2015-2016 English 10 Summer Reading
To Students and parents:
Williamsburg High School
The goal of this summer reading project is to help you develop lifelong literacy skills by guiding you to interesting, thought
provoking books you can read independently over the summer. You will read a piece of canonized literature as well as a
contemporary fiction novel. We hope that you will enjoy reading these books and make reading a part of your daily life.
Summer reading guidelines:
Assignments are due to Mrs.Futhey on the first day of school and will not be taken late. You will be tested over the required
reading on the second day of school. Presentations of posters will begin on the third day of school but must be brought on the
first day of school. This assignment is not to be taken lightly. We understand that a lot of time and commitment are given on
your behalf and we want to give the appropriate grade for that time. Therefore, if you do not do a summer reading project, your
grade will suffer greatly. If you have questions over the summer, feel free to email me at [email protected] and I will
try to respond to your emails in a timely manner. You may borrow from a public library or purchase your books. I also have
some that may be checked out from me.
PART A: REQUIRED READING: Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Read The Lord of the Flies accurately and thoroughly. You will want to take notes of important
characters, events, and themes in this novel. While these notes will not be collected, you will be
given a test over the entire novel on the second day of school.
PART A: ASSIGNMENT
For TWO of these seven topics:
1. Loss of innocence
5. Golding’s statement on society
2. Loss of Identity
6. Need for civilization
3. Symbolic death & rebirth
7. Religious allegory
4. Cruelty in the novel
you will complete a Say, Mean, Matter chart (see example below) which will let you practice
making the jump from what Golding has written to significance. In thoughtfully connecting
technique and meaning, you are making the move to better reading, writing, and thinking. You
need seven entries in each chart. Charts must be handwritten and will be necessary for the inclass Literary Analysis Paper you will write the second week of school. So, to be clear, you will
have TWO charts with SEVEN entries in each. Additionally, you should take notes for yourself.
1. What does it say? Find a significant quotation from the story that is “on duty”—carrying an unusually heavy
load
for the author’s central idea or interest. Copy the quotation in the Say column or section of your response. Cite
the quotation by providing the correct page number in parentheses after the quotation.
2. What does it mean? In the Mean column or section, paraphrase the quotation so that it is clear that you
understand what it means in the context of the story. You should also indicate any literary devices used in the quote.
3. Why does it matter? In the Matter column or section, comment on why the quotation is important or significant
to the reader’s understanding of the central idea(s) of the story. Explain how the excerpt advances the author’s
complex meaning. As you analyze, you should be reading and writing “above the line.” If you feel like you are
summarizing, stop. The “Matter” section should be the longest of the three requirements and demonstrate your
ability to link technique and meaning. It is NOT a summary.
The following example is ONE entry in a Say, Mean, Matter chart on the theme of Upper Class
of the 1920’s in The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. You should have 2 total charts with 7
entries in each.
Student Example: The Great Gatsby
Say Mean Matter – Theme of Upper Class of the 1920s
Mean
Matter
Say
“‘Whenever you feel like
criticizing anyone,’ he told
me, ‘just remember that all
the people in this world
haven’t had the advantages
that you’ve had’” (12).
In Nick’s youth, his father
told him to never judge
anyone harshly because
there are many people in
the world who have not
been raised with the same
education, opportunities,
or love that Nick received.
Therefore, they may not
have the ability to make
sound decisions.
(Characterization)
Fitzgerald chooses to begin his novel with this advice,
showing that Nick, his first person narrator, will try to
remain as objective and unbiased as possible as he
relates the story of his neighbor, the
wealthy Jay Gatsby. Fitzgerald’s repetition of the
second person “you ”emphasizes that this advice is
meant for the reader as well as Nick. The
advice is also significant because the reader must feel
secure that the narrator is “telling it like it is” to the best
of his ability. These words lend
credibility to the story. However, the quotation also
implies that there will be a struggle between honesty
and deception in the story. Probably,
all of the characters do not seek the truth or are as
grounded in reality as Nick. Since the novel takes
place in the extravagant era of the Roaring Twenties,
it’s likely that some characters will be so greedy that
they will resort to dishonesty.
Part B: Non-fiction:
Read the non-fiction article at the end of this packet and complete assignment. You
will need to print the article and write on it! Watch the TedTalk Video. Link
provided below.
HONORS ENGLISH 10 ONLY!
Part C You Pick Reading:
What is it and what is its purpose?
Choose one book from the list below to read on your own. One of the best parts of reading a good book is sharing with others
what you’ve read. Be prepared to share the plot, characters, and themes of your novel with your classmates. Keep notes for
yourself as you read. These will not be collected but they will help you complete a partner project the second week of school.
ASSIGNMENT: Make a poster that explains the theme of the novel. Choose five pieces of textual support that bolsters the
theme. Make your poster visually appealing. On the back of your poster provide the reasoning for each quote. Simply,
explain how the quote fits the theme. NO SPOILERS!
