Hey y’all, I could use some suggestions!
I’m a tutor & after-school teacher looking for 8 books to assign a group of 4th-6th graders for a summer reading and writing program. Each week, we discuss a different book as a group (one set of chapters each day) and do writing activities based on it.
Books I’ve already done with most of these students during the school year:
– Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH
– A Wrinkle in Time
– The Two Princesses of Bamarre
– Redwall
– The City of Ember
– Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry
If we could avoid those books, that would be ideal!
More intense or serious topics are okay to discuss with this cohort (hence Roll of Thunder, I read it with my 5th graders): there are some advanced readers in the group, and they’re good kids. If anything, RoT interested them MORE because they could tell they were being treated seriously as readers.
It’s a mix of boys and girls.
I’d like to avoid anything especially long (like Watership Down), since each book has one week assigned to it and I don’t want them to get fatigued.
Current thoughts are Isle of the Blue Dolphins, and potentially Bridge to Terabithia (though it’s a bit sad).
I’d appreciate any and all suggestions!! Thank you!
by ceruleanraindrops
10 Comments
I vote for “Island of the Blue Dolphins.” But, if you want some other suggestions:
A Long Way From Chicago by Richard Peck (novel)
*The Cay* by Theodore Taylor
*My Side of the Mountain* by Jean Craighead George
*From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler* by E. L. Konigsburg
*The Westing Game* by Ellen Raskin
*Island of the Blue Dolphins* by Scott O’Dell (yes, it’s on your list already, but here’s another vote for it!)
*The Pearl* by John Steinbeck
*The Phantom Tollbooth* by Norton Juster
*Number the Stars* by Lois Lowry
*The Cricket in Times Square* by George Selden
From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E Frankweiler – E. L. Konigsburg
The Phantom Tollbooth – Norton Juster
Some ideas:
– The Giver
– Number the Stars
-Tuck Everlasting
-Among the Hidden
-Gregor the Overlander (probably is a bit long but a great book otherwise)
-A Mango Shaped Space
-Because of Winn-Dixie
-The Great Gilly Hopkins
Troublemaker by John Cho
Frizzy: A Graphic Novel by Claribel A. Ortega
Some of the books I read in school around that time were: The Giver by Lois Lowry, The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman (I know he’s cancelled, but it is a great book if you can find used copies or borrow it from a library), Hatchet by Gary Paulson, To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, A Raisin In The Sun by Lorraine Hansberry, The Watsons Go To Birmingham by Christopher Paul Curtis, Holes by Louis Sachar, The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton, A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket, Matilda by Roald Dahl, The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick, The Phantom Tollbooth by Norman Juster, A Wrinkle In Time by Madeleine L’Engle, The Tale of Desperaux by Kate DiCamillo.
Through the hidden door by Rosemary Wells
oh man, I loved both Bridge to Terabithia AND Isle of the Blue Dolphines as a kid. Great books.
From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs Basil E Frankweiler – EL Koningsberg. Siblings run away and live in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC.
The Phantom Tollbooth – Norton Juster (loads of wordplay)
Treasure Island – RL Stevenson. Pirates! Treasure!
Harriet the Spy – Louise Fitzhugh
Hopefully I’m not too off on time/difficulty….
I did House Of The Scorpion by Nancy Farmer in a reading group around that age and loved it
The Hobbit is such a good read. I also really loved The Gammage Cup around that age.