May 23, 2023
Dear Rising Sixth Grade Families,
We are excited to provide summer reading options for our incoming sixth-graders as their time to join our Middle School approaches. Every spring our librarians and language arts faculty spend much time thinking about how to maintain our students’ literary engagement. Their experience in education and understanding of literature for middle school readers is an asset to our school. With that, the summer reading program is designed to promote reading as an enjoyable and worthwhile activity as well as to help maintain reading skills, reducing the effect of the “summer slide.” Students are required to choose one book from a curated list of titles to read over the summer, but we hope that they will use some of their extra time to read many more books of their choosing. The range of selections on this list take into consideration the varied interests, abilities, learning styles and maturity levels of the students across all middle school grades in addition to including appeal and points of view that are consistent with our school’s educational mission.
Titles, book covers and links to reviews can be viewed on the libraries’ webpage and are also available under Middle School Resources on the Family Resources Page of the school’s website. Families are encouraged to review this list and talk with their children about the possible choices in order to help find books that are most suitable for them.
We hope that you might also find a title or two that you would like to read this summer and join your children in the fun as well.
Regards,
Shaka Arnold
Head of Middle School
Stacy Nockowitz and Gwen Nzimiro
Librarians
Middle School Summer Reading 2023
Adventure / Mystery
Across the Desert by Dusti Bowling
Alone by Megan Freeman
Brother’s Keeper by Julie Milford
Greenglass House by Kate Milford
The Parker Inheritance by Varian Johnson
Classics
The Call of the Wild by Jack London
The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L’Engle
The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
Fantasy / Science Fiction
Dragon Pearl by Yoon Ha Lee
Hana Hsu and the Ghost Crab Nation by Sylvia Liu
The Eye of Ra by Ben Gartner
Solimar: The Sword of the Monarchs by Pam Muños Ryan
The Last Mapmaker by Christina Soontornvat
Historical Fiction
The Night Diary by Veera Hiranandani
Freewater by Amina Luqman-Dawson
The Blackbird Girls by Anne Blankman
The Poet Slave of Cuba by Margarita Engle
The Downstairs Girl by Stacey Lee
Nonfiction
We Must Not Forget: Holocaust Stories of Survival and Resistance by Deborah Hopkinson
Born to Fly: The First Women’s Air Race Across America by Steve Sheinkin
All Thirteen: The Incredible Cave Rescue of the Thai Boys’ Soccer Team by Christina Soontornvat
Playlist: The Rebels and Revolutionaries of Sound by James Rhodes
The In-Between by Katie Van Heidrich
Realistic Fiction
Ain’t Burned All the Bright by Jason Reynolds
Jennifer Chan is Not Alone by Tae Keller
In the Key of Us by Mariama Lockington
Linked by Gordon Korman
Diamond Willow by Helen Frost
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