Daily Middle School Copywork Passages

I’m compiling a set of daily handwriting exercises for my 11–13-year-old students and need engaging passages that make them slow down and focus on neat, consistent letter formation. The copywork will come from age-appropriate stories or book excerpts; no inspirational quotes or fact sheets this time—just narrative text that pulls them in while they practice.

Here’s what I’d like delivered:

• 30 original passages, each about 60–80 words (enough to fill roughly half a notebook page when handwritten).
• Source and author noted beneath every excerpt so I can credit material properly.
• Clean, modern language with standard punctuation and capitalization intact—students should be able to model exactly what they see.
• Text taken only from works firmly in the public domain or from sources where you can confirm clear usage rights (no poetry, song lyrics, or excerpts that might trigger permissions issues).

Please submit the first five passages in a Google Doc or Word file so I can confirm tone, length, and readability before you complete the remaining set. A single, well-formatted document containing the final 30 passages will be the finished deliverable.