Garage sales, Book Hoarding, and The Alchemist

Every summer, I look forward to a few different things.  Beach days, reading, sleeping in, and garage sales.  I know some people are automatically cringing at the thought of smelly old clothes and boring “antiques”.  But before your face gets stuck like that  ;) … read on! 

Garage sales are an excellent way of revamping your classroom library.  Teens get tired of their childhood books, college kids get tired of their teen books, or parents get tired of clutter and sell … regardless, I’ve scored a lot of books much cheaper than even Scholastic from garage sales.  That being said, I am something of a book hoarder.  I often buy books and don’t end up reading them until a few months or even years later.

When I began teaching at the middle school I’m at now (a good three and a half years ago) I saw that the 8th grade students were reading the Alchemist.  Over the summer, at a garage sale, I picked up the book.  It has been sitting on my bookshelf, untouched until this morning. 

I’m expecting I’ll finish it soon, because it’s an easy and interesting read.  I love that this book transports me first into Spain (have visited) and then to a few different areas of Africa (never visited).  I love the fact that I’m remembering what the lands of Spain were like and learning about African lands and deserts at the same time. 

It starts off with a boy named Santiago who is a shepherd.  He is content, but has dreams that nudge at him.  He sees a gypsy who tells him to travel to the Egyptian pyramids to find his treasure.  Santiago doesn’t really believe her, but comes across a man who claims to be a king.  Santiago doesn’t believe him at first either, but the king writes down personal information about Santiago and his family.  He has Santiago’s attention, and from there begins Santiago’s journey to find treasure and his personal legend. 

This book is philosophical but in a refreshingly simple way.  It’s about paying attention to omens and surroundings and choosing the right path.  Although this book might be too high for my 6th graders, I would pair “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost for a text to text connection with this novel if teaching it.