Middle School
Why read during the summer you might ask? School's out - it's time to relax, go to the beach, hang out with friends, right? Well, yes, but...
At ESJ we believe:
- Reading is the foundation of academic success.
- Reading is an essential skill that improves with practice.
- Reading promotes curiosity and intellectual growth; social acceptance and cultural understanding; diversity of perspectives; increased language fluency; and critical and independent thinking.
- Reading is an integral component of lifelong learning.
- Reading can change your life!
This program is designed for you to get more information about your choices for 2012's Summer Reading program. Middle School students will choose one book from the list on the left of the website in addition to reading One Thousand Paper Cranes: The Story of Sadako and the Children's Peace Statue by Ishii Takayuki (Laurel Leaf, 2001). Our goal was to give you greater freedom by providing engaging choices that appeal to readers with varied interests and diverse abilities.
Fifty-one books were chosen to fit into each of the following four categories:
- Contemporary Classics (English related themes)
- History/Historical Fiction (History/Arts/Language related themes)
- Science Fiction/Fantasy (Technology/Math/Science related themes)
- Teen Issues (Leadership/Theology related themes)
How to Use the Wiki:
To read more about any of the Summer Reading selections, simply look to the maroon column at the left of the Wiki page and click on the title of the book in which you are interested. You will be taken to a page on which you can see the book jacket and read reviews that will help you gain a better feel for the book that best suits your individual interests and reading level. Be sure to click "see more" when necessary to scroll to the end of the list!
"It is not enough to simply teach children to read; we have to give them something worth reading. Something that will stretch their imaginations - something that will help them make sense of their own lives and encourage them to reach out toward people whose lives are quite different from their own." - Newberry Award-winning author Katherine Paterson
English 9 and Honors English 9: Animal Farm by George Orwell and The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
Paulo Coelho's novel The Alchemist, timeless and entertaining, exotic yet simple, explores the Hero's Journey and Quest archetypes by breaking the journey we all take – to find the most meaningful treasures in our lives – into steps that are at once natural and magical. It is about the faith, power, and courage we all have within us to pursue the intricate path of a Personal Legend, a path charted by the mysterious magnet of destiny but obscured by distractions. The character Santiago shows how, along the way, we learn to trust our hearts, read the seemingly inconspicuous signs, and understand that, as we look to fulfill a dream, it looks to find us just the same, if we let it.
Animal Farm has a similarly timeless quality to it, but its author’s vision is much darker. George Orwell’s 1946 novel tells of a group of barnyard animals who try to create their own society, independent of humans, in which all animals are equal. This well-intended social experiment, however, goes horribly wrong, and the tale becomes a caution against the threat posed by controlling, tyrannical governments. While the story was written to parallel the Russian Revolution of 1917, contemporary readers will also see parallels in today’s society, in the attempts to influence and control public opinion and behavior coming from all directions – governmental, commercial, personal – on a daily basis.
In addition to serving as an introduction to archetypal/symbolic literary theory, these novels will familiarize the students with the literary device of allegory, in which a work communicates its message by means of symbolic figures, actions or symbolic representation.
English 10: Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand
Unbroken, the acclaimed biographical novel by Laura Hillenbrand, centers on the life of Louie Zamperini. Zamperini, a one-time juvenile delinquent, channeled his early defiance into a talent for running, a talent that took him to the 1936 Berlin Olympics. When the second World War arrived, however, the athlete became an airman, leading him to a doomed flight, a tiny raft, and a brutal stint as a prisoner of war. Zamperini’s story has been described as one of the most extraordinary odysseys of the Second World War, and is ultimately a testament to the resilience of the human mind, body, and spirit. Hillenbrand’s novel will also set the tone for the sophomore English curriculum, which examines the humanity’s efforts to find meaning and truth in seemingly broken worlds through The Odyssey, Oedipus Rex, and Macbeth.
Unbroken is divided into five main sections and an epilogue: Zamperini’s youth, his entry into the army, his being shot down and left adrift at sea, his time in the prison camp, and his liberation. In each section of the book, students should identify at least one passage which strikes them as meaningful, for whatever reason. They should either write out the passage or a brief summary of it, along with a page number, and then write a well-developed paragraph, explaining their reaction.
Honors English 10: The Chosen by Chaim Potok
“It is the now-classic story of two fathers and two sons and the pressures on all of them to pursue the religion they share in the way that is best suited to each. And as the boys grow into young men, they discover in the other a lost spiritual brother, and a link to an unexplored world that neither had ever considered before. In effect, they exchange places, and find the peace that neither will ever retreat from again...”.(Random House)
Reading Activity: While you are reading, define the following terms based on their use in the novel and provide a cited passage for each.
- Hasid
- Yiddish
- Assimilationist
- Fanatic
- Talmud
- Apikorsim
- Rabbi
- Cossacks
- Tallit
- Tefillin
- Shofar
- The Kaballah
- Tzaddik
- Torah
- Gematriya
- Misnaged
- Teresienstadt
- Goyim
- Zionism
- Bar mitzvah
Possible Essay Questions (to prepare for, for an open book in class writing)
1. Compare and contrast the characters of Reb Saunders and Mr. Malter:
As fathers and teachers
In terms of their world views, their views of Judaism, and their views of Zionism
2. Identify the speakers of the following quotations. Then explain their significance to the novel, referring to the characters and incidents throughout your discussion:
--“A father can bring up a child any way he wishes…”
--“What a price to pay for a soul!”