You Pick Titles:
Choose one book from the list below to complete Part B of your summer assignment. (All synopsis taken from "Novel
Synopsis." Barnes and Noble LLC. 2009. Barnes and Noble. 01 May 2009 <http://www.barnesandnoble.com/>.)
Handle With Care-- Jodi Picoult
Every expectant parent will tell you that they don't want a perfect baby, just a healthy one. Charlotte and Sean
O'Keefe would have asked for a healthy baby, too, if they'd been given the choice. Instead, their lives are made
up of sleepless nights, mounting bills, the pitying stares of "luckier" parents, and maybe worst of all, the whatifs. What if their child had been born healthy? But it's all worth it because Willow is, well, funny as it seems,
perfect. She's smart as a whip, on her way to being as pretty as her mother, kind, brave, and for a five-year-old
an unexpectedly deep source of wisdom. Willow is Willow, in sickness and in health. (some language).
House Rules—Jodi Picoult
Jacob Hunt is a teenage boy with Asperger's syndrome. He's hopeless at reading social cues or expressing himself well to others,
and like many kids with AS, Jacob has a special focus on one subject--in his case, forensic analysis. He's
always showing up at crime scenes, thanks to the police scanner he keeps in his room, and telling the cops
what they need to do...and he's usually right. But then his town is rocked by a terrible murder and, for a
change, the police come to Jacob with questions. All of the hallmark behaviors of Asperger's--not looking
someone in the eye, stimulatory tics and twitches, flat affect--can look a lot like guilt to law enforcement
personnel. Suddenly, Jacob and his family, who only want to fit in, feel the spotlight shining directly on
them. For his mother, Emma, it's a brutal reminder of the intolerance and misunderstanding that always
threaten her family. For his brother, Theo, it's another indication of why nothing is normal because of Jacob.
And over this small family the soul-searing question looms: Did Jacob commit murder?(some language).
**** Any Jodi Picoult novel will do except My Sister’s Keeper.**** (some language)
Right Where I Belong – Krista McGee TEEN CHRISTIAN FICTION
Watching her father hop from one wife to another, Natalia knows that there's no such thing as true love. But
after his most recent divorce, she decides to follow the ex-stepmom she adores to Florida. Natalia moves to the
United States with Maureen, an American who married Natalia’s dad while working in Madrid. Due to their
closeness in age and shared faith, Maureen is more a friend than a stepmother. When her dad announces his
divorce to Maureen, Natalia accompanies her back to America. Her dad supports the move because it will look
good on her resume. Her parents want her to become a successful businesswoman. Natalia leaves behind her
culture, her country, her best friend, but not her new faith. As she encounters challenges, Natalia is tempted to
return to Spain. Maureen begins looking for a job while Natalia enrolls in high school. Maureen’s pastor and his son Brian help
them get settled. Maureen struggles in her faith while trying to adjust to life as a divorced woman. Brian and Natalia become
friends, even though wealthy Spencer tries to impress Natalia.
The Princess – Lori Wick CHRISTIAN FICTION
In the Land of Pendaran, Shelby Parker lives a humble but good life. Her special qualities are eventually noticed by
the king and queen of the House of Markham, who seek a new wife for their widowed son, Prince Nikolai. To
uphold the tradition of their country, Shelby and Nikolai agree to an arranged marriage. But while Nikolai is a
perfect gentleman in public, he remains distant at home, leaving Shelby to wonder what is in his heart. Will the
prince ever love her as he did his first wife? Can the faith they share overcome the barriers between them?
The Shack – Wm Paul Young CHRISTIAN FICTION
Mackenzie Allen Philips' youngest daughter, Missy, has been abducted during a family vacation, and evidence
that she may have been brutally murdered is found in an abandoned shack deep in the Oregon wilderness. Four
years later in the midst of his "Great Sadness," Mack receives a suspicious note, apparently from God, inviting
him back to that shack for a weekend.
Against his better judgment he arrives at the shack on a wintry afternoon and walks back into his darkest
nightmare. What he finds there will change Mack's world forever.
In a world where religion seems to grow increasingly irrelevant The Shack wrestles with the timeless question,
"Where is God in a world so filled with unspeakable pain?" The answers Mack gets will astound you and
perhaps transform you as much as it did him.
Where the Heart Is – Billie Letts
A funny thing happens to Novalee Nation on her way to Bakersfield, California. Her ne'er-do-well boyfriend,
Willie Jack Pickens, abandons her in an Oklahoma Wal-Mart and takes off on his own, leaving her with just 10
dollars and the clothes on her back. Not that hard luck is anything new to Novalee, who is "seventeen, seven
months pregnant, thirty-seven pounds overweight--and superstitious about sevens.... Still, finding herself alone
and penniless in Sequoyah, Oklahoma is enough to make even someone as inured to ill fortune as Novalee
want to give up and die. Fortunately, the Wal-Mart parking lot is the Sequoyah equivalent of a town square,
and within hours Novalee has met three people who will change her life: Sister Thelma Husband, a kindly
eccentric; Benny Goodluck, a young Native American boy; and Moses Whitecotton, an elderly African American photographer.
