Venice Christian School Summer Reading List
2016-17 Middle and High School
Objective: Summer Reading is assigned to increase reading comprehension, critical thinking skills and the
enjoyment of reading.
Directions: Students must read two or more books for a total of 400 + pages. Students need to read at least one
book from the attached list that they have not read before. Other books may be student choice as long as it is
grade appropriate. All books need to be approved by parents. Please record the books that are read on the log
found at the end of this list. Parents/guardians must sign to affirm that their student has read each of the books.
In addition, students are required to complete, with page numbers, the “Book Challenge Bookmark” attached to
this packet (last page). When the student returns to school, he/she should be prepared with a complete project
on one of the books and to take an Accelerated Reader quiz.
Grading: Students will receive 100 or 150 points for
completing the bookmark and one of these assignments on the
book of their choice. The signed reading log is required to
receive these points.
Due: All reading projects and AR quizzes are to be completed
by Friday, September 16, 2016. Students may take as many
AR quizzes as books they read. Extra AR quizzes will go
toward AR Store rewards during the school year.
6th – 12th Grade Reading Project
Assignments - Choose One
Assignment Choice #1 for 100 Points
Choose a book you will read this summer
and . . .
1. Draw a map of the setting.
2. Write a short-short story stating what the
character(s) would be doing one year later (3
paragraphs).
3. Imagine you could interview the protagonist.
What three questions would you ask?
4. Write a short book review – 3 paragraphs. (1introduction, 2 - describe the book, 3 – your review.
Assignment Choice #2 for 150 Points
Add the following to choice #1 and take it to the next level…
1. Choose two people or characters from two different books
who you think would be great friends. Why? (Minimum 3 paragraphs)
2. Choose one book location or setting to live in for a week –
it can be fiction or nonfiction. Which book would you choose and why? (3 paragraphs)
3. Take a photo of the cover of every book and article you read. Create a photo collage
or animated trailer (Free like Animoto might be a fun choice).
Remember: Spelling, form, word choice and neatness counts!
Good & Great Reads For Summer 2016 for 6th – 9th
“We read to know we are not alone.” – C.S. Lewis
Bible – Any book in the Bible that is 25 chapters or more.
Absolutely Truly: A Pumpkin Falls Mystery
The Green Ember
Tiger Boy
Walking Home
Arcady’s Goal
The Boys of the Blur
Al Capone Does My Shirts
The Secret Garden
The Red Wall Series
No Excuses – NF sports
Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad
Julie of the wolves
Blue Fingers: A Ninja’s Tale
Shadow of a Bull
Rifles for Watie
Julie of the Wolves
The Big Sky
Bridge to Teribetha
Hatchet
Soul Surfer
Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Anderson
100 Cupboards by N.D. Wilson (6th grade) &
Ashtown Burials (upper middle school)
The View from Saturday
The Shakespeare Stealer
Chronicles of Narnia
Old Yeller
Tuck Everlasting
My Father’s Dragon
Escape from Warsaw
Summer of the Monkeys
The Trumpet of the Swans
The Phantom Tollbooth
The Waltons go to Birmingham
The Pigman
Tuck Everlasting
Freak the Mighty
20,000 Leagues under the Sea
Swiss Family Robinson
Lincoln: A Photo biography
Black Ships before Troy
Homecoming
The red Pony
Kidnapped
Bud and Me
The Eagle of the Ninth
The Hawk that does not Hunt by Day
Flight of the Eagles
Hunger Games series
The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood
Truth Slayers and Truth Twisters Series
The Homelanders Series and all young adult books by Klaven
(7th & 8th)
Dream House Kings series by Liparulo
The Shadow series
Diary of Anne Frank – Holocaust (mature girls)
Homecoming by Cynthia Voight (older middle)
Charlottes Web
Farewell to Manzanar
Soft Rain (8th & up)
Fat Men from Space
Caddie Woodlawn
500 Balloons
The Boy in the Strip Pajamas – Holocaust
Sarah, Plain, and Tall
Heidi
Rascal
The Devil’s Arithmetic – Holocaust
Prims by Wambu
Tin Tin in America
Amos Fortune, Free Man
Journey Through the Night (if you can find – out of print)
The Emerald Atlas
Wild Trek - Kjelgaard
Rogue Crew
The Red Wall series
Tarzan books
Sounder
The Red Pony
Red Hugh, Prince of Donegal
Little Women
Books by Peretti, Decker, L’Engle, Hinton
Nonfiction books by D’aulaire, Gail Gibbons, and David
Macaulay
Shipwrecked at the Bottom of the World: The Extraordinary
True Story of Shackleton
High School Summer Reads for 2016
Bible – Any book in the Bible that has 25 chapters or more.
