Grade 9: Outcasts United

 An American Town, a Refugee Team, and One Woman’s Quest to Make a Difference, this young people’s edition is a complex and inspirational story about the Fugees, a youth soccer team made up of diverse refugees from around the world, and their formidable female coach, Luma Mufleh.

Luma Mufleh, a young Jordanian woman educated in the United States and working as a coach for private youth soccer teams in Atlanta, was out for a drive one day and ended up in Clarkston, Georgia, where she was amazed and delighted to see young boys, black and brown and white, some barefoot, playing soccer on every flat surface they could find. Luma decided to quit her job, move to Clarkston, and start a soccer team that would soon defy the odds. Despite challenges to locate a practice field, minimal funding for uniforms and equipment, and zero fans on the sidelines, the Fugees practiced hard and demonstrated a team spirit that drew admiration from referees and competitors alike.

Outcasts United explores how the community changed with the influx of refugees and how the dedication of Lumah Mufleh and the entire Fugees soccer team inspired an entire community. 

Connection to Trimester 1 Curriculum Map:  Of Mice and Men explores similar themes including: Companionship, The American Dream, Freedom vs. Captivity

Here’s the link to the corresponding Summer Reading Assignment!

Books will be provided by Northeast. However, for more information and to see the reviews on Outcasts United, here is the Amazon Link

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Grade 10: The Outsiders

A dramatic and enduring work of fiction that laid the groundwork for the YA genre. S. E. Hinton’s classic story of a boy who finds himself on the outskirts of regular society remains as powerful today as it was the day it was first published. The novel is set in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in the 1960s and centers around the Curtis brothers, Ponyboy, Sodapop, and Darry, who are part of the greaser gang. The greasers are a group of working-class teenagers who are often at odds with the wealthy and privileged “Socs” (short for Socials). The story follows Ponyboy, the youngest of the Curtis brothers, as he navigates his relationships with his brothers, friends, and the rival gangs.

Connection to Trimester 2 Curriculum Map: The Outsiders explores similar themes to The Crucible, including: Group vs individual, Community, Preserving Childhood Innocence, Individual identity, Class, Honor among the lawless.

Here’s the link to the corresponding Summer Reading Assignment!

Books will be provided by Northeast. However, for more information and to see reviews on The Outsiders, here is the Amazon Link

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Grade 11: The Hunger Games

In Panem, wealth is heavily concentrated in the hands of the rich, particularly those people living in the Capitol and certain districts, and the result is a huge disparity between their lives and the lives of the poor. This disparity reveals itself in numerous ways throughout the novel, but among the notable is food. In the poor districts, many of the residents do not even have enough to eat. Katniss notes that starvation is common in District 12, and she has to hunt illegally in the woods beyond the district’s borders to feed her family. The novel suggests that most of the district’s residents are not able to or don’t know how to hunt, meaning even given the little Katniss’s family has, it is still more than many of the other families in her district. Furthermore, all but the most basic foods are luxuries. Katniss later learns that Peeta’s family, which owns a bakery and is thus one of the more well-off in the district, can’t afford most of the food they bake and eat mostly the stale leftovers that nobody buys. In contrast, when Katniss arrives in the Capitol, she is awed by the lavish feasts and elaborately prepared dishes. The food is rich and abundant, and Katniss, for the first time, tries hot chocolate.

Connection to Trimester 1 Curriculum Map: The Hunger Games is the first title listed on Trimester 1 curriculum map.Themes include: Love, Appearance,Power, Survival, Control, Rebellion, Violence, Class,Friendship, Identity, Reality television, Societal inequality, Versions of reality, Entertainment and society, Sacrifice,Spectacle,Starvation,Stoicism,The privileged and powerful few.

Here’s the link to the corresponding Summer Reading Assignment!

Books will be provided by Northeast. However, for more information and to see reviews on The Hunger Games, here is the Amazon Link.

Grade 12: 1984

In the novel “1984” by George Orwell, the story takes place in a dystopian future where the totalitarian government, known as the Party, exercises total control over the population of Oceania. The protagonist, Winston Smith, is a low-ranking member of the ruling Party who begins to question the Party’s authority and rebels against its oppressive regime.

 A startling and haunting vision of the world, 1984 is so powerful that it is completely convincing from start to finish. No one can deny the influence of this novel, its hold on the imaginations of multiple generations of readers, or the resiliency of its admonitions—a legacy that seems only to grow with the passage of time.

Connection to Trimester 2 Curriculum Map: “Heroism:” identifying resilience; learning self-reliance/earning independence/establishing a voice; assessing active participation in life/society; learning how to determine what is valuable / what is worth “fighting for:” learning how to distinguish between “just causes” vs. “lost causes”

Here’s the link to the corresponding Summer Reading Assignment!

Books will be provided by Northeast. However, for more information and to see reviews on The Hunger Games, here is the Amazon Link.