For the next two months, Novalee surreptitiously makes her home in the Wal-Mart, sleeping there at night, exploring the town by
day. When she goes into labor and delivers her baby there, however, Novalee learns that sometimes it's not so bad to depend on
the kindness of strangers.
The Help – Kathryn Stockett
Aibileen is a black maid in 1962 Jackson, Mississippi, who's always taken orders quietly, but lately she's
unable to hold her bitterness back. Her friend Minny has never held her tongue but now must somehow
keep secrets about her employer that leave her speechless. White socialite Skeeter just graduated college.
She's full of ambition, but without a husband, she's considered a failure. Together, these seemingly
different women join together to write a tell-all book about work as a black maid in the South, that could
forever alter their destinies and the life of a small town...
Water for Elephants – Sara Gruen
Though he may not speak of them, the memories still dwell inside Jacob Jankowski's ninety-something-yearold mind. Memories of himself as a young man, tossed by fate onto a rickety train that was home to the
Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth. Memories of a world filled with freaks and clowns, with
wonder and pain and anger and passion; a world with its own narrow, irrational rules, its own way of life, and
its own way of death. The world of the circus: to Jacob it was both salvation and a living hell. Jacob was
there because his luck had run out—orphaned and penniless, he had no direction until he landed on this
locomotive "ship of fools." It was the early part of the Great Depression, and everyone in this third-rate circus
was lucky to have any job at all. Marlena, the star of the equestrian act, was there because she fell in love
with the wrong man, a handsome circus boss with a wide mean streak. And Rosie the elephant was there because she was the
great gray hope, the new act that was going to be the salvation of the circus.
Beloved—Toni Morrison
Set in rural Ohio just after the civil war, Beloved is based on a true story. Staring unflinchingly into the abyss
of slavery, this spellbinding novel transforms history into a story as powerful as Exodus and as intimate as a
lullaby. Sethe, its protagonist, was born a slave and escaped to Ohio, but eighteen years later she is still not
free. She has too many memories of Sweet Home, the beautiful farm where so many hideous things
happened. And Sethe’s new home is haunted by the ghost of her baby, who died nameless and whose
tombstone is engraved with a single word: Beloved. Filled with bitter poetry and suspense as taut as a rope,
Beloved is a towering achievement.
The Poisonwood Bible -- Barbara Kingsolver
The Poisonwood Bible is a story told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce, evangelical
Baptist who takes his family and mission to the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry with them everything they
believe they will need from home, but soon find that all of it—from garden seeds to Scripture—is calamitously
transformed on African soil. What follows is a suspenseful epic of one family's tragic undoing and remarkable
reconstruction over the course of three decades in postcolonial Africa. This beautifully crafted tale is told
through the distinct voices of the daughters and wife of Nathan Price.
Defending Jacob – William Landay
For the past twenty years, Andy Barber has been a happily married, respected assistant D.A. in a small
Massachusetts town. Within weeks, his professional situation and marriage crumble under the pressure of a case
involving the stabbing murder of a teenager. Barber's suspicions originally focus on a neighborhood pedophile, but
before long, damaging evidence mounts that incriminates Jacob, his own 14-year-old son. Caught between
desperation, loyalty, and instinct, the tenacious prosecutor struggles to make sense of disturbing revelations.
Already a Dagger Award winner, William Landay's Defending Jacobs brilliantly combines the best features of a
gripping psychological thriller, a realistic courtroom drama, and a moving portrait of a family in meltdown.
(Language)
Non-Fiction Article Assignment
How do Vaccines Work?
Instructions: COMPLETE ALL QUESTIONS AND MARGIN NOTES using the CLOSE reading
strategies. This requires reading of the article three times.
Step 1: Skim the article using these symbols as you read:
(+) agree, (-) disagree, (*) important, (!) surprising, (?) wondering
Step 2: Number the paragraphs. Read the article carefully and make notes in the margin.
Notes should include:
o Comments that show that you understand the article. (A summary or statement of the main
idea of important sections may serve this purpose.)
o Questions you have that show what you are wondering about as you read.
o Notes that differentiate between fact and opinion.
o Observations about how the writer’s strategies (organization, word choice, perspective,
support) and choices affect the article.
Step 3: A final quick read noting anything you may have missed during the first two reads.
Your margin notes are part of your score for this assessment. Answer the questions carefully in complete
sentences unless otherwise instructed.
