Middle College Reading
English III
Clarksville Montgomery County School system is no longer assigning summer work. Research shows that
students often lack the understanding and expectations of really reading a novel “like a professor;” this
has nothing to do with intelligence and far more to do with experience.
For example, as I’m discussing the nuances of The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock and reference the
allusions of death and the resurgence of life, a moment between students and teacher often occurs, “We
each adopt a look. My look says ‘What, you don’t get it?’ [The student’s] says, ‘We don’t get it. And we
think you’re making it up’” (Foster xiii).
We’re having a communication problem. Basically, we’ve read the same text, poem, story, novel, but have
viewed this writing through a different lens. As a teacher of literature, the study and research necessary
to build a certain “language of reading” has been done. And in time, you will also develop this skill. Much
of the Common Core State Standards push students to see a text through a different perspective that
allows for this “literary reading.”
When students read without guidance, they often return in August with different perceptions of the text,
and our goal is to be on the same page so that we can take the reading to the next level. In short, no
summer assignment.
With this said, however, I still want to provide you with a list of novels we will be reading during the
2014-2015 school year. This is NOT required summer reading, but merely recommended if you’d like to
forge ahead (though NO plot spoilers allowed!).
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair – this will be our first read and REQUIRED in class by August 28, 2014
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien
All of these books can be found at your local bookstore or through online resources such as Amazon.com
(often at thrifty used prices!). eReaders are an option, but often do not allow the through marking of text
either in the book or via post-it notes. I do not recommend eReaders for class. I’ve found them to be timeconsuming and cumbersome for Junior English.
Full text of all of these novels can be found online and printed out for class but be aware of how much you
are printing! Max printing in the APSU library is 20 pages per day- failure to have your novel for the
assigned time frame cannot be blamed on technology – invalid reason.
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair - http://www.gutenberg.org/files/140/140-h/140-h.htm (229 pages!)
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald - http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200041.txt (98 pages)
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck - https://libcom.org/files/grapes%20of%20wrath.pdf (133 pages)
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien - corysnow.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/ttc-full-text.pdf (163 pages)
*If any of the above links do not work, my apologies. A quick Google search will reveal these texts as well.
I am looking forward to a productive year of work together!