LPHS ninth graders in Mrs. Merrihew’s course started the school year reading Veronica Roth’s best-selling novel “Divergent,” a dystopian piece of the young adult genre that is set in the future. While students studied the book in English class, they researched and learned about ancient civilizations in their Global class.

The courses came together for a “The Merrihuggan Project” assignment that asked students to research an assigned civilization and compare that civilization to the one found in “Divergent.” Students were asked the big question: If the characters in “Divergent” are considered divergent because their thinking is unrestricted, then was the civilization you researched also a divergent civilization?

Students were asked to demonstrate their findings via an infomercial. After the classes studied advertising techniques and strategies that make infomercials effective, each group researched their assigned civilization, created a storyboard, wrote a script, filmed, and edited their infomercials before presenting them to their peers.

The groups were encouraged to use creativity to convince people to move to their ancient civilization. Many of the infomercials included humor, and it was clear that the ninth graders enjoyed watching their classmates’ productions.

Mrs. Duggan and Mrs. Merrihew were thrilled with the results of this project.