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Accelerated Reader is a program based on the fact that students become more motivated to read if they are tested on the content of the books they have read and are rewarded for correct answers. Students read each book, individually take the test on the computer, and receive gratification when they score well. Schools using the Accelerated Reader program have seen a significant increase in reading among their students.

Globally and locally, teens are confronted with a wide variety of social issues and difficult political realities. These titles are excellent for community service learning and tolerance building.

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School Library Journal Review

Gr 8 Up-- While adults make the decision to wage war, it is often teenagers who carry out the orders. In this excellent collection of short stories and essays , teenage soldiers in troubled areas around the world express their front-line view of military conflict. From Northern Ireland to Tienanmen Square, from the Middle East to Lithuania, young writers and former soldiers tell their personal stories, giving readers insight into the realities behind today's newspaper headlines. ``The Cemetery,'' a short story set in Beirut, uses the friendship between two boys to express the political and cultural forces that shape the PLO; ``A Slight Deception'' by Israeli writer Yitzhak Ben-Ner examines the corrosive effects of seeing one's neighbor as a deadly enemy. These and other thoughtful young voices raise questions that concern teenagers everywhere, questions of the individual versus authority, our common humanity versus national interest. Among the many unforgettable stories are two by a conscripted Russian student who writes with searing honesty about the first person he must kill--a young Afghani boy--and about the death of his best friend in battle. His well-crafted accounts show the psychological effects of warfare on the warrior and challenge the Nintendo game stereotype of soldiers as less, and more, than fully human. In class, or as individual reading, this unprecedented book will stimulate thoughtful response to world crises and discussion of the decisions that young people must make about their own lives today.-- Carolyn Polese, Humboldt State University, Arcata, CA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Booklist Review

Gr. 9-12. Containing both fiction and nonfiction, this rather uneven collection centers on young people whose childhoods have been disrupted by political strife in their homelands. The scope is worldwide--Africa, Poland, China, Lebanon--with selections ranging from a Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer's record of travels through Nicaragua to an excerpt from a recently published Hebrew novel focusing on a young Israeli soldier on patrol in hostile territory. Headnotes about contributors are provided, but there is not enough background on some of the individual selections--readers will wonder too often whether they're reading fiction or fact. But the sadness of children being brutalized and forced to be brutal themselves and the shocking extent to which war exists in modern times come through loud and clear. A bibliography, including some excellent follow-up titles, and a glossary are appended. ~--Stephanie Zvirin