Summer Reading Assignment for Rising Juniors:
“How does America live its values?”
(Class of 2014)
Welcome to your Junior Year! We look forward to sharing new challenges and learning
with you in Humanities 11, A Study of U.S. History & Literature. In preparation for the
first day of school, you are required to:
1) read TWO books (one from each book group)
2) write FOUR response journal entries in response to each book (a total of 8 response
journal entries) related to the essential question below in part II.
I. Required Reading. (Choose ONE book from each group.)
Fiction Book Group:
 How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents by Julia Alvarez
The story of a Dominican family escaping to the U.S. and New York City in 1960. As each
member of the family tries to survive in the new American culture, the girls try to lose
themselves—by forgetting their Spanish, by straightening their hair and wearing fringed bell
bottoms. For them, it is at once freeing and challenging being caught between the old world and
the new, trying to live up to their father’s version of honor while accommodating the
expectations of their American boyfriends.
 Donald Duk by Frank Chin
Donald Duk isn't a cartoon character but a smart 12-year-old Chinese-American boy who, with
all the intensity and certainty of youth, spits on everyone and everything Chinese. At night
Donald dreams he’s an underaged railroad builder in 1869 California, one of 1200 unheralded
Chinese workers. The New Year festival in San Francisco's Chinatown becomes Donald's rite of
passage and doorway to self-acceptance and –respect.
 **The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan
The story of four daughters and four mothers, who are recent Chinese immigrants to San
Francisco in the 1950s. The story follows these four women who begin meeting to eat dim sum,
play mahjong and talk about their daughters. The mothers boast or despair over daughters, and
daughters roll their eyes even as they feel their mothers’ control and hopes.
**This is a challenge option and will earn you extra credit!
Non-Fiction Book Group:
 The Mayor of Castro Street: The Life and Times of Harvey Milk by Randy Shilts
This is a biography of Harvey Milk, the man whose personal life, public career, and
tragic assassination paralleled the dramatic emergence of the gay community in San
Francisco and America during the 1970s. His is a story of personal tragedies and
political intrigues, assassination in San Francisco and massive riots in the streets, the
miscarriage of justice and the strengthening of gay power and gay hope.
 Always Running: La Vida Loca – Gang Days in L.A. by Luis Rodriguez
Classic memoir of young boy growing up in the Mexican-American gang culture of East
Los Angeles. Rodriguez describes his increasing fear as gang life claimed friends and
family members. Before long, Rodriguez saw a way out of the barrio through education
and the power of words and successfully broke free from years of violence and
desperation.
 ** The Autobiography of Malcolm X by Malcolm X (with Alex Haley)
The story of one of the U.S.’s most famed leaders for racial and social justice. X
describes his youthful days of hustling, drug addiction and armed violence, and his
dramatic prison conversion to become a Black Muslim. As their spokesman he became
identified in the white press as a terrifying teacher of race hatred; but to his direct
audience, the oppressed American blacks, he brought hope and self-respect.
**This is a challenge option and will earn you extra credit!
You will be able to find the books in public libraries or local bookstores.
You must have copies of your chosen books available to use in class during the first
TWO weeks of school.
II. Thinking & Reflecting.
As you are reading your books, find evidence (specific quotes and events) to defend a
response to the following question. Use active reading strategies that work for you, such
as post-its, notes, underlining, etc. This will be the central question that we will focus
on in the first weeks of school.
Consider the experiences of the different characters in the novel or non-fiction
book. What do your chosen books suggest about how America has or has not
lived up to its founding ideals of equality and opportunity for all?
Here is some background information to help you with the question above. The
founding documents of this country (Declaration of Independence and Constitution)
speak to the ideals that this country was based on: Equality, Opportunity, Democracy,
Rights and Liberty. Ideals are principles that we strive for but may not always reach.
For example, honesty is an ideal for many of us in life but there are times we find
ourselves falling short and not telling the truth or the full truth in certain situations.
Likewise, the United States has had times in its history where it has met its ideals and
others where it has fallen short.
For your books, we want you to focus on two of the founding ideals:
 Equality and Opportunity.
o Equality refers to treating people equally or the same.
o Opportunity refers to making sure each individual is given the
opportunity to achieve in this country.
The three fiction books concern the immigrant experience and how recent
immigrant families were welcomed and treated as they sought to improve their lives in
the United States. Were they given opportunity? Were they treated equally?
The three non-fiction books deal with different social movements in the United
States where certain groups have sought to end discrimination and mistreatment
towards them.
III. Required Writing.
As you read each book, write at least FOUR full-page response journal entries about
what you have read. These response journal entries should be chosen from throughout
the book.
This writing assignment is due the first day of class.
What does a response journal look like? It’s a lot like what you did when reading Night
in Humanities 10. See below.
Clarify –
Pose at least two questions that have been answered in this section and
answer them.
React –
React to what you have read in 4-5 sentences.
Analyze – Two or three quotes. Be sure to write them down. How do these quotes
relate to larger themes in the book or in society? How do they relate to the
central question? (See central question above.)
Predict –
What do you think will occur next in the story? (1-2 sentences)
Summarize – What occurred in this section of the book? (3-5 sentences)
We look forward to working with you in Humanities 11.
Sincerely,
Greg Grossman
Jeffrey Sprague
2013-2014 11th grade Humanities teachers
David Booth