Witness by Karen Hesse is a book written in first-person, prose/narrative poems. Therefore, this book should be read aloud in class with students taking on the parts of each poem's narrator.  (It is helpful to have a narrator read the italicized, 3rd person passages.) Costumes are encouraged and can be provided in class. The audience/students without parts should be engaged by acting as Johnny Reeve's congregation and should react to his sermons. To include all students, parts can be rotated each day. 

This book is historical fiction, and set in 1924 Vermont -- before the Holocaust.  Told through first-person prose, a variety of characters reveal their perspectives of the Ku Klux Klan and a wave of nationalism that set in upon their small town.  Historic events are referenced throughout the book, so background knowledge of events alluded to should be introduced before reading each passage. The reading of this book -- as a class play -- takes about 1 week of 1 hour classes.  The audiobook can also be used, if performing the poems does not fit your classroom. Essential Questions can also be integrated if desired.

The title of the book, Witness, is very powerful symbolism: be careful what you think that you see? Is what you "see" always the truth? This is a very important theme in today's world! After all, is what we read, see and hear always the truth?

As a final assignment/writing project, students can write a narrative poem from a character's perspective in the book whose voice wasn't included as a poem in the book. Students can present their narratives to the class -- in costume, and the audience can guess whose perspective the poem was written from!