Varied Genres and Comprehension Strategies

So that students will develop intellectual hospitality, confidence, and familiarity with literature, students are introduced to a wide range of genres and related comprehension strategies.   In every grade, students become acquainted with multiple genres and, in the older grades, classic works of literature and, at the same time, become practiced at how a good reader approaches a new and challenging text.

Genre and A Sampling of Literature by Grade

Grade 4: 
Little House on the Prairie, Classic Fiction
Because of Winn Dixie, Realistic Fiction
I Have a Dream, Biography
Hatchet, Adventure, Author Study
The Lion the Witch & the Wardrobe, Fantasy
Sammy Keyes and the Skinny Bones, Mystery
Poetry of American Poets

Grade 5:
The Wanderer , Realistic Fiction
A Photobiography of Abraham Lincoln, Biography
Bull Run, Historical Fiction
The Land (Author Study: Margaret Taylor), Historical Fiction
The Cay, Adventure
Out of the Dust, Narrative Poetry
An Anthology of Poetry by Langston Hughes
Walt Whitman: Words for America

Grade 6:
The Great Migration, Non-fiction and Visual Arts
I, Dred Scott,  Fictional Memoir
Dark Sons, Historical Fiction
The Tree is Older than You Are, a Collection of Poetry from Latin America
Diary of Anne Frank  Non-fiction
Freedomwriter’s Diary, Memoir
Baseball in April, Short Stories
The Messenger, Fantasy (Author Study: Lois Lowry)

Grade 7:
Legend of Gilgamesh, Myth
Flag of Childhood, Poetry from the Middle East
Zlata’s Diary, Non-fiction
Anne Frank Remembered, Play
Ashes of Roses, Historical Fiction
Red Scarf Girl, Memoir
Warriors Don’t Cry, Memoir
Breaking Through, Memoir

Grade 8:
Night, Memoir Classic
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Fiction Classic
Fahrenheit 451, Fantasy Classic
The Good Earth, Historical Fiction Classic
Things Fall Apart, Adventure Classic
Before We Were Free, Memoir Classic
The Tempest, Classic Play
The Crucible, Classic Play
I, Too, Sing America, A Collection of African American Poetry


Reading is strategic.  Each year, students practice and expand their repertoire of reading strategies.

• Making Connections: text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to world

• Activating Background Knowledge:  bridging the known with the unknown

• Questioning: speaking to the text before, during, and after reading

• Visualizing and Making Inferences: making what’s implicit explicit (otherwise known as reading between the lines)

• Determining Importance: finding the big ideas and taking notes

• Summarizing and Synthesizing: writing outlines and summaries

• Understanding Tests:  developing test-taking strategies