Fast+Food+Nation

**NOTE: Depending on the age and level of students, teachers might consider using Chew on This, a YA adaptation of the original //Fast Food Nation.//**

**TO BEGIN THE UNIT**:
 You might want to watch a short video clip such as this one from //**Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution**//:

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Have a classroom discussion about these ideas. How often do students eat fast food? What do they often eat at home? What is their response to the video clip?

** IDEAS FOR READING THE BOOK AS A CLASS: **
//Fast Food Nation// is a fascinating but somewhat hefty text. Because of its density, we would suggest one of two courses of action if the teacher does not have enough time for all students to read the book in its entirety:

(1) Divide the class into small groups and do a traditional **jigsaw project** - each group reads one section and creates some sort of brief presentation (poster, power point) to teach the rest of the class about their part. In this way, all students get the main points of the book in a much briefer time frame.

(2) Only have the class read **certain sections** of the book. For example, it might not be necessary to read about the founders of fast food (Ch. 1), but reading about advertising to children (Ch. 2) and the life minimum-wage fast food workers endure (Ch. 3 and Ch. 8) might be more pertinent to the overall inquiry question.

Of course, if possible, have students read the whole thing! Then, they might select an area that piqued their interest and delve further into research about it using texts they find themselves, as well as some posted on this website.

LESSON IDEAS AS YOU READ:
Check out the "**Advertising to Children"** page on the left sidebar. This page gives a sample activity that you might want to do with students as they read about how fast food corporations market to young kids and adolescents.

ASSESSING STUDENTS:
A multi-genre research project would be ideal for a unit on //Fast Food Nation//. Multigenre projects allow students to examine an issue in depth and creatively form a response to inquiry questions. Just some ideas:

- a diary entry as a slaughterhouse worker - a recipe for a fast food burger - a timesheet and paycheck to a fast food worker <span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif;">- a satirical fast food advertisement <span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif;">- a family's schedule for the week <span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif;"> - a report on the nutrition of a McDonald's Happy Meal

<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif;"> ....the possibilities are endless!