Edison 8th Grade 2011
Summer Reading List
The reading list for this summer is intended to engage students in active learning by giving purpose to reading throughout the summer. Students are required to read and respond to FOUR books = TWO books from the Required Reading List + TWO Newbery or Sequoyah award-winning books (reminder: FOUR books total.) All four Responses should be in a different format. You can choose from the seven Accepted Response Formats. These Responses are due the first week of school. Each Response should be on 8½ X 11 paper, hand-written, and placed in a manila envelope labeled with your name, grade and the titles of the books. The grades will be distributed across the four quarters of the school year.
Required Reading List (Choose TWO)
Goddess of Yesterday by Caroline B. Cooney (Trojan War)
Fire on the Mountain by Edward Abbey (resisting imminent domain)
Jacob’s Blood by Mangum (Civil War)
Forbidden City by William Bell (modern China)
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas (classic revenge)
Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card (science fiction)
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle (detective)
Soldier X by Don Wulffson (WWII)
A Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne (fantasy/adventure)
Shackleton’s Stowaway by Victoria McKernan (adventure)
Tulsa Burning by Anna Myers (1921 riot)
Jim Thorpe: Original All-American by Joseph Bruchac (biography)
Accepted Award-Winning Books (Choose TWO)
Sequoyah Awards at http://www.oklibs.org/sequoyah
Newbery Medals and Honors at www.ala.org/alsc/newbery.cfm
Accepted Response Formats (A different one for each book)
1. JOURNALING: Start with a journal. (You might use a spiral.) At the end of each chapter, record your thoughts by writing two questions, two observations, and one prediction about the reading.2. LITERARY POWER POINT: Select an important quote from the story, explain how you connected to the quote from the story, and show how the quote relates to the theme, conflict, or character in the text. The information must be presented in a power point format with no less than 8 frames and no more than 12 frames.
3. FORESHADOWING: List ten (10) clues sprinkled throughout the story which revealed the plot. Explain how each of these clues helped you understand the theme of the story. / 4. SUMMARIZING and EVALUATING: In a five-paragraph essay, summarize and evaluate two or three decisions the main character made.
5. CREATE A NEWSPAPER: Summarize the plot in one article, cover the weather in another, do a feature story on one of the more interesting characters in another. Include an editorial and a collection of ads that would be pertinent to the story.
6. OUTLINE the story. Use the outline to expand into paragraphs to explain the book.
7. SOLVING CONFLICTS: Stories are based upon conflicts and solutions. Choose three conflicts that take place in the story and give the solutions. Is there one that you wish had been handled differently? Explain
Contact information: Melissa Hort
Kelli Miller
Denzil Stamper