Reading List – Grade 7-9
Today I thought I would share some of the literature that is on our reading list for grades 7 to 9. These are well-known classics. We’re pretty flexible in that I won’t make them finish a book they “hate.” Life’s too short and their are too many amazing books!
Let me add that our list changes as the kids’ interest change and as we cover different things in our homeschool.
My daughter is actually in Grade 6, but she is a very advanced reader, so she is working through this list as well. If you are interested in some of her pleasure reading (which includes lots of books about cats or animals!), you can check out some of her favorites at this post: Reading List – Grade 4-6 post.
LD and DD are currently reading Anne Frank as part of their homework. (They have some assignments that they complete on their own each week with things like memorizing German verbs, question/answer in science or history, reading a specific book…)
We are reading Great Expectations (by Charles Dickens) aloud together. I think it would be too challenging for the kids on their own, but even ED is enjoying it as a read aloud. That’s the benefit of continuing to read things together as a family, right? 🙂 I still remember reading Macbeth aloud together with my family when I was in 3r grade.
My son has done research projects/papers on both WWI and WWII which is why there are several books on the list that touch on that period of history.
This is an ever-changing list (things are put on/taken off depending on what the kids think!) but here it is in its current form!
I have a word doc and jot down their initial when they’ve read the book. I have a similar list for grades 4-6.
If I were to recommend just one book from the list below, I would probably suggest Flowers for Algernon.
(The links below are affiliate links.) I’ve indicated which books my son LD and daughter (DD) have read so far. 🙂
Reading List
- All Quiet on the Western Front
- Anne Frank, Diary of a Young Girl; The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom
- The Bridge of San Luis Rey
- The Call of the Wild
- The Color Purple
- Cry, the Beloved Country
- Esperanza Rising – DD
- Flowers for Algernon – LD DD
- Great Expectations by Charles Dickens – LD DD ED
- Gulliver’s Travels
- Hiroshima by John Hershey
- The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings – LD
- Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
- Lord of the Flies – LD
- The Joy Luck Club
- Schindler’s List by Thomas Keneally
- Summer of My German Soldier
- To Kill a Mockingbird – LD
We also purchased used Literature Books. LD is reading through this Language of Literature text. He likes the selections. It has classics by authors such as Edgar Allan Poe, Maya Angelou and others. We often set the timer for 20 minutes before our writing workshop time and the kids read from these texts. (My daughter loves these so much, she has reads them for fun. She read most of the Literature texts by McDougal Littell that I purchased last year.)
See you again soon here or over at our Homeschool Den Facebook Page. Don’t forget to Subscribe to our Homeschool Den Newsletter! You might want to check out some of the posts from our Literature Resource Page. We have a lot of free resources (grammar worksheets, writing resources, etc.) Don’t forget to check out Our Store. ~Liesl
Disclosure: The links above are affiliate links and at no additional cost to you, I will earn a commission if you decide to make a purchase. And if you do follow the links, thank you SO much for supporting our blog! ~Liesl
You might be interested in this Writing Workshop and Writing Resource BUNDLE:
I love Esperanza Rising! I also love Echo. But, I recommend it for 8th grade up because of the content. Our list is a little different but similar in that I mix realistic fiction and classics. One the world lit books I like is called the Vine Basket. For realistic fiction, I also add in Paper Things (homelessness), Flipped (shows two sides), Fish in a Tree (dyslexia and other issues addressed), and Hope Was Here (which talks about voting). 🙂