Summer Assignments

Summer Reading

Summer 2025

All Students must complete a Summer Reading Assignment, which will be due on the first day of classes in the fall. The summer reading grade will stand as a significant grade for the first marking period. Assignments for each grade can be found below.

For additional reading suggestions for students, see our Heights Books program.

Lower School

Lower School students must read all of the books listed for their respective grade before the first day of school. Much of the first few days of classes will be devoted to group discussions, presentations, in-class writing assignments, and games based on the summer reading books. No book reports or essays need to be written before school begins. It is very fruitful for parents to read the books with their sons (aloud together or separately).

Third Grade
  1. American Tall Tales by Mary Pope Osborne
  2. Stone Fox by John Reynolds Gardiner
  3. The Trumpet of the Swan by E.B. White
Fourth Grade
  1. Mr. Popper’s Penguins by Richard Atwater
  2. By the Great Horn Spoon! by Sid Fleischman
  3. Homer Price by Robert McCloskey
Fifth Grade
  1. Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome
  2. The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster
  3. Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH by Robert C. O’Brien

Middle School

All Middle School students will read the three books from the grade lists below and write at least a one-page essay on each of these books.

In these essays, students should describe the book’s main characters, setting, plot, and lessons or themes. In addition to demonstrated knowledge of the story, students will be graded on proper spelling, punctuation, logic, and style according to their respective grade levels. The essays will count towards the first quarter English and History grades. If possible, teachers appreciate typed essays (12-pt font, double-spaced), although this is not required.

All essays should be submitted to faculty on the first day of school.

Sixth Grade

Students entering sixth grade have one required book and the other two books can be chosen from the list below. Please review the writing assignment above.

Required for History Class

Carry on Mr. Bowditch  by Jean Lee Latham

Choose two of the following for English class

  • White Water, P.J. Petersen
  • Mr. Tucket, Gary Paulsen
  • My Brother Sam is Dead, James and Christopher Collier
  • Where the Red Fern Grows, Wilson Rawls
  • April Morning, Howard Fast
  • Old Yeller, Fred Gipson
  • Yankee Doodle Boy, Joseph Plumb Martin
  • Amos Fortune, Free Man by Elizabeth Yates
Seventh Grade

Students entering seventh grade have one required book and the other two books can be chosen from the list below. Please review the writing assignment above.

Required for History Class

Across Five Aprils, Irene Hunt

Choose two of the following for English class

  • Banner in the Sky, James Ramsey Ullman
  • Captains Courageous, Rudyard Kipling
  • Adam of the Road, Elizabeth Janet Gray
  • The Day Lincoln Was Shot, Jim Bishop
  • True Grit, Charles Portis
  • Day of Infamy, Walter Lord
  • King Solomon’s Mines, H. Rider Haggard
  • Summer of the Monkeys, Wilson Rawls
  • The Chestry Oak, Kate Seredy
  • Shades of Gray, Carolyn Reeder
Eighth Grade

Students entering eighth grade have one required book and two additional books that can be chosen from the list below. Please review the writing assignment above for the summer essay expectations.

Required for Eighth Grade Literature:

The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien is required summer reading as the third book of the summer. This book will be discussed in depth at the beginning of classes in the fall. For this reason, we recommend it as the final book read during the summer. The Lord of the Rings trilogy by J. R. R. Tolkien is a centerpiece of the literature curriculum, and this final book of the trilogy contains superb writing and indispensable insights for individuals and societies. Students will be offered a copy of this book during the last week of school or they can purchase the same edition (ISBN 978-0-547-92819-7) over the summer. We encourage students to annotate this book while reading it.

In addition, choose two of the following:

  • Call of the Wild, Jack London
  • The Bronze Bow, Elizabeth George Speare
  • Set All Afire, Louis de Wohl
  • A Study in Scarlet, Arthur Conan Doyle
  • Journey to the Center of the Earth, Jules Verne
  • The Raft, Robert Trumbull (Naval Institute Press)
  • Incredible Victory, Walter Lord
  • Mr. Midshipman Hornblower, C.S. Forester
  • The Lantern Bearers, Rosemary Sutcliff
  • The Light in the Forest, Conrad Richter
  • The Old Man and the Sea, Ernest Hemingway
  • The Prince and the Pauper, Mark Twain
  • Rifles for Watie, Harold Keith

Upper School

Students entering grades nine through twelve are to read three books according to the instructions specific to each grade (see below). On the first or second day of English class, students will write an in-class summer reading essay in response to a prompt (which will not be communicated ahead of time). The essay will be graded and count as an exam grade for the first quarter.

To successfully answer the essay prompt, the student will need to have a general understanding of the three books, be able to recall pertinent details, and have a grasp of important themes.

The best way to prepare for this assessment is to attentively read the three books and review them prior to the first day of school.

Ninth Grade

The following two books are required:

  • The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas
  • Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

Choose one book from the following:

  • Watership Down by Richard Adams
  • The Last Crusader by Louis de Wohl
  • Out of the Silent Planet by C.S. Lewis 
  • The Sea Wolf by Jack London
  • Scaramouche by Rafael Sabatini
  • Quo Vadis by Henryk Sienkiewicz, translated by Jeremiah Curtin
  • Silver Branch by Rosemary Sutcliff
Tenth Grade

The following book is required:

  • The Great Bridge: The Epic Story of the Building of the Brooklyn Bridge by David McCullough

Choose two books from the following:

  • Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry
  • 1776 by David McCullough
  • One of Ours by Willa Cather
  • Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper
  • Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation by Joseph J. Ellis
  • A Song for Nagasaki by Paul Glynn
  • A Separate Peace by Jonathan Knowles
  • The Bounty Trilogy by Charles Bernard Nordhoff
  • Voyage to Alpha Centauri by Michael O’Brien
  • The Chosen by Chaim Potok
  • Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
  • Up From Slavery by Booker T. Washington
Eleventh Grade

Choose three books from the following:

  • Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky (counts for 2 books)
  • Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
  • Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
  • Saint Thomas Aquinas: The Dumb Ox by G.K. Chesterton
  • Cellist of Sarajevo by Stephen Galloway
  • Apollo 13 by James Lovell and Jeffrey Kluger
  • Theophilos by Michael O’Brien
  • The Gift of Asher Lev by Chaim Potok
  • The Hot Zone by Richard Preston
  • The Snakebite Survivors’ Club by Jeremy Seal
  • Othello by William Shakespeare
  • Ghost Soldiers by Hampton Sides
  • Walden by Henry David Thoreau
Twelfth Grade

The following book is required:

  • Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl

Choose two books from the following:

  • David Copperfield by Charles Dickens (counts for 2 books)
  • Brothers Karamozov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (counts for 2 books)
  • Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (counts for 2 books)
  • Witness by Whittaker Chambers
  • The Quiet Light by Louis de Wohl
  • The Road by Cormac McCarthy
  • The Path Between the Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal, 1870-1914 by David McCullough
  • Chesapeake by James Mitchner
  • In Order to Live by Yeonmi Park
  • Northwest Passage by Kenneth Roberts
  • Island at the Center of the World by Russell Short
  • The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles
  • A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken
  • Edmund Campion by Evelyn Waugh