Category: Lists

Last summer I did a 40 Book Reading Challenge for Blake & Clark and I loved it.

I’m changing my Summer Challenge a bit this year.  I changed some categories and am offering a different reward.  Last year I took the boys to do Laser Tag if they finished their challenge, but this year we’re going to Dave & Buster’s if they finish.

Here’s a link to the PDF if you’re interested to try it out for your kids.

And here’s a link to an 80 Picture Book Challenge if your child isn’t quite ready to read chapter books all summer.

Happy Reading!

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?

In addition to doing 3 different Library Programs this summer, I also made a 40-book challenge for Blake and Clark. I love making lists and things like this. Clark seemed to really take to it. He kept making lists of what books he would read for each category, instead of actually just reading the books. Blake had to be reminded several times that he needed certain categories still. He reads voraciously…when he picks the books. Historical fiction, poetry, biographies…not really his normal cup of tea, but that’s why I wanted to do this challenge.

Here’s a glimpse of both of their papers.

I promised both of them a trip to play Laser Tag if they finished their challenge by the last week of summer. Clark finished it with a week to spare, he was really focused on the books he needed and that was all he read. Blake finished the very last night that he could.

(Does anyone else see a blank #9???)

I didn’t get any pictures of the boys at Laser Tag, but they had a great time. I was going to let Isaac do it too, because he worked hard reading me 3 Easy Reader books each day during the summer, since he’s not up to chapter books yet. But Isaac was too scared to try Laser Tag, which was fine. Maybe next summer. 🙂

I even made myself a little list of books to read for the summer – I only gave myself 9 requirements since I don’t have as much time as the kids to read. I still ended up having to count some of the children’s books I read and just like Blake, I read extra books that didn’t fit into a category. (And I still haven’t finished my parenting book, that’s all I have left!)

A book that was made into a Movie – Princess Bride by William Goldman
A book published this year – Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard
A book that won the Newbery Award – Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis and Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse
A book by an author I love or reread a favorite – Saint Anything by Sarah Dessen and Abandon by Meg Cabot
A “classic” – Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder
A book “everyone” has read but me – The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
A book you started but never finished – Dear Mr. Henshaw by Beverly Cleary
A book I own but haven’t read – From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg
A book that will make me smarter – Parenting with Love and Logic by Foster W. Cline

We are a reading family!