The Glass Menagerie is a classic play because it continues to connect with audiences decades after its first premiere. Chances are, your students will find a point of connection as well. For one thing, the play's conflicts are immediately recognizable. Your students will have no trouble understanding the tension between the Wingfield children and their domineering mother, and they are likely to identify with the paradox that you can both love and hate your family at the same time.

Some students will probably have experienced being abandoned by a parent, and students are also ripe for feeling ready to escape, to leave home, to live anywhere but where they've grown up. Tom's central conflict stems from the strain of trying to establish his own identity in the shadow of his parents, and we're betting your students will get that.