Dear Parent/Guardian,
We are pleased to present the John F. Kennedy High School Summer Reading Program. Summer should be filled with joyful times, and we hope that reading will be an important part of your child’s summer plans.
To quote acclaimed English teacher-leader and author Dr. Kylene Beers, “Summer reading is about kicking off shoes, staying up much too late, reading all day with no one caring that’s what you’re doing. It’s about rushing through one to get to the next or lingering as long as you want. It’s about vicarious experiences that let us become a girl in an attic, a boy in the wilderness, a kite runner in a far-away land. And that type of reading begins with personal choice.”
To that end, the English Department at John F. Kennedy High School invites your child to select a book of his or her choice for this year’s summer reading. To assist students in making their selection, the JFK High School Library website will provide various peer-reviewed lists of suggested titles appropriate for adolescent and young adult readers. Students are encouraged to read at least one selection of their choice, be it fiction or nonfiction, novel, graphic novel, or drama.
While all of the titles on the lists we provide are deserving of merit, some may be suitable for more mature students. Therefore, we urge you to carefully review the lists and to help your son or daughter make a selection that is appropriate based on his or her interests, age, reading level, and maturity. Again, these lists are provided to offer suggestions, but it is not mandatory for your child to limit his or her selection to a title on one of these lists.
We hope this approach to summer reading will enable students to discover, or re-discover, a natural love of reading.
Enjoy the summer with a good book!
The Kennedy English Department
JFK High School Library Website: https://jfk-library.weebly.com/
*Please note that this voluntary program is not for AP Seminar, AP Research, AP Language, or AP Literature courses. Students in these courses have already joined a Google Classroom for their summer assignment.