Grades 6-8 Assignment:

Instructions: Students in grades 6 through 8 are to read any three books assigned to their grade. On the first day back to school, they should provide their English teacher an essay style summary of the main plot, characters, and major themes for each of the three books they read. Each of these essays should be at least a page in length.  For the 7th and 8th grades, we strongly suggest that each of these three summaries be typed and saved because later in the school year they will be reused and incorporated into a larger essay that is designed to teach the students how to link the three books into a single written project.  Students who would benefit from teacher direction while they work on this summertime assignment may elect to attend the Study Skills and Writing Workshop each year in late August.  Students may also benefit from outlining the short essay for each book soon after they finish reading it in order to guide their writing.

Grading will be based on how well described the essays are, how well they incorporate detail from the books to convey their points, and on the use of proper grammar and style. Standards, of course, will be based on the respective grade level of the student. The mark will stand as a significant grade in the English class for the first quarter.

Grade 6:

Whitewater, P.J. Peterson
Wrinkle in Time, Madeline L’Engle
Mr. Tucket, Gary Paulsen
My Brother Sam is Dead, James and Christopher Collier
Where the Red Fern Grows, Wilson Rawls
Across Five Aprils, Irene Hunt
April Morning, Howard Fast
Old Yeller, Fred Gipson

Grade 7: 

Banner in the Sky, James Ramsey Ullman
Captains Courageous, Rudyard Kipling
Adam of the Road, Elizabeth Janet Gray
The Day Lincoln Was Shot, Jim Bishop
True Grit, Charles Portis
Day of Infamy, Walter Lord
King Solomon’s Mines, H. Rider Haggard
The Machine Gunner, Robert Westall
Summer of the Monkeys, Wilson Rawls

Grade 8:

A Study in Scarlet, Arthur Conan Doyle
Journey to the Center of the Earth, Jules Verne
The Raft, Robert Trumbull (Naval Institute Press)
Incredible Victory, Walter Lord
Mr. Midshipman Hornblower, C.S. Forester
The Long Walk, Slavomir Rawicz
Swan Town, Michael J. Ortiz
The Lantern Bearers, Rosemary Sutcliff
The Old Man and the Sea, Ernst Hemingway
The Prince and the Pauper, Mark Twain