SUMMER READING

  

TASK

 

JULY

Read at least ONE  book from the suggested summer reading list for sixth  grade.

Select TWO responses from the list of responses provided.

Select TWO writing assignments from the writing choice board and complete the assignment on loose leaf paper.

AUGUST

Read another book from the suggested summer reading list for sixth  grade.

Select TWO responses from the list of responses provided.

Select TWO writing assignments from the writing choice board and complete the assignment on loose leaf paper.

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Dear Parents/Guardians,

Happy Summer! In an effort to keep all of our students in the Preparatory Academy reading at-level or above-level over the summer months, we are encouraging students to read at least TWO books over the summer, write four reading responses,  and complete four writing assignments from the writing choice board.   Attached to this letter are a series of recommended book, as well as a variety of essay/short response prompts to help students think about, respond to, and connect with their reading. Students can also jot down any questions, wonderings, and key points/themes found while reading. 

In order for students to reach their full potential, they need a strong foundation in reading and writing. Reading outside of the classroom is critical for maintaining and expanding a child’s literacy skills especially over the extended summer break. In fact, research suggests that students should spend a minimum of 30 minutes a day reading outside of the classroom. As a department, we encourage that each student reads each day over the summer!

The New York Public Library has an application called “Simply E” that allows students to borrow and read books for free on a tablet, IPad or SmartPhone. Furthermore, there is a free reading application called SORA that can be downloaded on any technological device. All students need to do is sign in with their DOE credentials in order to access free books! Here is the link you need: https://www.overdrive.com/apps/sora/  If you would like to know more about the content of any book, you may visit www.commonsense media.org .

 

We wish you all a restful and exciting summer vacation, and we look forward to seeing you all back in September!

 

 

Thank You,

The 6th Grade ELA Department

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The Preparatory Academy @ P.S.71

Reader Response Prompts for Summer Reading

Following is a list of journal prompts. Use whatever helps you to arrive at good, interesting reflections. You do NOT have to use any of these if you so choose. Remember, your journal entries should be your reflections, connecting your novel to universal ideas, current events, history, yourself, etc. Also, pay attention to the writer’s craft. Have fun!

Each journal response should AT LEAST be a paragraph. Please label your journal entry and write down the question.

1. How does the protagonist change throughout the novel?
2. What is the major conflict, and how does it develop a theme within the text?
3. What are the major symbols in the novel? How do they help the reader better understand the characters and conflict?
4. What does the author want the reader to take away from this novel?
5. What were your feelings after reading the opening chapter of this book? Explain
6. Did this book make you laugh? cry? cringe? smile? cheer? Explain.
7. What connections are there between the book and your life? Explain.
8. What is the most important sentence/paragraph/passage in this book? The most important event or feeling?  Explain.
9. Who should or shouldn’t read this book? Why?
10. What is the best part of the book? Why? What is the worst part? Why?
11. Do you like the ending of the book? Why or why not? Do you think there is more to tell? 
12. What came as a surprise in the book? Why? How do you think the author presented this surprise? Explain.
13. What parts of the book seem most believable or unbelievable? Why?
14. What makes you wonder in this book? What confuses you?
15. In what ways are you like any of the characters? Explain.
16. Do any of the characters remind you of friends, family members, or classmates? Explain.
17. Which character developed the most? What did you read that makes you say that? Explain.
18. What would you and your favorite character talk about in a conversation? Begin the conversation.
19. Do you think the title fits the book? Why or why not?
20. Some other possible titles for this book might be…(minimum of 5). Explain your reasoning.
21. What was the author’s purpose for writing this book? Explain and discuss your speculations.
22. Has the book helped you in any way? Explain.
23. How have you changed after reading this book? Explain
24. What do you know now that you didn’t know before? Explain.
25. What questions in this book would you like answered? Explain those answers.
26. How would the story be different if it was told…(choose ONLY one)

• • •  from a different character’s point of view?

