When You Reach Me

Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. Can the end happen before the beginning? What do you know about time travel?

Teaching Suggestion: While reading the novel, students might get caught up in trying to understand time travel, or in imagining its many possibilities, which might hinder or enhance attention to the literary elements of the text. Use this question to help get ahead of some of the inevitable tangents the time-travel plot may cause.

• NASA’s kid-friendly explainer of time-travel. This resource is not as fantastical as other sources, advanced theories, or science fiction literature/film.
• Articles from Space.com and Cosmos Magazine are more conceptually complex, but written in simple language.
• This Big Think video has several scientists breaking down the concept of time. Astrophysicist Michelle Thaller’s segment is the most simple, engaging, and straightforward.

Short Activity

What do you know about life in the 1970s? Write down some things you think you know; then research life in the 1970s. Choose one of the following: fashion, literature & film, politics/world events, and latchkey kids. Find out as much as you can about your topic and report back to the class both the facts you’ve gathered and how your research findings align with or differ from your original impressions of the time period.

Teaching Suggestion: Students might work individually or in groups. Teachers might have students focus more narrowly on specific topics or do a broad overview. Focus on immersing students in 1970s society and culture. Some of the videos below might be immersive enough to help students form initial impressions about the era. Research will confirm or deny their first impressions or assumptions, which creates an opportunity to discuss preconceptions versus reality. For example, “I thought David Bowie was really unique in his fashion choices, but it turns out a lot of men dressed like that.” It may also be helpful to connect latchkey kids to some of the political and economic conditions that students identify.

• YouTube has wordless clips/stock footage of city life in the 1970s, including New York City, and a clip from the 1980s about latchkey kids, which aligns with advice Miranda’s mother gives her and lends context to their conversations about surviving in the city as a latchkey kid.
• Timelines and fact sheets about the 1970s abound online and might help students jump start some of their independent research. Teachers might also print out resources and have students glean information from these specific materials. 
• Clips from The $20,000 Pyramid hosted by Dick Clark will help students understand the subplot surrounding Miranda’s mom appearing on the show.