8th Grade Lightning Literature

Authors and Works

• G. K. Chesterton ("A Crazy Tale" - short story)
• Robert Louis Stevenson (Treasure Island - novel)
• Isaac Bashevis Singer (A Day of Pleasure - autobiography)
• Nathaniel Hawthorne ("Wakefield" - short story)
• Charles Dickens (A Christmas Carol - novel)
• J. R. R. Tolkien (The Hobbit - novel)
• Lafcadio Hearn ("Reflections" - short story)
• Gerald Durrell (My Family and Other Animals - autobiography)
• Harper Lee (To Kill a Mockingbird - novel)
• Various poets (Walt Whitman, Lewis Carroll, Christina Rossetti, Ralph Waldo Emerson, John Keats, etc.) and poetry

Topics

• Author's Purpose
• Taking Notes
• Setting
• Rewriting in Your Own Words
• Vivid Imagery in Poetry
• Free Verse and Ballad
• Sharing Culture through Writing
• Rewriting Your Own Words
• Details in Writing
• Citing Sources in a Paper
• Character Development
• The Narrator
• Figurative Language (Simile, Metaphor, Personification, Allegory)
• Acrostic, Alphabet Poem, Cento
• Conflict
• Genre Fiction
• Symbolism
• Sentence Structure
• Humor
• Bibliography
• Meter in Poetry
• The Sonnet
• Literary Analysis
• Writing a Conclusion

Recommendations

Although this is listed as an eighth grade text, students cannot be easily boxed into grades. A seventh grader who is a strong reader and likes writing would be able to do well with this course. Another option for the parent of a sixth grader who is eager to begin Lightning Lit is to complete the seventh grade course and this course over two years, though this will make the schedules in the Teacher's Guide useless.

This course can also work for the ninth grader who needs to work at the foundations of composition. Please note, however, that we currently cannot accept this for 9th grade students enrolled with us. If you wish to enroll a 9th grade student with us who needs help with the basics of composition and who is not ready for our standard English course, we recommend the student enroll in our Basic English course using the Speech text for grade 9.