Tom Sawyer book club

I knew I wanted my kids to read Huckleberry Finn in 8th grade, and to prepare for that I wanted them to first read Tom Sawyer so they had familiarity with the character. You could totally read one without the other, but I wanted them to read the fun adventure story of Tom Sawyer before we get into the heavier topics of slavery and racism of Huck Finn. All told, I happily enjoyed our Tom Sawyer book club, I can’t say The Artist enjoyed it quite as much as I did, but either way it was a fun book and a movie night.

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Tom Sawyer book club

A great deal of our discussion centered around the voice Mark Twain used in Tom Sawyer. The Artist hated with a fiery passion the colloquial terms used, and the misspellings.

I loved it because it added to the character of the story.

We also discussed how Mark Twain wrote this as an adventure story, there was no particular plan for us to dissect the book and find deeper meaning. What does that mean for students and teachers years later trying to find deeper meaning? Are we wrong to do that, or can an author write deeper truths without meaning to?

But, for more formal Tom Sawyer discussion questions:

• Book Companion
• Litchatte

Tom Sawyer book club snacks

When we watched the movie, we watched Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. According to Amazon this movie came out in 2016, but it also seemed familiar, so I’m a bit confused…

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• Treasure map- Nutter Butters with melted chocolate “writing”
• Boat- apple wedges
• rations- sourdough rolls
• engagement ring- for some reason I did peppermints and smarties, I’m not quite sure why this seemed like a good idea when I did it… Maybe they are supposed to represent gems?
• treasure- Nilla wafers, which look kind of like gold coins, though I could have gotten chocolate coins
• fence posts- biscotti
• Tom Sawyer- Sour Patch Kids
• Cigarettes- Pirouettes
• Stolen ham- rolled ham slices with a toothpick
• Fried chicken- Batman has a chicken fingers recipe we tried, this particular rendition didn’t turn out as well as we’d hoped because of the breading we used was too big

So that was our Tom Sawyer book club, I’m glad to finally have this written because I’ve had it sitting there waiting to be written for YEARS! Years I tell you.

I just kept thinking I had already written it, now I can stop saying, “I think I have a Tom Sawyer book club post,” and then discover, nope, nope that’s not there yet for some reason.

And I do highly recommend following this up with a Huckleberry Finn book club.

Some more 7th-grade learning

While I have Tom Sawyer written down as a 6th grade book, we completed our Tom Sawyer book club in 7th grade, so here are some more great 7th grade learning ideas.

• 7th Grade Curriculum Choices
• Princess Bride book club
• Galveston Flood of 1900 history lesson
• Solar Power car lesson

“‘Tom Sawyer (right) and Huck Finn (left)’ (1926) by Frederick Hibbard — Foot of Cardiff Hill North and Main Streets Hannibal (MO) May 2018” by Ron Cogswell is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

“Statue of ‘Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn’ (1926) by Frederick Hibbard — Foot of Cardiff Hill North and Main Streets Hannibal (MO) May 2018” by Ron Cogswell is licensed under CC BY 2.0.