1. 1. 1. from a narrator? 
      2. in a different time period?

  

 

Sixth Grade Suggested Summer Reading

 Parents/ guardians, if you would like to know more about the content of any book, you may visit www.commonsense media.org 

Fiction

Waiting for Normal   By: Connor, Leslie

Twelve-year-old Addie tries to cope with her mother's erratic behavior and being separated from her beloved stepfather and half-sisters when she and her mother go to live in a small trailer by the railroad tracks on the outskirts of Schenectady, New York.

 

The Thing About Luck  By: Kadohata, Cynthia

Just when twelve-year-old Summer thinks nothing else can possibly go wrong in a year of bad luck, an emergency takes her parents to Japan, leaving Summer to care for her little brother while helping her grandmother cook and do laundry for harvest workers.

 

Saving Marty By: Griffin, Paul, 1966-

When Lorenzo adopts Marty, a runt piglet, nothing prepares him for the life-changing bond they form or for the chaos a full grown pig can create.

 

The First Rule of Punk     By: Perez, Celia C., 1972-

Twelve-year-old Maraia Luisa O'Neill-Morales (who really prefers to be called Malâu) reluctantly moves with her Mexican-American mother to Chicago and starts seventh grade with a bang--violating the dress code with her punk rock aesthetic and spurning the middle school's most popular girl in favor of starting a band with a group of like-minded weirdos.

 

Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life    By: Mass, Wendy, 1967-

Just before his thirteenth birthday, Jeremy Fink receives a keyless locked box--set aside by his father before his death five years earlier--that purportedly contains the meaning of life.

 

Blackbird Fly  By: Kelly, Erin Entrada

Bullied at school, eighth-grader Apple, a Filipino American who loves the music of the Beatles, decides to change her life by learning how to play the guitar.

 

They Call Me Guero: a border kid's poems  By: Bowles, David (David O.)

Twelve-year-old Guero, a red-headed, freckled Mexican American border kid, discovers the joy of writing poetry, thanks to his seventh grade English teacher.

 

 

Three Bird Summer   By: St. Antoine, Sara

Anticipating a quieter summer at his grandmother's rustic lake cabin when his family members make different plans, an introspective boy befriends girl-next-door Alice, who proves to have a sense of humor and adventure when she accompanies him on a treasure hunt.

 

Summer lost    By: Condie, Allyson Braithwaite

"Following the sudden deaths of her father and autistic younger brother, Cedar Lee spends the summer working at a Shakespearean theater festival, making a new friend, and coming to terms with her grief"--.

 

Other Words for Home    By: Warga, Jasmine

Sent with her mother to the safety of a relative's home in Cincinnati when her Syrian community is overshadowed by violence, Jude worries for the beloved family members who were left behind and forges a new sense of identity shaped by friends and changing perspectives.

 

Everything Sad is Untrue: a true story   By: Nayeri, Daniel

At the front of a middle school classroom in Oklahoma, a boy named Khosrou (whom everyone calls "Daniel") stands, trying to tell a story. His story. But no one believes a word he      says. To them he is a dark-skinned, hairy-armed boy with a big butt whose lunch smells funny; who makes things up and talks about poop too much. Like Scheherazade in a hostile classroom, Daniel weaves a tale to save his own life: to stake his claim to the truth.

 

The Last Boy at St. Edith's By: Malone, Lee Gjertsen

Seventh-grader Jeremy Miner, the only boy in a school of 475 girls, unleashes a series of pranks in hopes of getting expelled.

 

Look Both Ways: a tale told in ten blocks By: Reynolds, Jason

A whimsical exploration of the role detours play in life follows a group of students who become so engaged in everyday activities while taking 10 different routes home from school that they fail to notice a school bus that has dropped from the sky.

 

 

The Crossover: a basketball novel    By: Alexander, Kwame

Fourteen-year-old twin basketball stars Josh and Jordan wrestle with highs and lows on and off the court as their father ignores his declining health.

