English 8
English 8
2026
2026
Summer Reading Adventures
Summer Reading Adventures
Embedded Files
Dear Future 8th Graders:
Congratulations — you made it to summer! The alarms are off, the backpacks are tossed into corners, and for a little while, your biggest decisions might be things like:
Pool or beach?
Sleeping in or getting up early?
Watermelon before dinner… or after dinner? ...or all day long?
You’ve earned a break from the daily routines of the school year, and I hope your summer is full of fun, relaxation, adventures, and time with family and friends. However, before you completely disappear into vacation mode, I have one important mission for you:
Keep reading.
Reading is like exercise for your brain — except instead of lifting weights, you’re building imagination, creativity, empathy, vocabulary, and critical thinking skills. The more you read, the stronger your mind becomes. And the best part? Summer reading doesn’t have to feel like schoolwork. It can happen on the beach, during a road trip, by the pool, at the park, or curled up on the couch during a thunderstorm.
This summer’s reading assignment has three (3) parts, each designed to let you explore different kinds of writing while still enjoying your break.
Part I: Read and annotate a Short Story. Short stories pack a lot into just a few pages — suspense, humor, mystery, drama, and unforgettable characters. Your job is to read carefully and think about how authors create meaning in a short amount of space.
Part I: Read and annotate a Short Story. Short stories pack a lot into just a few pages — suspense, humor, mystery, drama, and unforgettable characters. Your job is to read carefully and think about how authors create meaning in a short amount of space.
Part 2: Read and Respond to Poetry. Poetry is more than rhyming words. Poems can tell stories, capture emotions, paint vivid images, and make us see ordinary things in new ways. Some poems may make you laugh, some may confuse you at first, and some might surprise you. Your response is your chance to react honestly and thoughtfully.
Part 2: Read and Respond to Poetry. Poetry is more than rhyming words. Poems can tell stories, capture emotions, paint vivid images, and make us see ordinary things in new ways. Some poems may make you laugh, some may confuse you at first, and some might surprise you. Your response is your chance to react honestly and thoughtfully.
Part 3: Read or Listen To a Longer Work of Fiction. That’s right. Listening counts too! Whether you choose a physical book, an e-book, or an audiobook, I want you to experience a longer story over time. Fiction allows us to step into someone else’s world, and sometimes the characters we meet in books stay with us long after summer ends.
Part 3: Read or Listen To a Longer Work of Fiction. That’s right. Listening counts too! Whether you choose a physical book, an e-book, or an audiobook, I want you to experience a longer story over time. Fiction allows us to step into someone else’s world, and sometimes the characters we meet in books stay with us long after summer ends.
My hope is that you discover something you genuinely enjoy reading and that you discover something new about yourself. Not every book is for every person, and that’s okay. Part of becoming a strong reader is finding genres, authors, and stories that connect with you. Another part of becoming a strong reader is figuring out strategies to move your way through a book you may not immediately love.
When we return in the fall, we’ll use these summer readings to launch discussions, activities, and projects together. You’ll walk into 8th grade already prepared to think deeply, share ideas, and start the year strong.
Until then, enjoy every bit of your summer break. Relax, recharge, make memories… and don’t forget to bring a book along for the adventure.
Happy Reading and Happy Summer!
Ms. Vanscoy, Your Future 8th Grade Teacher
Our Essential Question:
What does it take to survive and advance?
Your summer adventures include three (3) distinct activities:
Part I. Read, annotate, and make marginalia for one (1) short story.
Part II. Read eight (8) poems and respond to one (1).
Part III. Read one (1) longer text from the 8th grade summer reading list. No writing required.
Due date for assignments: Thursday, August 20, 2026
PART I
All 8th graders will read, annotate, and write marginalia for the text:
The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell
Instructions for writing marginalia are on
Part II
All 8th graders will read and respond to poems in the 8th Grade Poetry Packet. Poems and instructions are on
Part III
Read at least one (1) of the books on the list linked above and appearing below. It is your choice to annotate--think about what will help you to be prepared to participate in a seminar discussion on Thursday, August 20th. (I do recommend listening to Project Hail Mary.)
Project Hail Mary / Andy Weir / 2022
Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission—and if he fails, humanity and the earth itself will perish.
Except that right now, he doesn’t know that. He can’t even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it.
All he knows is that he’s been asleep for a very, very long time. And he’s just been awakened to find himself millions of miles from home, with nothing but two corpses for company.
His crewmates dead, his memories fuzzily returning, Ryland realizes that an impossible task now confronts him. Hurtling through space on this tiny ship, it’s up to him to puzzle out an impossible scientific mystery—and conquer an extinction-level threat to our species.
And with the clock ticking down and the nearest human being light-years away, he’s got to do it all alone.
Or does he? (ISBN-13: 978-0593135228)
The Lost Year / Katherine Marsh / 2024
A middle-grade survival story that traces a family secret back to the Holodomor, a terrible famine that devastated Soviet Ukraine in the 1930s.
Thirteen-year-old Matthew is miserable. His journalist dad is stuck overseas indefinitely, and his mom has moved in his one-hundred-year-old great-grandmother to ride out the pandemic, adding to his stress and isolation.
But when Matthew finds a tattered black-and-white photo in his great-grandmother’s belongings, he discovers a clue to a hidden chapter of her past, one that will lead to a life-shattering family secret.
Set in alternating timelines that connect the present-day to the 1930s and the US to the USSR, Katherine Marsh’s latest novel sheds fresh light on the Holodomor – the horrific famine that killed millions of Ukrainians, and which the Soviet government covered up for decades. (ISBN: 978-1250909305)
When Stars Are Scattered / Victoria Jamieson and Omar Mohamed / 2020
Omar and his younger brother, Hassan, have spent most of their lives in Dadaab, a refugee camp in Kenya. Life is hard there: never enough food, achingly dull, and without access to the medical care Omar knows his nonverbal brother needs. So when Omar has the opportunity to go to school, he knows it might be a chance to change their future . . . but it would also mean leaving his brother, the only family member he has left, every day. Heartbreak, hope, and gentle humor exist together in this graphic novel about a childhood spent waiting, and a young man who is able to create a sense of family and home in the most difficult of settings. It's an intimate, important, unforgettable look at the day-to-day life of a refugee, as told to New York Times Bestselling author/artist Victoria Jamieson by Omar Mohamed, the Somali man who lived the story. (ISBN: 978-0525553908)
The Odyssey / Gareth Hinds / 2010
Fresh from his triumphs in the Trojan War, Odysseus, King of Ithaca, wants nothing more than to return home to his family. Instead, he offends the sea god, Poseidon, who dooms him to years of shipwreck and wandering. Battling man-eating monsters, violent storms, and the supernatural seductions of sirens and sorceresses, Odysseus will need all his strength and cunning—and a little help from Mount Olympus—to make his way home and seize his kingdom from the schemers who seek to wed his queen and usurp his throne. Award-winning graphic artist Gareth Hinds masterfully reinterprets a story of heroism, adventure, and high action that has been told and retold for more than 2,500 years—though never quite like this. (ISBN-13 : 978-0763642686)
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