(Some of the following books are newer and recommended by Word Magazine)
Titans
American Born Chinese
The Poe Estate
Sorta Like A Rock Star
Sumphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and
The Last Summer of the Death Warriors
the siege of Leningrad
The Knife of Never Letting Go
A Hear Revealed
Divergent Series
Faker: How to Live for Real When You’re Tempted to
16th Summer
Ultraviolet
Fake It NF
The Adoration of Jenna Fox
The Skin Map, The Bone House & Byzantium by Stephan Lawhead
The Sweetest Thing
The Best American Sports Writing – Jane Leavy
Promises to Keep
Singer Triology – Calvin miller
Coming Back Stronger, Halfback tough – football
Intentional Walk, Rob Rains
Brave Dragons – Chinese basketball
Who’s on Worst? Bondy
Speak
The Guns of Naverone
Banner in the Sky NF
The Boys of Summer NF – Baseball
Fabiola or The Church of the Catacombs NF
Soul Surfer NF
Let’s Roll (9/11)
Guns of Navarone
All’s Quiet on the Western Front
Something Beautiful for God NF
Answers for Difficult Days, David Quine
Soft Rain
Fairy tales by Hans Christian Anderson
Emma
Hitler’s Cross by Lutzer NF
God’s Smuggler: Brother Andrew NF
Band of Brothers by Ambrose NF
The Begotten – Lisa Bergrens
Unspoken – Angela Hunt
Babylon (a graphic type novel on Daniel)
Jaybar Crow, Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry
The Begotten – Lisa Bergren
Ribbon of Years – Robin Lee Hatcher (romance)
A Lasting Impression (romance)
Blue Moon Promise (romance)
Mine is the Night (romance)
Predator, Blackstock
The Shunning (Amish)
Babylon, (Graphic Novel)
Jesus & Paul, Wangerin
A Separate Peace
Their Eyes were Watching God
Jewel
Sarah Plain and Tall
Watership Down
The Good Earth
The Virginian
The Robe
The Light in the Forest
Lord of the Rings
The Sacket series
Ivanhoe
The Sea Wolf
Animal Farm
Tears of a Tiger
The Book Thief – Holocaust
The Boy in the Strip Pajamas – Holocaust
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court
Girlof the Limberlost
The 39 Steps
Hiroshima
The Chosen
Amusing Ourselves to Death – NF
Hollywood World Views – NF
Radical –NF
Kon Tikki – NF (Soon to be a movie)
Who Made God – Zacharias – NF
7 Habits of Highly Effective People – Covey – NF
Jayne Eyre (750 words that show up on the SAT’s)
The Three Musketeers
Robinson Crusoe
Lost Horizon
Into Thin Air NF
C.S. Lewis Space Trilogy
King Solomon’s Ring
Killer Angels (Civil War)
Ghost Soldiers
Quo Vadis?
Black Ships before Troy
Emma, Jane Austin
Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries by Dorothy Sayers
Les Miserable
Martian Chronicles
Mere Christianity NF
1984
Cost of Discipleship, Bonhoeffer
Of Mice and Men
Portrait of Dorian Grey
The Cross and the Switchblade NF
End of the Spear NF
Blue Like Jazz
NF
Run Baby Run NF
Through Gates of Splendor NF
Christy
The Call of the Wild
Same Kind of Different as Me
Ashtown Burials, N.D. Wilson
Freakonomics (NF)
The Invisible Man
The War of the World
The Time Machine
The Count of Monte Cristo
The Man in the Iron Mask
Alice in Wonderland
Through the Looking Glass
Seven Men who rule the World from the Grave, David Breese (Good Intro to world philosophies) NF
Rooms (If you read The Shack this is equally creative, but with better theology)
Vienna Prelude (WWII Christian Romance – part of the Zion Chronicles)
One Tuesday Morning – Kingsbury (story based on 9/11)
Deadline, Dominion, Deception – detective trio by Randy Alcorn, Also try Safely Home
Redeeming Love and Atonement Child, Rivers (Realistic romance)
Tilt- A- Whirl – N.D. Wilson (Christian Life – delightful, especially if you are a wordsmith)
Sophie’s World (easy way to learn about the world’s different philosophies)
How VCS Screens Books for Objectionable Material and Language
Thank you to HCA for crafting the Bob Jones summary for use.
As students reach the middle and high school reading levels, language, violence and romantic entanglements can become
problematic for teachers, parents, and students. The three criteria used to screen books and literature considered for
inclusion on the summer reading list are specified in the essay, “Classroom Censorship” from Bob Jones University which
explains the criteria as follows:
1. Gratuitousness – is the representation of evil purposeful or is it present for its own sake?
2. Explicitness – Is the representation of evil, if purposeful, present in an acceptable degree? Or is it more conspicuous or
vivid than the purpose warrants? Is the censorable material too potent to serve well as a negative example?
3. Moral tone – is evil presented from a condemning perspective? Is it made to appear both dangerous and repulsive?
What is the attitude of the work toward it? Will the censorable material be presented emphatically as a negative example?
Will what it portrays appear dangerous and repulsive regardless of the author’s intention?
As always, you know your student and what they should read. These diverse titles are picked carefully, thoughtfully and
prayerfully for summer reading. They are not all Christian works of literature. Some are good books (well written).
Some are great books (well written with important, impacting ideas that have passed the test of time). Christian themes
are recognizable, even if that was not the author’s intent. . These books talk of the fears, hopes, joys, frustrations people
experience. They are books about people not only as they are but as they can be. Students should examine, analyze and
understand themes, characters and plots using God’s word to light their path of discovery.
VCS SUMMER READING LOG
Directions: Students are required to do the following:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Read 400 plus pages from a novel on the reading list and any other novel approved by parents.
Your project is on a book from the list.
Fill out and turn in a reading log to your Language Arts teacher on September 16 th.
All novels included on the reading log must be completed.
Grading: Students will receive up to 150 points. .
Reading Log
Book Title
Author
# of pages
Parent Signature
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
By signing below, you are giving your word that the log is true and accurate.
Student Signature_____________________________________________________
Book Challenge Investigation
Bookmark
Name:________________________________
Title: _________________________________
List the page number and a brief reminder
of the details from the book you find as you
read. You can use these details in your
response to the challenge.
p. ___________________________________
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Additional notes (make copies or use back if
needed):
Copyright 2004, NCTE/IRA. All Rights
Reserved.