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Gordon Korman – THE UNTEACHABLES : They Can Only Hurt You If You Try To Teach Them
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THE UNTEACHABLES : They Can Only Hurt You If You Try To Teach Them

Gordon Korman
LIKE NEW, PAPERBACK

RM17.00

When The World’s Worst Class Of Kids Is Paired With The World’s Worst Teacher, Will They Torpedo Each Other Or Redeem Themselves ?

ISBN 9780062563903
Book Condition LIKE NEW
Format PAPERBACK
Publisher Balzer and Bray
Publication Date 06 Feb 2020
Pages 304
Weight 0.28 kg
Dimension 19 × 13 × 2 cm
Retail Price RM37.95
Availability: 1 in stock

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A hilarious new middle grade novel from beloved and bestselling author Gordon Korman about what happens when the worst class of kids in school is paired with the worst teacher—perfect for fans of Ms. Bixby’s Last Day. A good choice for summer reading or anytime!
 
As usual, award-winning author Gordon Korman’s latest book is a satisfying glimpse into the world of middle schoolers. In The Unteachables, Korman gives us a sort of pre-teen version of To Sir, with Love—a class full of misfit kids that the education system has given up on and the teacher that fights through his own disillusionment to become the mentor the students need.
 
The Unteachables are a notorious class of misfits, delinquents, and academic train wrecks. Like Aldo, with anger management issues; Parker, who can’t read; Kiana, who doesn’t even belong in the class—or any class; and Elaine (rhymes with pain). The Unteachables have been removed from the student body and isolated in room 117.
 
Their teacher is Mr. Zachary Kermit, the most burned-out teacher in all of Greenwich. He was once a rising star, but his career was shattered by a cheating scandal that still haunts him. After years of phoning it in, he is finally one year away from early retirement. But the superintendent has his own plans to torpedo that idea—and it involves assigning Mr. Kermit to the Unteachables.
 
After 30 years as a teacher, Zachary Kermit is burned out and ready for retirement. But the superintendent, Dr. Thaddeus, wants him out before he can draw a full pension, so he assigns Mr. Kermit the class called SCS-8, or the Self-Contained Special 8th-grade class. Known as the “Unteachables,” Dr. Thaddeus hopes they drive Mr. Kermit to quit before the year’s end. Mr. Kermit knows it’s going to be rough, but he figures he’ll just keep his head down and coast until May.


He is not surprised by the students. There is the slow worker, Parker Elias, social dweeb Mateo Hendrickson, anger-management challenged Aldo Braff, ex-athlete “Barnstorm” Armstrong, potential bully Elaine Okafor, sleep-deprived Rahim Barclay, and new student Kiana Roubini. Through many hilarious and touching escapades, Mr. Kermit figures out that what he really has is a group that just needs help, patience and the recognition that, really, they may be the most teachable of any class.
 
The Unteachables never thought they’d find a teacher who had a worse attitude than they did. And Mr. Kermit never thought he would actually care about teaching again. Over the course of a school year, though, room 117 will experience mayhem, destruction—and maybe even a shot at redemption.
 
The Unteachables is about seven students who instead of going to regular eighth grade classes, stay in one classroom and learn all the subjects from one teacher. This is called SCS-8 (Self-Contained Special Eighth grade Class) also known as the Unteachables.
 
Mr. Kermit wants to hate his former student, but he finds it difficult to stay mad at someone the Unteachables like so much. Watching his students become interested in learning makes Mr. Kermit realize he needs to do right by them and actually teach. As both students and teacher find their places in the classroom, Dr. Thaddeus discovers a rule in the district handbook that would allow him to fire Mr. Kermit if the kids do poorly on a science aptitude exam. The kids do well, but since Kiana was never registered, her score (highest in the class) doesn’t count, which drops the class’s grade low enough for Dr. Thaddeus to fire Mr. Kermit.
 
Kiana is a new girl from California who isn’t supposed to be in the SCS-8 class, but due to a crazy first day, she is never properly registered in the school. Mr. Kermit is a fifty-five year old teacher who just needs to teach for one more year to qualify for early retirement. The Superintendent of the school does not like Mr. Kermit because of an incident that happened in the nineties.
 
He is trying to fire Mr. Kermit before he can qualify for early retirement, so he gives him the SCS-8 class thinking that Mr. Kermit will give up and just quit during the year. The book follows the SCS-8 students, Mr. Kermit, and newfound allies as they try to keep Mr. Kermit’s job and his chance for early retirement.
 
Throughout the book, various students in Mr. Kermit’s class offer their perspectives on how much they dislike school. Meanwhile, Mr. Kermit remains stuck in the past, haunted by the cheating scandal that destroyed his career 27 years ago. Despite his surly mood, Mr. Kermit stands up for the kids in his class, which no teacher has done for them before. To repay him, they steal the vuvuzela noisemakers for the school’s spirit week because they know he hates them and dump them in the river. When an article appears in the newspaper describing the incident and linking it to the cheating scandal, the student responsible for the scandal (now a successful businessman) takes it upon himself to help Mr. Kermit’s class.
 
Mr. Kermit wants to hate his former student, but he finds it difficult to stay mad at someone the Unteachables like so much. Watching his students become interested in learning makes Mr. Kermit realize he needs to do right by them and actually teach. As both students and teacher find their places in the classroom, Dr. Thaddeus discovers a rule in the district handbook that would allow him to fire Mr. Kermit if the kids do poorly on a science aptitude exam. The kids do well, but since Kiana was never registered, her score (highest in the class) doesn’t count, which drops the class’s grade low enough for Dr. Thaddeus to fire Mr. Kermit.
 