 

 

Short     By: Sloan, Holly Goldberg

Very short for her age, Julia grows into her sense of self while playing a munchkin in a summer regional theater production of The Wizard of Oz.

 

The Seventh Most Important Thing      By: Pearsall, Shelley

In 1963, 13-year-old Arthur is sentenced to community service helping the neighborhood Junk Man after he throws a brick at the old man's head in a moment of rage, but the junk he collects might be more important than he suspects. Inspired by the work of American folk artist James Hampton.

 

 

 

The Paper Cowboy    By: Levine, Kristin (Kristin Sims)

In a small town near Chicago in 1953, twelve-year-old Tommy faces escalating problems at home, among his Catholic school friends, and with the threat of a communist living nearby, but taking over his hospitalized sister's paper route introduces him to neighbors who he comes to rely on for help.

 

 

Like Vanessa      By: Charles, Tami

It is 1983 and Vanessa Martin, a thirteen-year-old African American girl in Newark's public housing, dreams of following in the footsteps of the first black Miss America, Vanessa Williams; but the odds are against her until a new teacher at school organizes a beauty pageant and encourages Vanessa to enter.

 

The Jumbies    By: Baptiste, Tracey

Eleven-year-old Corinne must call on her courage and an ancient magic to stop an evil spirit and save her island home.

 

Breaking Stalin's Nose     By: Yelchin, Eugene

In the Stalinist era of the Soviet Union, ten-year-old Sasha idolizes his father, a devoted Communist, but when police take his father away and leave Sasha homeless, he is forced to examine his own perceptions, values, and beliefs.

 

The Blackbird Girls     By: Blankman, Anne

Told in alternating perspectives among three girls--Valentina and Oksana in 1986 and Rifka in 1941--this story shows that hatred, intolerance, and oppression are no match for the power of true friendship.

 

The Truth About My Bat Mitzvah     By: Baskin, Nora Raleigh

After her beloved grandmother, Nana, dies, non-religious twelve-year-old Caroline becomes curious about her mother's Jewish ancestry.

 

The Length of a String     By: Weissman, Elissa Brent

Twelve-year-old Imani, the only black girl in Hebrew school, is preparing for her bat mitzvah and hoping to find her birthparents when she discovers the history of adoption in her own family through her great-grandma Anna's Holocaust-era diary.

 

Lucky Broken Girl     By: Behar, Ruth

A semi-autobiographical story about a multicultural girl's coming-of-age in the 1960s describes how Cuban-Jewish Ruthie Mizrahi emigrates with her family from Castro's Cuba to New York, where a devastating accident challenges her perceptions about mortality and strength.

 

One Crazy Summer    By: Williams-Garcia, Rita

In the summer of 1968, after travelling from Brooklyn to Oakland, California, to spend a month with the mother they barely know, eleven-year-old Delphine and her two younger sisters arrive to a cold welcome as they discover that their mother, a dedicated poet and printer, is resentful of the intrusion of their visit and wants them to attend a nearby Black Panther summer camp.

 

This is Just a Test     By: Rosenberg, Madelyn,

In 1983 seventh-grader David Da-Wei Horowitz has a lot to worry about--his bar mitzvah is coming soon, his Jewish and Chinese grandmothers argue about everything, his teammates for the upcoming trivia contest, Scott and Hector, do not like each other, heis beginning to notice girls, and Scott has persuaded him to begin digging a fallout shelter just in case the Cold War heats up.

 

American as Paneer Pie    By: Kelkar, Supriya, 1980-

Feeling like she lives two lives as the only Indian American girl in her school, Lekha Divekar is excited to meet a Desi newcomer only to discover that her proud new friend has just relocated to America and is not content to be quiet about bullying.

 

 

Towers Falling     By: Rhodes, Jewell Parker

While learning about September 11th, fifth grader Dèja (born after the attacks) realizes how much the events still color her world.

