Independent Reading Resources
8th Grade 2020 Reading Recommendations
Awesome AP Classics for High School:
To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Awesome 2019-2020 Young Adult Fiction Novels:
The Kingdom of Back by Marie Lu
Yes No Maybe So by Becky Albertalli and Aisha Saeed
All Your Twisted Secrets by Diana Urban
Tweet Cute by Emma Lord
Infinity Son by Adam Silvera
One of Us is Next by Karen M. McManus
Of Curses and Kisses by Sandhya Menon
Layoverland by Gabby Noone
All the Stars and Teeth by Adalyn Grace
The Conference of the Birds by Ransom Riggs
Awesome 2019-2020 Young Adult Nonfiction Reads:
We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Do You Know Who You Are? by DK
Honor Girl by Maggie Thrash
Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging by Sebastian Junger
Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand
7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens by Sean Covey
Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson
I Am Malala: How One Girl Stood Up for Education by Malala Yousafzai
Trapped by Marc Aronson
Undefeated: Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team by Steve Sheinkin
Don't forget about Destiny Discover !!
Here are some links to resources that can give you access to tons of online reading!!
A Note On Students And Books
What’s a classroom without books! If you’re going to be teaching virtually you might be wondering where to find reading material for your students. Some students might be lucky enough to have a lot of reading material at home. No doubt, many will not.
Here are a few ideas:
- New Braunfels Public Library offers free access to eBooks and audio books. Find out what they are doing to hook you up with great reads!!!
- Newsela — Great real world texts presented so that children can access the same text at different reading levels (currently free for schools).
- Rivet — Free app that families can download with thousands of modern leveled readers.
- Epic — Digital library of modern books aimed at children under 12. Always free for teachers and librarians (and students can access it during school hours).
- ReadingIQ — Similar to Epic. There are thousands of modern digital books for readers under 12. Access is free for closed schools — learn more here.
- International Children’s Digital Library –– A collection of international books for children aged 3-13 presented in 59 languages.
- Project Gutenberg — Don’t be put off by the “old school” design of this website. There are 60,000+ eBooks that can be downloaded for all ages (most are older works with expired copyright).
- Faded Page — 5000 plus eBooks that are completely free to download. Not designed for children but there are many classics for older students (like Project Gutenberg they are mostly older works with expired copyright).
- Open Library — Catalogue where you can borrow books for free (lots of options for older students).
- Lit2Go — A free online collection of stories and poems in MP3 (audiobook) format with accompanying text. Includes many classics with expired copyright.
- Storyline Online
- Free new and popular ebooks from Junior Library Guild in elementary, middle and high school levels. Don’t click personal login after clicking the link for ebooks for your grade level. Enter the codes below.
Middle School
Username: JLGMID
Password: JLGFREE