Among the Hidden
Written by Margaret Peterson Haddix

Publisher’s Summary:
Luke has never been to school. He’s never had a birthday party or gone to a friend’s house for an overnight. In fact, Luke has never had a friend.

Luke is one of the shadow children, a third child who is forbidden by the Population Police. He’s lived his entire life in hiding, and now, with a new housing development replacing the woods next to his family’s farm, he is no longer even allowed to go outside.

Then, one day Luke sees a girl’s face in the window of a house where he knows two other children already live. Finally, he’s met a shadow child like himself. Jen is willing to risk everything to come out of the shadows — does Luke dare to become involved in her dangerous plan? Can he afford not to?

Primary Source Pairing:
The dystopian setting of this novel generates questions about the population of our community and world. Is there a Population Police? Will there ever need to be? Will Luke’s story ever be one of our own? For this primary source pairing, invite students to explore a world population infographic.  Ask students questions about the events in the book that led to the overpopulation problems. What insights do students find when studying this infographic? What connections can be made between the information known about the population of the people in the book Among the Hidden and what is observed on the population infographic about the world we live in?

Questions for Discussion:

• What do you notice first?
• Find something small but interesting.
• What do you notice that you didn’t expect?
• What do you notice that you can’t explain?
• What can you learn from examining this?
• What do you still wonder about?
• How does the information in this infographic connect to the population information in Among the Hidden?

Credits:
Book Cover and Summary: Follett
Infographic: Jack Hagley
Infographic in other languages: Jack Hagley

Aditional Resources:
Current World Population Counter: WorldOMeters
If The World Were 100 People website: 100People.org
If the World Were a Village: A Book about the World’s People, Written by David J. Smith, Illustrated by Shelagh Armstrong: Amazon