"A Homemade Education" is a literacy narrative, a genre with a rich tradition, each story concerning someone's learning to read or write. Often, several scholars have argued, central to literacy narratives is the idea that knowledge equals power. Explain how this theme is developed in "A Homemade Education."

Respond to Malcolm X as if writing a journal entry and being charged to respond either intellectually, emotionally, or aesthetically (There will be a mini-lesson on these approaches to writing). You may do academic analysis or a more personal reaction. Or, just write about why this piece makes you … something—sad, inspired, confused, interested in finding out more about . . . what?

What do you make of Malcolm X's self-mocking humor in this excerpt? What about his extreme methods (copying the entire dictionary!)? Do these unusual features make his views more or less impactful to you? More or less relatable? Why? Due to the transformative quality of these events, which of these jailhouse circumstances might you think worthy of being replicated in order for U.S. jails to more effectively rehabilitate prisoners, and more often see them successfully reintegrated into society?

Following up on the above topic of rehabilitation and to possibly free-write for your paper 2, feel free to use Malcolm X's text to make meaningful comparisons and contrasts of his time in jail (1946-1952) to incarceration now in the U.S. How rehabilitative is prison today for most inmates, and why. Brainstorm ways to improve prison outcomes and reduce recidivism. (Look it up if you don't know this key term).

In short order, X transitions from the literacy narrative into a detailed, richly cited discussion of black history, white colonial power and hostilities throughout the centuries, and international conflicts that persist today. What are some of these key details, and what is X’s analysis of black history as told by the pre-eminent historians of his times?

Are we doing better today teaching the real U.S. history? Why, or why not? What made YOUR K-12 education in U.S. racial matters either insufficient and surface-level, or deep and meaningful--or somewhere in-between?