3. Discuss the values and beliefs of Reb Saunders and Mr. Malter, and show how the novel dramatizes the affect these had on the development of Danny and Reuven. Then analyze your own parents’ values and beliefs, exploring the way they have shaped, and are continuing to shape, your identity.
4. Reuven’s father tells him, “The Talmud says that a person should do two things for himself. One is to acquire a teacher.” Danny remembers that the other is to choose a friend. In what ways have both Danny and Reuven done these things for themselves? What has each boy derived from the teacher?
The vocabulary list and essay questions are taken from a Teacher’s Guide provided by Rosalyn McPherson for Random House.
English 11 and AP Language – One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey
Cuckoo’s Nest was an important expose about the state of mental health care in the early 1960’s, but it is also a powerful character study. Although Randall McMurphy is the protagonist, this book is also very much the story of Chief Bromden, and collaterally Nurse Ratchet and the other inmates of the asylum. It is also a fascinating study of ‘control’, its use and abuse. The interpersonal dynamics of the story can enlighten us in a number of ways. Your job, as you read it, is to identify the parts that address these issues. There will be an opportunity to write about these things at the beginning of next year, and the more ‘evidence’ you can bring to bear in your discussion, the better.
English 12: Old School by Tobias Wolff
Amazon.com praises the novel by writing, "Tobias Wolff's Old School is at once a celebration of literature and a delicate hymn to a lost innocence of American life and art. Set in a New England prep school in the early 1960s, the novel imagines a final, pastoral moment before the explosion of the Civil Rights movement, the Vietnam War, the assassination of John F. Kennedy, and the suicide of Ernest Hemingway.”
The unnamed narrator is one of several boys whose life revolves around the school's English teachers, those polymaths who seemed to know "exactly what was most worth knowing." For the boys, literature is the center of life, and their obsession culminates in a series of literary competitions during their final year. The prize in each is a private audience with a visiting writer who serves as judge for the entries. Through these contests, the main character learns more about himself than he does about writing. Readers will appreciate his struggles and conflicts as a student in a private school and will hopefully learn some lessons about honor.
To complete over the summer, due on the second day of school:
Make a list of the various virtues Wolff examines in the story. For example, there are times when the narrator is less than truthful with himself, honesty being one of the virtues Wolff explores. Choose one or two of these virtues and write several paragraphs examining how Wolff incorporates these ideas into the story. This informal will writing sample will then serve as the springboard for the first discussions of the year, anchoring the course with a dialogue about honestly, heroism, identity, love and faith, to name a few of the topics explored. These written responses will be due on the second day of school. Students should bring two copies: one to use during the discussions and one to submit.
AP Literature: Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
Students are to:
1. loosely annotate the novel (this means make notes in the margins, including defining words you didn't know, commenting on characters, etc.)
2. mark three "loaded" passages, paragraphs or entire scenes that you find intriguing, important or otherwise noteworthy;
3. ask three essential questions that the novel, at least in part, can answer; though you may not be able to answer the question satisfactorily yourself, this shouldn't keep you from thinking about it and trying.
Bring your notes and questions to the first class (for a quiz/participation grade) and be prepared to take a test on the material in the first week.
English 12 & Theology: The Religious Sense by Luigi Giussani
This little book is a jewel. Its brevity should not suggest that it can or should be read quickly, but rather approached as fine meal in which one should enjoy every bite. Monsignor Giussani, writing in response to conversations with high school students in Italy in the mid 1960's, challenges his readers to examine their own direct experience of reality as an essential step in forming a genuine philosophy of themselves as human beings. As he carefully weaves philosophical discussion together with very down-to-earth examples, he leads us step by step to grasp the framework of a deep objective truth around which to comprehend our personal and deeply subjective experience. Students entering Theology English 12 will be well served by a careful, slow and deliberate reading of this marvelous book. One cannot scan-read this kind of writing, but it is short enough to enjoy in small slow steps. I consider it to be one of the most important books I have read in many years.
English 12 / Tolkein: Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Within the context of the Nazi horror Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote this little study about the structure of what true community is. As the atrocities of the time unfolded around him, Bonhoeffer saw very clearly the dangers of false constructs of human community. He was appalled by the inability of his fellow Germans (especially his fellow clergymen) to formulate a cogent resistance against the Nazi programs. He then formulates his own understanding of what true fellowship is and the One around whom true fellowship forms. As you read, think critically about this question: has the idea of community been imposed as an ideological abstraction that undermines human freedom, or has community emerged as a byproduct of divine love that fosters human freedom? What have you experienced that illustrates either side of this question? Be prepared to discuss this as we enter into our study of Tolkien.
Upper School History
AP U.S.
Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of new England by William
Cronon and John Demos
AP Government