Berlin High School English Department

Accelerated/Honors Program

Required Summer Reading Titles for 2007

One important component of the accelerated/honors program is required summer reading. These books will serve as points-of-reference throughout the entire year. All accelerated/honors students will read four teacher-selected summer reading books per year and take a test on all four books at the start of the school year. Exceptions are English 9 and English 10 Accelerated with three required novels and Accelerated Humanities with one longer required text and one longer suggested text. Students who achieve success (85% or above, average of all four tests) on the summer reading tests will be welcomed into the accelerated/honors section; it is suggested strongly that students who score below 85 on the summer reading tests reconsider their decision to take the accelerated/honors course.

Going into English 9 Accelerated:

1. The Time Machine - H. G. Wells

2. A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving

3. I am the Cheese - Robert Cormier

Going into English 10 Accelerated:

1. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold

2. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini

3. Life of Pi - Yann Martel

Going into American Studies Accelerated:

Students must read:

1. The Kentucky Cycle, Robert Schenkkan

2. My Antonia, Willa Cather

3. How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents, Julia Alvarez

American Studies students must also choose one of the following:

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Maya Angelou

Growing Up, Russell Baker

The Woman Warrior, Maxine Hong Kingston

Hunger of Memory, Richard Rodriguez

On Gold Mountain, Lisa See

Going into Junior Honors English:

1. Babbitt - Sinclair Lewis

2. Snow Falling on Cedars - David Guterson

3. The Glass Menagerie - Tennessee Williams

4. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath

Going into Accelerated Humanities:

1. Sophie's World - Jostein Gaarder (Required Reading, subject to summer reading test)

2. The City of Joy - Dominique Lapierre (Suggested, Optional Reading)

Going into Advanced Placement Senior English:

1. The Stranger - Albert Camus

2. Othello - William Shakespeare

3. Three Tall Women - Edward Albee

4. Siddhartha - Hermann Hesse