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Summer Reading

Treasure Coast Classical Summer Reading List – Lower School (K-5th) provided by the Barney Charter School Initiative

 Thoughts on Summer Reading

Summer break is primarily for family and leisure.  Ideally, it is a time of rest through which scholars are rejuvenated for the coming school year.

Options for supplementary reading may be titles typically read in earlier grades during the academic year which scholars will not have read.  Older scholars can read things from the elementary school grades, as some children’s literature is frequently profound to more mature readers.  From Kindergarten to Second Grade, books should be primarily read aloud by parents. Some books below are placed in those specific grade levels as extensions of content from the previous year’s curriculum (i.e. Oliver Twist listed in Seventh Grade after scholars read The Prince and the Pauper in Sixth).

Kindergarten

  • Make Way for Ducklings, Robert McKloskey 
  • Mother Goose Nursery Rhymes 
  • Dr. Seuss Books 
  • Winnie the Pooh, A.A. Milne 
  • When We Were Very Young, A.A. Milne 
  • William Steig Books 
  • Danny and The Dinosaur, Sid Hoff 
  • Little Chicken’s Breakfast and other Little Chick stories (early level 1), Mary DeBall Kwitz 
  • Little Bear Stories, Else Holmelund Minarik

First Grade

  • The Nutcracker 
  • Encyclopedia Brown 
  • The Sword in the Tree, Clyde Robert Bulla 
  • Paddington Bear, Michael Bond 
  • Now We Are Six, A.A. Milne 
  • Owl at Home, Arnold Lobel 
  • Frog and Toad stories, Arnold Lobel 
  • Arthur and Violet stories, Lillian Hoban 
  • Frances stories, Russell Hoban

Second Grade

  • Little House Series, Laura Ingalls Wilder 
  • Stuart Little, E.B. White 
  • The Mouse and the Motorcycle, Beverly Cleary
  • Roald Dahl Books 
  • The Thirteen Clocks, James Thurber 
  • Snow Treasure, Marie McSwigan 
  • Original Amelia Bedelia stories, Peggy Parish 
  • Henry and Mudge Series, Cynthia Rylant 
  • Magic Tree House series, Mary Pope Osborn 

Third Grade

  • The Trumpet of the Swan, E.B. White 
  • Sarah, Plain and Tall, Patricia MacLachlan 
  • Mr. Popper's Penguins, Richard Atwater 
  • The Thirteen Clocks, James Thurber 
  • The Tale of Despereaux, Kate DiCamillo 
  • Billy and Blaze series, C.W. Anderson 
  • Davy Crocket, a Life on the Frontier (Ready to Read series) 

Fourth Grade

  • Calico Captive, Elizabeth George Speare 
  • A Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L’Engle
  • Misty of Chincoteague Island, Marguerite Henry
  • The Black Stallion, Walter Farley
  • Where the Red Fern Grows, Wilson Rawls 
  • Benjamin West and his Cat Grimalkin, Marguerite Henry ●
  • Door in the Wall, Marguerite De Angeli 
  • Core Classics edition of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow 

Fifth Grade

  • The Reluctant Dragon, Kenneth Grahame 
  • Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry; Mildred D. Taylor
  • Little Lord Fauntleroy, Frances Hodgson Burnett
  • Emily of New Moon Series, L.M. Montgomery
  • Old Yeller, Fred Gipson 
  • Heidi, Johanna Spyri
  • The Black Arrow, Robert Lewis Stevenson
  •  Core Classics edition of Sherlock Holmes

Sixth Grade

  • My Side of the Mountain, Jean Craighead George
  • Little Men, Louisa May Alcott 
  • White Fang, Jack London 
  • Redwall Series, Brian Jacques 
  • Captains Courageous, Rudyard Kipling 
  • The Hobbit, J.R.R. Tolkien 

Seventh Grade

  • Oliver Twist, Charles Dickens
  • Watership Down, Richard Adams
  • The Last of the Mohicans, James Fennimore Cooper
  • The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, J.R.R. Tolkien

Eighth Grade

  • Ben Hur, Lew Wallace
  • The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Victor Hugo
  • Ivanhoe, Sir Walter Scott
  • Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte

Ninth Grade

  • The Odyssey, Homer (Required Summer Reading)
  • My Ántonia, Willa Cather
  • Billy Budd, Herman Melville
  • The Old Man and the Sea, Ernest Hemingway
  • Mythology, Edith Hamilton

​​​​​​​Tenth Grade

  • A Farewell to Arms, Ernest Hemingway
  • Inferno, Dante
  • Emma, Jane Austen
  • Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy