Author: Katie

Top Ten Thursday: Chapter Books for Preschoolers

I have gone through 4 preschoolers in my house and I have read them many chapter books over the years.  I started with Blake when he was 4 and he was the BEST listener.  He liked almost any book I read to him. (And he became a voracious reader once he started reading.) Jane sits well and listens, but she still likes the book to have a few pictures.

So here is a list of my Top Ten chapter books to try with your preschoolers.  If they can sit through long picture books and pay attention, then it’s time to try out some chapter books.

Age 4-5:

  1. Mercy Watson by Kate DiCamillo
  2. The Magic Finger by Roald Dahl
  3. The Enormous Crocodile by Roald Dahl
  4. Lulu and the Brontosaurus by Judith Viorst
  5. Freckle Juice by Judy Blume
  6. Magic Tree House by Mary Pope Osborne (tons of books in this series – I would start with the first one)
  7. Chocolate Fever by Robert Kimmel Smith
  8. My Father’s Dragon by Ruth Stiles Gannett
  9. Junie B. Jones by Barbara Park
  10. The Pain and the Great One by Judy Blume

Your preschooler may be able to sit through longer books than this and that’s great!  These are just some shorter chapter books I’ve found that are good to start with and still have some pictures to help keep the kids engaged.  What books have your preschoolers enjoyed?

 

Top 100 Children’s Books on Goodreads

Recently Goodreads released a list of the Top 100 Children’s Books on Goodreads.  They had a few stipulations: the rating had to be over 4.0 (which is a high bar and ruled out quite a few good books), and it had to be a chapter book or middle grade book.  So I believe easy reader chapter books were excluded, but graphic novels were included.

I looked through the list and have read about 40, which was a little bit disappointing considering all the chapter books I’ve read to my children over the years.  I thought I might be around 50, but that’s okay.  I had 16 of the books already marked on my “To Read List.”  So I should probably focus on those 16 over the next year.

  1. The Black Stallion by Walter Farley
  2. The Borrowers by Mary Norton
  3. Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson
  4. Dealing with Dragons by Patricia C. Wrede
  5. The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
  6. The Complete Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen
  7. The Lions of Little Rock by Kristin Levine
  8. Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder
  9. A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett
  10. My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George
  11. Old Yeller by Fred Gipson
  12. So B. It by Sarah Weeks
  13. The Two Princesses of Bamarre by Gail Carson Levine
  14. Watership Down by Richard Adams
  15. Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace Lin
  16. The Wishing Spell by Chris Colfer

Some of my favorite books on this list are:

  1. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
  2. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis
  3. Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White
  4. Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle by Betty MacDonald
  5. Matilda  by Roald Dahl
  6. The Giver by Lois Lowry
  7. Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery
  8. The False Prince by Jennifer A. Nielsen
  9. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
  10. Number the Stars by Lois Lowry
  11. Princess Academy by Shannon Hale
  12. Sideways Stories from Wayside School by Louis Sachar
  13. Wonder by R.J. Palacio
  14. Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne

If you haven’t read any of these 14 books, you should definitely move them to the top of your list.  (Apparently if you use initials you’ll end up with good books – 5 of these authors just use initials for their first name!)

A few books that I’m really surprised didn’t make it:

  1. The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
  2. Hatchet by Gary Paulsen
  3. Because of Mr. Terupt by Rob Buyea
  4. Ramona or Henry Huggins by Beverly Cleary
  5. Pollyanna by Eleanor H. Porter
  6. Holes by Louis Sachar

What books would you want to add or take off this list?  Which ones are your favorites?

 

 

 

Mo Willems’ Elephant & Piggie Books

We found our first Elephant and Piggie Book when my oldest was in Kindergarten, I think, so around 2010. There were probably about 12 books out at that point. All 3 of my boys loved to listen to them and could even start sounding out words and reading them when they were first learning to read. (Though these books are easy to memorize, so after a few reads they’re not really sounding out words anymore.)

We have followed these books over the years and I think we’ve read all of them. We just checked out Mo Willems’ last book in the series, The Thank You book (#25).

isaac jane piggie

This book does not disappoint. It’s just as funny as the other books and my 5 year old daughter has requested me to read it several times since we checked it out.

If you want to read more news about the Elephant & Piggie books, you can look at the author’s blog.

In fact, there are lots of fun ideas for celebrating Thank-o-rama month at this new website. So start thanking away.

We’d like to thank Mr. Willems for writing such fun, colorful, and witty books to be enjoyed by the whole family! Thank you Mo Willems.

RecoMonday: Lulu & the Brontosaurus by Judith Viorst

Remember Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day? That is an excellent book. My kids love it. And they love the other books in the series as well. (Though I just found out there is a 4th book about Alexander that came out in 2014; I’ve already put it on hold at the library.)

Well, the author of the Alexander books, Judith Viorst, has come up with another great series. This time it’s about a girl named Lulu and the books are slightly longer. Lulu wanders out into the forest and ends up finding a Brontosaurus, and the story that unfolds is quite entertaining.

I originally read this to my 6 year old son, who couldn’t wait to read it every night. So then I decided that it’d probably be a good chapter book for my 4 year old daughter to listen to as well. She still needs some pictures when we read and she really enjoyed it too.

I read Lulu and the Brontosaurus to them back in the fall, and then recently checked it out again so I could take a picture of it and recommend it. When Jane saw it today she told me that she wants to read it again.

So I’ll be reading this book for the 3rd time this week. You should check it out.

lulu

(We have read the other 2 Lulu books in the series and I don’t think they’re as good as this first one.)

Children Sports Books – Basketball

My boys’ favorite thing to do after school is to shoot hoops.  So it’s no surprise that they love to read books about kids playing basketball.  We found Matt Christopher books when my oldest son was in 1st grade and he immediately fell in love with them.

matt christopher

Over the past 4 years I have really built up our collection of Matt Christopher books.  He writes about several different sports, but my boys’ favorites are the basketball and football stories.

Recently we’ve found a few new series that the boys love so I wanted to share them.

Amar’e Stoudemire (or a ghost writer) has started this series of stories about Amar’e growing up.  My 5th grader is desperate to be able to dunk in 6th grade just like Amar’e did in the book.  Good luck with that, Blake!

stat

I also found this Super Hoops series by Hank Herman that Clark, my 4th grader, thinks is better than sugar cereal.  My library doesn’t even have the whole series, so we’ll have to start scouting around for them at Goodwill.

super hoops

Do your kids like to read sports books?  Let me know what other good books are out there.