Harry Potter book review

Summary

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets is the story of a boy named Harry Potter – a wizard attending the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. This is the second book in the Harry Potter series that corresponds with his 2nd year of school at Hogwarts. This year, before school starts, Harry’s muggle (non-wizarding folk) family the Dursleys, which consists of his hateful and unloving aunt, uncle, and cousin, attempt to keep him from attending his ‘freak’ school by keeping him locked up in his room. After getting rescued by Ron (Harry’s best friend) in a flying car Harry arrives at Hogwarts only to find that strange happenings are disrupting the school. Students are being attacked at random by a mysterious monster and the legendary Chamber of Secrets has been opened! This means that Hogwart’s is now unsafe and the school may have to be shut down, and Harry would be doomed to a life with his the Dursleys. After a year’s worth of detective work by Harry and his two best friends Ron and Hermione, the trio discovers who and what is causing the attacks. Harry goes on a perilous mission into the depths of the Chamber itself to defeat the creature and its master, the infamous Lord Voldemort, and to rescue Ron’s younger sister Ginny.

Response

I am obsessed with Harry Potter! I think this is the seventh time that I’ve read Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets… Because we were required to read the first book for class, I can’t help reading the whole series again, so I figured I might as well write a response on one of them! I’ve always been drawn to high fantasy, and the epic theme of good versus evil evident in each book draws the reader up into the excitement and action of the story. The characters are loveable and entertaining, yet realistic with unique shortcomings, and therefore easy to relate to – to this day I think of Hermione, Harry, and Ron as close friends! The main characters tend to exhibit admirable traits such as loyalty, courage, friendship, and a general willingness to help others. The dialogue is humorous and full of advanced and diverse vocabulary. This book is overall a captivating read. When I finished reading the Harry Potter books in fifth grade, I remember worrying that I would not enjoy reading others books as much, so I asked my librarian for a recommendation to a book similar to Harry Potter. She led me to the author Tamora Pierce (young adult writer), who’s writings I’ve also followed since then. The magical world in her books reminds me of the world of Harry Potter. The Chronicles of Narnia are another group of high fantasy books that involve epic battles between good and evil, with children as the main characters. A book I read recently, Lev Grossman’s The Magicians, is like a more adult version of the Harry Potter series.

Teaching Ideas

1. It would be really fun to write math word problems using objects from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, just to liven up the lesson.

2. This would be a great book to use a literature circle discussion on. Choose one chapter towards the beginning to discuss and further down the road do another literature circle discussion on a later chapter.

3. Have students create a board game on a large sheet of poster board based on Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Use this to teach about plot sequence. There should be at least 15 spaces, and one space (in the correct order) that deals with each introduction, rising action/conflict, climax, falling action, resolution/conclusion. The end result board should be colorful and decorated with images related to the book (not random drawings).

4. Have students fill out a literary report card on at least 3 characters from the book (choose character traits the grade on their own). Students should use examples from the text to support the grade and record the page number.