Missed the first parts of this series? Read Part 1 of Fifteen Favorite Children’s Read-Alouds, Part 2 of Fifteen Favorite Children’s Read-Alouds, and Part 3 of Fifteen Favorite Children’s Read-Alouds.
And remember to check out my post on Five Ways to Get Books for Free for ideas of how to pick up copies of these and other books frugally.
13. Curious George Books
The girls would ask me to re-read the Curious George books again and again. And to this day, it’s not changed! Anytime I ask them to go pick out books to read, you can be sure there will be at least one Curious George title in the mix.
14. Little House on the Prairie — We’re currently reading through the The Complete Little House Nine-Book Set
15. Little Jewel Books — I highly recommend the Little Jewel books, especially for younger children. They are fun to read and full of great character lessons that even very small children can understand and apply. We’ve accumulated most of ours by requesting them for birthday and Christmas gifts for the girls.
A few more Honorable Mentions
I had trouble narrowing our list of favorite books down to 15, so here are a few more we really enjoy: The Little Animal books by Judy Dunn
One resource I’ve used extensively to find quality books to read-aloud to my children is the Hand That Rocks the Cradle: 400 Classic Books for Children. It has excellent reviews and book summaries, as well as dividing up all the books by three different reading levels.
What are some of your favorite children’s read-alouds?
This post is brought to you in part by HarperCollins and the Borders Double Dog Dare You Reading program. Kids 12 and under can join the Borders Double Dog Dare You Reading program and earn a free book when they read 10 books. Just fill out this form and bring it in to any Borders, Waldenbooks, or Borders express store by August 26, 2010 to participate in this program. Find more Summer Reading Programs here.
I like using the Honey for a Child’s Heart book to help make selections also. And I am so thrilled that another reader mentioned the Betsy-Tacy series! These were my absolute favorite books growing up, so much so that I named one of my girls Tacy. 🙂 I also loved the All of a Kind family series by Sidney Taylor. Such wonderful books about such a wonderfully kind family and I loved learning about life in a Jewish family. To everyone who enjoyed the Anne of Green Gables series, don’t miss the Emily of New Moon series by the same author. There are only 3 books in that series and I always liked them even better. Everyone has inspired me so much, I think I’ll go read with my kids… 🙂
The Little Jewel books were favorites of mine growing up as read alouds and some other Rod and Staff books as well. (To answer the question above, yes, Rod and Staff did publish them). We also enjoyed Tattletale Sparkie, The Little Missionaries and other books from them as well.
We also are big fans of curious George here too. I have used them often as a lesson as to why you have to listen and obey even when you are curious.
I have never heard of The Hand that Rocks the Cradle. I will have to check that out. I usually use Honey for a Child’s Heart by Gladys Hunt or the Five in a Row series by Jane Lambert for ideas to pick out books (or sometimes the Sonlight Curriculum catalog)!
We are currently reading The Little House series as well. The girls love it and love to pretend they are Mary, Laura, and Baby Carrie! I bet your girls would love The Big Green Pocketbook by Candice Ransom. My girls adore it! They also like We’re Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen.
My daughter loved the My First Little House books when she was younger! Had I known she’d have a baby sister, I would have saved them rather than getting rid of them years ago!
sandra boynton has some great read-aloud books.
we picked up a few curious george books for our children at our local library’s used book sale (which is a great way to get a lot of books for cheap…check out yours). i totally forgot about george’s ether binge in “curious george takes a job”.
Traction Man by Mini Grey and the sequel Traction Man Meets Turbodog (they are picture books) are super excellent choices for little boys. Very cleverly written with highly detailed pictures- encourages the use of imagination in everyday situations. I HIGHLY reccommend!!
We love lots of the books you listed (esp. Jesus Storybook Bible), and here are a couple more of our favorites. With three little boys, I am always looking for books with really fun pictures and creative stories to read aloud:
The Giant Carrot by Jan Peck
This is a great book if you like to read with different voices. Very fun pictures, and a great recipe at the end to go along with the story.
