7th Grade Reading Teacher needs recommendations!

[Charlotte]

Hi all! I just joined this group because I am a 7th grade Reading teacher (to all girls) and I am wanting to do a novel in the upcoming semester with each of my classes! I am also an avid reader and enjoy all genres and book for all reading levels! I would love to hear recommendations of books for my students from others that work with teens and from teens themselves! Thanks in advance!

[Patty]

The Goose Girl and Book of a Thousand Days would both be good choices for 7th grade girls. Shannon Hale is the author of both, and both books have resourceful and brave heroines.

[Patty]

I teach 7th, too (boys and girls) and I've had a lot of success with To Kill a Mockingbird, Tom Sawyer, Something Wicked This Way Comes, and The Joy Luck Club. For an all-girls classroom, I'd probably lean toward Joy Luck and Mockingbird since they feature strong female characters.

[Allison]

I second anything by Shannon Hale! My favorite is The Goose Girl, but she won a Newbery Honor for Princess Academy, so you may also wish to consider that title.

I'd also recommend Rules, by Cynthia Lord (a 2007 Newbery Honor book), and The Lightning Thief, by Rick Riordan. The latter has a male protagonist, but also features a smart, strong female character. I haven't met a middle schooler yet who didn't like that book.

Have fun! :)

[Jo]

To tired from all the Christmas stuff going on to think but one would be Erec Rex. Please feel free to look at my book list under youth, teen for advanced and childrens for those catching up or old favorites... Good luck!

[Rachael]

The Princess Bride
It's an excellent example of satire, yet also a very engaging and enjoyable book with strong characters humor, an exciting plot.

[Alexandra]

How about,

Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery
Joy in the Morning by Betty Smith
Midnighters 1: The Secret Hour by Scott Westerfeld
Airborn by Kenneth Oppel - protagonist is a boy, but there is a girl as a main character involved in most events.

[Ash]

You may not ever find me post and it might be too late but I will speak anyways.
The Giver
Dramarama
The Cure
Violet and Claire
Gingerbread

These books are pretty good reads and I found the last two and Dramarama not too sad just in case you have sesitive people.

[Lisa]

Copper Sun by Sharon Draper, Incantation by Alice Hoffman. both of these are historic fiction which I wouldn't normally like but I loved both books and successfuly booktalked them with a 7th grade audience. for a great nonfiction choice I recommend Let Me Play, the Story of Title IX.

[bjneary]

Al Capone Does My Shirts
Lizzy Bright and the Buckminster Boy
Sweetgrass Basket
The Thief Lord

[Kim]

I've been doing school tours with my novel, Songs for a Teenage Nomad, and last week did a workshop in a seventh grade classroom. We had a blast working on the song journal project, but they also gave me a list of their favorite books. Here are some of the highlights.
Uglies
The Giver
Rules
Goose Girl
Lizzy Bright and the Buckminster Boy
The Princesses of Atlantis
...there were a couple of others, but I'm blanking...

[Sarah]

I loved
- the Pendragon series by DJ Machale,
- Artemis Fowl series by Eoin Colfer and
- Power of Five series by Anthony Horowitz.

Horowitz' other series about Alex Rider is not bad either.

[Caroline]

I go to an all girls school and in seventh grade To Kill a Mockingbird, Shane (I did not like it) and Anne Frank. I think that a Tamora Pierce book would also be good or a Mango Shaped Space.

[Shel]

Some of my recent favorites:

When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead 2009 Newbury Award
Just read Schooled by Gordon Korman -- the MC is a boy, but I think girls would enjoy.
Also, just re-read the Watson's Go to Birmingham -- 1963. this is an old book, but I was reminded how heartfelt it is.

Also, I run a web-site http://whatchareadingnow.com that has a monthly e-zine with book recommendations.

[4th-8th]

michelle wrote: "Some of my recent favorites:

When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead 2009 Newbury Award
Just read Schooled by Gordon Korman -- the MC is a boy, but I think girls would enjoy.
Also, just re-read th..."

I just peeked at your website and I am very pleased to see that there is much on the dystopian novels.
http://whatchareadingnow.com/

[Shel]

Thanks so much for the kind comments! We launched the site mid-January of this year. Our next issue should be up in the next day or so...that one is themed love, but does not deal only with romance.

All issues will be archived, including the current one on dystopian novels, so I hope you'll stop back from time to time!

[Susan]

I loved When You Reach Me. I also recommend If a Tree Falls at Lunch Period by Gennifer Choldenko. I also read and enjoyed The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate by Jacqueline Tate. Is that young?

[Susan]

How could I forget! 8th Grade Superzero by Olugbemisola Rhuday Perkovich

[Claire]

May be to late, but take from a seventh grader. My class read Tom Sawyer and hated it, it made writing essay's and literary responses really hard. Most of the girls in my class loved A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith, or right now me and my class picked out our own novels to read independently, and we use technology and make very academic rigoring projects and literary responses on our blogs.

[Kellee]

I teach 7th grade and some great books I teach (and the girls especially love) are:
Walk Two Moons
Out of the Dust
Princess Academy
Shakespeare's Secret

[Jen]

Check out our blog - it's written by 7th grade students and they give their honest opinions about what they are reading!

http://blogs.ellingtonschools.org/lar...