Suggested Reading for Middle School Students

(Grades 5–8)

 

5th Grade Reading List

Historical Fiction

Across Five Aprils by Irene Hunt

The American Adventure series by Norma Jean Lutz

Anne of Avonlea by Lucy Maud Montgomery

Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery

Dragonwings by Laurence Yep

Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder

The Friendship by Mildred Taylor

Number the Stars by Lois Lowry

Sarah, Plain, and Tall by Patricia MacLachlan

Sign of the Beaver by Elizabeth Speare

Where the Lilies Bloom by Vera and Bill Cleaver

 

General Fiction

The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis

Fight for Freedom by Norma Jean Lutz

The Grandma’s Attic Novels by Arleta Richardson

 

General Nonfiction

Linnea’s Windowsill Garden by Christine Bjork

Maggie by My Side by Beverly Butler

The Story of Football by Dave Anderson

 

5th Grade Reading List for Poetry

Casey at the Bat by Ernest ThayerErie Canal by John A. and Alan Lomax in American Ballads and Folk Songs

The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein

Hiawatha by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

New Kid on the Block by Jack Prelutsky

Now We Are Six by A. A. Milne

When We were Very Young by A. A. Milne

 

6th Grade Reading List

 

Biography

Abe Lincoln Grows Up by Carl Sandburg

Corrie Ten Boom, Keeper of the Angel’s Den by Janet and Geogg Benge

David Livingstone, Africa’s Trailblazer by Janet and Geogg Benge

Margaret Bourke-White: Racing with a Dream by Catherine A. Welch

Secret Soldier: The Story of Deborah Sampson by Ann McGovern

 

Fiction Recommended Reading List

Across Five Aprils by Irene Hunt

Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne

Caddie Woodlawn by Carol Ryrie Brink

Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift

Heidi by Johanna Spyri

My Brother Sam Is Dead by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier

Sounder by William H. Armstrong

Sourland by William H. Armstrong

 

Short Stories for Sixth Grade Students

“A Candle for St. Bridget” by Ruth Sawyer published in A Newbery Christmas

“Farmer Giles of Ham” and “Smith of Wootton Major.”by J. R. R. Tolkien

“Legend of Sleepy Hollow” by Washington Irving

“The Reluctant Dragon” by Kenneth Graham

“Rikki Tikki Tavi” by Rudyard Kipling from The Jungle Book

7th Grade Reading List

 

Biography

Anne Frank Beyond the Diary: A Photographic Remembrance of Holocaust Years by Rudd Van der Rol and Rian

Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank

The Defenders by Ann McGovern

Joan of Arc: The Lily Maid by Margaret Hodges

The Magic Never Ends: The Life and Works of C. S. Lewis by John Ryan Duncan

Richard Wright and the Library Card by William Miller

Tallchief: America’s Prima Ballerina by Maria Tallchief with Rosemary Wells

The Upstairs Room by Johanna Reiss

 

Fiction Recommended Reading List

Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain

Black Pearl by Scott O’Dell

Call It Courage by Armstrong Sperry

Eight Cousins by Louisa May Alcott

The Cay by Theodore Taylor

The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien

Gentle Ben by Walt Moray

The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis

The Twenty-One Balloons written and illustrated by William Pene du Bois

Where the Lilies Bloom by Vera & Bill Cleaver

Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls

 

Short Stories for Seventh Grade Students

“The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calavaras County” by Mark Twain retold by Samuel L. Clemens

“Rip Van Wrinkle” by Washington Irving from The Sketch Book.

“The Specter Bridegroom” by Washington Irving from The Sketch Book

“The White Seal” by Rudyard Kipling from The Jungle Book stories

8th Grade Reading List

 

Biography

All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot

Amos Fortune, Free Man by Elizabeth Yates

American Hero: the True Story of Charles A Lindbergh by Barry Denenberg

Invincible Louisa, the Story of the Author of Little Women by Cornelia Meigs

The Magic Never Ends: The Life and Works of C. S. Lewis by John Ryan Duncan

So Far From the Bamboo Grove by Yoko Kawashima

Ten Queens: Portraits of Women of Power by Milton Meltzer

Zlata’s Diary, a Child’s Life in Sarajevo by Zlata Filipovic

 

 

Fiction Recommended Reading List

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery

Captain’s Courageous by Rudyard Kipling

David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

Jacob Have I Loved by Katherine Paterson

Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson

Lilies of the Field by William J. Barrett

Let the Circle Be Unbroken by Mildred Taylor

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Path of the Pale Horse by Paul Fleichman

Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe

Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred Taylor

The Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan and Fleming H. Revell

Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson

 

Short Stories for Eighth Grade Students

“The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry.

“The Monkey’s Paw” by W.W. Jacobs.

“The Minister’s Black Veil” by Nathaniel Hawthorne.

“Split Cherry Tree” by Jesse Stuart

“The Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allen Poe