Student ____________________________Class Period__________________
How do vaccines work?
Let’s Begin…The first ever vaccine was created when Edward Jenner, an
English physician and scientist, successfully injected small amounts of a cowpox
virus into a young boy to protect him from the related (and deadly) smallpox
virus. But how does this seemingly counterintuitive process work? Kelwalin
Dhanasarnsombut details the science behind vaccines.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rb7TVW77ZCs
Notes on my thoughts,
reactions and questions as I
read:
Transcription of TED Talk:
In 1796, the scientist Edward Jenner injected material from a cow pox virus into an eight-yearold boy with a hunch that this would provide the protection needed to save people from deadly
outbreaks of the related smallpox virus. It was a success. The eight-year-old was inoculated
against the disease, and this become the first every vaccine. But why did it work?
To understand how vaccines function, we need to know how the immune system defends us
against contagious diseases in the first place. When foreign microbes invade us, the immune
system triggers a series of responses in an attempt to identify and remove them from our bodies.
The signs that this immune response is working are the coughing, sneezing, inflammation, and
fever we experience which work to trap, deter, and rid the body of threatening things, like
bacteria. These innate immune responses also trigger our second line of defense called adaptive
immunity.
Special cells called B cells and T cells are recruited to fight microbes and also record
information about them creating a memory of what the invaders look like and how best to fight
them. This know-how becomes handy if the same pathogen invades the body again. But despite
this smart response, there’s still a risk involved. The body takes time to learn how to respond to
pathogens and to build up these defenses. And even then, if a body is too weak or young to fight
back when it’s invaded, it might face very serious risk if the pathogen is particularly severe. But
what if we could prepare the body’s immune response, readying it before someone even got ill?
This is where vaccines come in. Using the same principles that the body uses to defend itself,
scientists use vaccines to trigger the body’s adaptive immune system without exposing humans
to the full strength disease. This has resulted in many vaccines, which each work uniquely,
separated into many different types.
First, we have attenuated vaccines. These are made of the pathogen itself but a much weaker and
tamer version. Next, we have inactive vaccines, in which the pathogens have been killed. The
weakening and inactivation in both types of vaccine ensures that pathogens don’t develop into
the full blown disease. But just like a disease, they trigger an immune response, teaching the
body to recognize an attack by making a profile of pathogens in preparation. The downside is
that live attenuated vaccines can be difficult to make and because they’re live and quite
powerful, people with weaker immune systems can’t have them, while inactive vaccines don’t
create long-lasting immunity.
Another type, the subunit vaccine, is only made from one part of the pathogen, called an antigen,
the ingredient that actually triggers the immune response. By even further isolating specific
components of antigens, like proteins or polysaccharides, these vaccines can prompt specific
responses.
Scientists are now building a while new range of vaccines called DNA vaccines. For this variety,
they isolate the very genes that make the specific antigens the body needs to trigger its immune
response to specific pathogens. When injected into the human body, those genes instruct cells in
the body to make the antigens. This causes a stronger immune response and prepares the body
for any future threats, and because the vaccine only includes specific genetic material, it doesn’t
contain any other ingredients from the rest of the pathogen that could develop into the disease
and harm the patient. If these vaccines become a success, we might be able to build more
effective treatments for invasive pathogens in years to come.
Just like Edward Jenner’s amazing discovery, spurred on modern medicine all those decades ago,
continuing the development of vaccines might even allow us to treat diseases like HIV, malaria,
or Ebola, one day.
Notes on my thoughts,
reactions and questions as I
read:
Comprehension questions – answers may be in phrases.
1. Edward Jenner created a vaccine against smallpox by injecting patients with material from what
disease?
2. What is the purpose of the author’s use of the question “But why did it work?” early in the TED
Talk?
3. Define contagious as used in the article.
4. What is the main advantage of the live attenuated disease?
5. Define principles as used in the text.
9/10.RI.4,5,6
2. Answer each question in one or more complete sentences.
7/8.RI.1,2,3,4,5
What
is the function of an innate immune response?
Which of the vaccine types appears to be in the research phase as of right now? How were you able to
infer this?
Of the
Explain this statement: “Vaccines do not only protect against those who get vaccinated, but others as
well.”
9/10.RI.1
3. What are the advantages and disadvantages of using a TED Talk video versus a written article? Given a
choice, which medium would you prefer? Explain.
(
7/8.RI.7
4. Create a dialogue between two parents. Parent 1 wishes to opt out of vaccinations for their children
while parent 2 believes vaccinations are essential for the health of his/her children as well as the health of
other people. The majority of the responses should cite directly from the text. A minimum of 10 total
responses is required.
9/10..RI.6
Dhanasarnsombut, K. How do vaccines work? TED.com. Mordecai, A. The science facts about autism and vaccines. ed.ted.com. January 2015.