I had it all lined up in my head what I was going to do for class. Then it turns out that there are a lot more parameters than they told me. Eighth and ninth has to be American Literature. So half the books on my list won't work. My 12th grade class is going to have some 16 year olds in it. It's British Lit. I'm going to end up using an anthology and extra books to supplement.

So, 8th and 9th grade is going to read:

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

The Red Badge of Courage

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

Ethan Frome

The Call of the Wild

The Story of My Life: Helen Keller

The Great Gatsby

The Old Man and the Sea

Short stories by most of the “famous” classic authors: Hawthorne, Poe, Melville, etc.

Poems by American Poets.

There weren't any black poets in the book, so I am also ordering an anthology of African-American poets. Wish they could be all in the same book, but I guess not.

12th grade is going to work through the anthology of British Lit up to 1700.

We are also going to read a prose version of Beowulf, Pilgrim's Progress, Everyman, four morality plays, Samson Agonistes, Much Ado About Nothing, Dr. Faustus, Romeo and Juliet, and some poems which are fun and not in our lit book.

“The only real use of books is to make a person think for himself. If a book will not set one to thinking, it is not worth shelf space.” Aleph Bey