinese" - Gene Luen Yang

American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang was my first graphic novel that I have ever read completely, and I must say I was a fan! One major thing that I enjoyed about the graphic novel was that the audience is able to watch the dialogue play out and see the characters body language. When I read I play the story out in my mind and a graphic novel paints the image clearly.

In my cooperating classroom we use a variety of traditional literature, and I would never have thought about including a graphic novel; however, after reading this one I would find it beneficial in the classroom. With working specifically on American Born Chinese students could focus on Chinese mythology, racism, stereotypes, and character development.

Using American Born Chinese and graphic novels in general, teachers are able to introduce the reading strategy of making an inference. My students have been reading The Lord of the Flies and I have found from my cooperating classroom that making an inference can be a particularly difficult reading strategy to teach and have students become comfortable with. My cooperating teacher and I have been struggling with illustrating how readers need to “read between the lines” and combine their schema knowledge (what you already know) with what they read.  Making an inference seems very abstract, and students struggle with grasping the concept. As a result of this I think that a graphic novel would help students be able to use the images and the dialogue in order to read between the lines and make inferences.

One obstacle that I could see with a graphic novel could be that students may get bored because of the level of reading. When I was reading American Born Chinese I found that it only took me an hour or so to finish it because the dialogue was easy to read and follow. One way to overcome this would be to teach the graphic novel in sections, or only use it as a supporting literature and not the main focus.