As I’ve shared with you before, this year I started a middle grade book club for kids in our homeschool community. We began by choosing our books for the year with a book tasting. This September we met for our first discussion meeting about Gordon Korman’s Restart, the story of a notorious bully who falls off his roof, gets amnesia, and gets a chance to choose who he wants to be after he wakes up in the hospital.
Restart lent itself to a great discussion, so today I’m sharing with you some of the questions we talked our way through. Use these as a starting point for discussion after reading and enjoy all of the different directions your readers’ reactions and perspectives take you in.
Discussion Questions for Restart by Gordon Korman
- Why do you think the author chose to tell the story through many narrators?
- Who are the static characters in the story? Who are the dynamic characters?
- What and who in Chase’s life help him to change for the better? Who doesn’t want Chase to change for the better? Why?
- What would it feel like to have amnesia? What would it be like to discover that you’re a notorious bully? What would it be like to be a bullying victim?
- What would it be like to be Joel? Shoshana? What did you think about Shoshana dumping the frozen yogurt on Chase’s head?
- Why do you think Chase doesn’t immediately break off his friendship with Aaron and Bear?
- When Chase joins the video club, is his desire for a second chance more important, or are Shoshana’s feelings as a victim more important?
- What is the theme of the book? (What truth about human life does this story reveal?)