 

 

The Life and Times of Benny Alvarez By: Johnson, Peter,

As his English teacher focuses on poetry during the month of October, Benny faces down the smartest girl at school while also navigating his friendships and a difficult family life after his grandfather's multiple strokes.

 

 

Count Me In       By: Bajaj, Varsha

Told from two viewpoints, sixth-graders Karina and Chris use social media to stand up to racism in Houston, Texas, after an attack puts Karina's Indian American grandfather in the hospital.

 

Non Fiction

 

The Dumbest Idea Ever! By: Gownley, Jimmy

A renowned comics creator recounts his adventures as he grows from an eager-to-please boy into a teenage comic book artist, sharing the real-life story of how the DUMBEST idea ever became the BEST thing that ever happened to him.

 

Chance: escape from the Holocaust

The Caldecott Medal-winning illustrator of The Fool of the World and the Flying Ship presents a heartrending, illustrated account of his childhood escape from Nazi-occupied Warsaw to the Soviet Union, where he experienced his awakening as an artist.

 

Good night stories for rebel girls: 100 immigrant women who changed the world By: Favilli, Elena

A lavishly photographed motivational treasury of true bedtime tales shares events in the lives of 100 diverse women who have shaped the world, from Asma Khan and Madeline Albright to Rihanna and Josephine Baker.

 

A sporting chance: how Ludwig Guttmann created the Paralympic Games   By: Alexander, Lori

Telling the inspiring story behind the creation of the Paralympics, this biography combines archival photos, full-color illustrations, and a riveting narrative to honor the life of Ludwig Guttmann, whose work profoundly changed lives.

 

Leaving Lymon    By: Cline-Ransome, Lesa

In a companion to the award-winning Finding Langston, young Lymon is uprooted by tragedy from his life in the Deep South of 1946 before the limits of his talents and resilience are tested in two Northern cities.

 

Graphic Novels

 

This Was Our Pact     By: Andrews, Ryan

When their community celebrates the annual Autumn Equinox Festival by lighting paper lanterns and floating them in the river, Ben and the school misfit, Nathaniel, embark on a bicycle trip to discover what happens to the lanterns.

 

El Deafo    By: Bell, Cece

The author recounts in graphic novel format her experiences with hearing loss at a young age, including using a bulky hearing aid, learning how to lip read, and determining her "superpower."

 

Class Act   By: Craft, Jerry

Eighth grader Drew Ellis recognizes that he isn't afforded the same opportunities, no matter how hard he works, that his privileged classmates at the Riverdale Academy Day School take for granted, and to make matters worse, Drew begins to feel as if his good friend Liam might be one of those privileged kids and is finding it hard not to withdraw, even as their mutual friend Jordan tries to keep their group of friends together.

 

Oddly Normal. Book 1    By: Frampton, Otis

Oddly explores a mad scientist's lair and receives a strange gift that will change her life.

 

Pashmina    By: Chanani, Nidhi

For Pri, her mother's homeland can only exist in her imagination. That is, until she find a mysterious pashmina tucked away in a forgotten suitcase. When she wraps herself in it, she is transported to a place more vivid and colorful than any guidebook or Bollywood film. But is this the real India? And what is that shadow lurking in the background?

 

 

Stargazing     By: Wang, Jen

Chinese-American student Christine is devastated when her artistic best friend, Moon, falls dangerously ill amid revelations that she has been having visions about celestial beings telling her she does not really belong on Earth.

 

Best Friends     By: Hale, Shannon

Sixth grade is supposed to be perfect. Shannon’s got a sure spot in the in-crowd called The Group, and her best friend is their leader, Jen, the most popular girl in school. But the rules are always changing, and Shannon has to scramble to keep up. She never knows which TV shows are cool, what songs to listen to, and who she’s allowed to talk to. Who makes these rules, anyway? And does Shannon have to follow them?

 _Grade 6 Summer Packet 2024-25 ELA.pdf 

 PS71 Summer Reading Log.docx