Getting my classroom ready for students next week, very excited that it is the 20th Anniversary of Harry Potter this year, so I have gone with it as the theme for my classroom decorations and also sent out “Hogwarts Letters” to my AICE Students today!
Why use Harry Potter for a High School Classroom?
1) Harry is a character that has grown up “ordinary”-the Everyman-he connects to the bullied, the little, the ones hoping for something better.
2) Opportunity knocks-well Hagrid breaks down the door-but semantics; Harry finds out the he is much more than he ever thought possible. Is he better just because of a birthright, a skill, or a given opportunity? NO, it is the CHOICES he makes & we hear that word at Mandarin daily!
3) Harry is not a “special snowflake”, as McGonagall points out “why is it always you three?” Harry teaches the value of Friendship and that you cannot do it alone. I don’t care how big your ego might be.
4) It teaches the value of those friends, the archetype of the sidekick, will my students be:
-Smart like Hermione
-Loyal like Ron
-Brave like Neville
-Unique like Luna
-Preserver like Semus (he really does blow up a lot)
-Comically Brilliant and wise beyond their years like the Weasley Twins
-Kind as Hagrid
So many other characteristics and characters that could go on for ages.
5) Harry shows that to be successful, sometimes you have to sacrifice, sometimes life is hard, but you have to chose to move forward. Have a goal and achieve it.
I know some see it as just a “magic book”, but it would not have endured from my generation down into our children now if there was not some sort of classical resonance. So I will reference Harry Potter as I teach mythology in my class; ,we will see parallels to what they read as children that prepared them for Dickens & Conrad & Shakespeare. They need to see the connections beyond the walls of my classroom and I hope that their lives might be a little more magical because of it. 