Determined to keep their teacher, the kids enter the science fair. The students with the winning project get ten points added to their science exams, which would be enough to boost their scores. Despite their amazing project, they finish second, but an article in the newspaper calls out Dr. Thaddeus for firing one of Greenwich’s best teachers.
 
With protests on the horizon, Dr. Thaddeus revokes Mr. Kermit’s termination notice. Rather than retire, Mr. Kermit signs on to teach the following year. His students are overjoyed, and the book ends with Kiana deciding to stay in Greenwich with her friends.
 
This book was really funny and it kept readers wanting to read more. Korman puts a lot of thought into his characters and he fills them with fun twists and surprises that get discovered the farther you go into the book. At some points I was surprised at what happened in the book because it was something that readers least expected.
 
Written in chapters that explore the viewpoint of each character, The Unteachables is a heartwarming story about not giving up on yourself or others. Filled with twists and turns and thought-provoking ideas, The Unteachables is a must-read for any middle-schooler. Gordon Korman may attract people with his brightly-coloured covers, but what exists inside his books are even brighter! Another home run for Korman for which all of us, adults and children alike, can cheer. This book reminded me of the Gordon Korman’s other book Ungifted. This is a great read for a funny, lighthearted book.
 
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Review From New York Journal Of Books :
 
“The Unteachables is a lively, feel-good book.”
 
There’s no doubt about it, middle school is awful for everyone. Students in the midst of puberty, teachers who have to deal with them, parents trying to raise them . . . it’s difficult and problematic in so many ways. However, not everyone has it as hard as the students and teachers at this book’s Greenwich Middle School.
 
Mr. Kermit’s career was derailed early on because of a cheating scandal that wasn’t his fault, and the Self-Contained Special Eighth-Grade Class—known to the rest of the student body as The Unteachables—has been shuffled off to the school’s darkest corner to be, well, out of the way. Kiana Roubini, a transfer student, accidentally finds herself in the mix.
 
“I push open the door and walk into room 117. A plume of smoke is pouring out the single open window. It’s coming from the fire roaring in the wastebasket in the center of the room. A handful of kids are gathered around it, toasting marshmallows skewered on the end of number two pencils.”
 
Kiana is one of half a dozen students in the class, which includes a boy with a reading disorder, one who can’t control his anger, and others who can’t fit in with more traditional students because of their quirky personalities. Their teacher, Mr. Kermit, used to be good at his job, before the trouble. He began his work life with enthusiasm and a desire to change the world.
 
“The first day of school. I remember the excitement. New students to teach. New minds to fill with knowledge. New futures to shape. The key word is remember. That was thirty years ago.”
 
Mr. Kermit is thrown in with SCS 8 as one final humiliation before early retirement. He is expected to crash and burn, along with the unusual, forgotten students. He plans to ride out the year handing out worksheets and completing crossword puzzles. The students don’t have a problem with that. At least, not at first. Gradually, they get to know each other. The students want more from school, and Mr. Kermit begins to remember what it was like to care.
 
“My career has taken some strange detours. Yet here I am, surrounded by the worst class I’ve ever had in every way but one—the fact that they’re the best class I’ve ever had.”
 
This warm, funny, touching story is told from the perspectives of the many different people involved, each chapter showing another person’s point of view. The students are lovable, and their reasons for their own issues become clear as they narrate their parts of the plot. The love, respect, and care which come to light in the story are real, and it’s easy to root for this group of misfits.
 
This book would be fun for a wide variety of readers, including middle-school students, teachers, and parents. There is much with which to identify, and plenty to learn. The Unteachables is a lively, feel-good book. Enjoy!
 
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KIRKUS REVIEW :
 
An isolated class of misfits and a teacher on the edge of retirement are paired together for a year of (supposed) failure.
 
Zachary Kermit, a 55-year-old teacher, has been haunted for the last 27 years by a student cheating scandal that has earned him the derision of his colleagues and killed his teaching spirit. So when he is assigned to teach the Self-Contained Special Eighth-Grade Class—a dumping ground for “the Unteachables,” students with “behavior issues, learning problems, juvenile delinquents”—he is unfazed, as he is only a year away from early retirement.
 
His relationship with his seven students—diverse in temperament, circumstance, and ability—will be one of “uncomfortable roommates” until June. But when Mr. Kermit unexpectedly stands up for a student, the kids of SCS-8 notice his sense of “justice and fairness.” Mr. Kermit finds he may even care a little about them, and they start to care back in their own way, turning a corner and bringing along a few ghosts from Mr. Kermit’s past.
 
Writing in the alternating voices of Mr. Kermit, most of his students, and two administrators, Korman spins a narrative of redemption and belief in exceeding self-expectations. Naming conventions indicate characters of different ethnic backgrounds, but the book subscribes to a white default. The two students who do not narrate may be students of color, and their characterizations subtly—though arguably inadequately—demonstrate the danger of preconceptions.
 
Funny and endearing, though incomplete characterizations provoke questions.
 
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About The Author :
 
Gordon Korman has written more than fifty middle-grade and teen novels. Favorites include the New York Times #1 bestseller The 39 Clues: One False Note, The Juvie Three, Son of the Mob, Born to Rock, and Schooled. Though he didn’t play football in high school, Gordon’s been a lifelong fan and season ticket holder. He says, “I’ve always been fascinated by the ‘culture of collision’ in football and wanted to explore it-not just from the highlight films but from its darker side as well.” Gordon lives with his family on Long Island, New York.

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