The Toughest Cowboy: Or How The Wild West Was Tamed by John Frank One of the top two for our boys right now (who also go by Cowboy). I love the artwork and the plotline is very creative. Best cowboy themed book I’ve found.
Way Far Away on A Wild Safari, Jan Peck
Way Down Deep in the Deep Blue Sea, Jan Peck
These two books (and I think there is one about being up in a tree) are fun for the little guys. Even the big one likes to find it again at the library.
Jimmy Zangwow’s Out-Of-This-World Moon Pie Adventure by Toni DiTerrilizi The other of their top favorites these days. Goes great if you want to splurge on a moon pie and milk treat afterward. Again, I love his artwork.
All of R.C. Sproul’s Children’s books such as The Priest With Dirty Clothes. Fabulous way of teaching abstract theological principles in a captivating, easy to understand child’s story (and great for grandparents to read to children – no need to change the story!). You can find these most anywhere or by searching his name or the title.
The Family Pilgrim’s Progress by Jean Watson. This is our favorite adaptation of the classic, for kids. Our almost-5-year old requests it often and has been through it three times (its 116 pages, with pictures). You can find it at http://www.ChristianFocus.com
and finally…
The Building on the Rock Series by Joel Beeke and Diana Kleyn. Five books filled with short stories of “How God….” …stopped the pirates, used a drought and an umbrella, sent a dog to save a family, etc. You can find this series at http://www.ChristianFocus.com also.
I would have a hard time doing only 15! Great job – thanks!
I’m not sure you mentioned Richard Scarry anywhere on your lists – but I loved his books as a little kid and now my kids do to. “What do People Do All Day” is my favorite.
Crystal, I enjoyed this series you’ve done so much. I linked you from my blog. I also shared some of our favorites as well, with pictures… maybe you would like to check it out.
http://dougzwife.xanga.com/729408790/favorite-childrens-read-alouds/
Thank you for sharing this list!! Our 2 oldest have learned to read over the last year and they both just pull books out for their free-time and read. We then hear about the stories later and and realized just how much they pick up, whether good or bad! When they were babies, we had a huge box of books that someone donated to us and we just let them look at the pictures, but a couple of months ago, started going through, getting rid of and replacing books that do not exemplify the principles and beliefs that we have. This list is a great resource for that purpose! We loved the Light of Faith books and the price is not bad at all. Thanks!
Cassie and Alex
Thanks so much for your recommendation of Keep the Lights Burning, Abbie- I happened to see it when we were at the library last weekend and checked it out. I read it to Alex last night and he was fascinated- it was nice to read him an actual story instead of a book about dinosaurs with names I can’t pronounce (that’s what he usually picks out.)
Thanks for the list. These are great titles. Another homeschool mom recently told me that the Curious George books are nice because they are grammatically correct. Many are not, obviously! I looked through the few titles that I have in our home library. They do appear to use correct punctuation and grammar. I’ll be checking more Curious George titles from the library.
A is for Adam is great! Ken Ham actually just spoke at our church a couple of weeks ago and it was amazing! I just bought his “Answers” series as well – both the adult and children versions.
Awesome stuff. I really want to go visit the Creation Museum now so hubby and I are saving for a trip!
Our favorite author right now and series of books is Dog and Bear by Laura Vacarro Seeger. There are 3 stories to a book and at 16-18 months my little one could tell the first couple of stories. They are about best friends and the things they get into. I also love so many of her other books but at 2 years old Dog and Bear are the fav’s
Separate thought, separate comment: I really like Ellen Raskin as a children’s author. Her “The Westing Game” won the Newberry. All her books are puzzles of one sort or another, which is good for the mind. Most of them have something to interest an adult as well, a plus if you find yourself reading and rereading the book with a child. She write for kids about age 6 to early teens.
@WilliamB, That was one of my favorite books as a kid — I was all about the mysteries, so those + Encyclopedia Brown.
Some of your links lead to deadends – part one of the series and more summer reading programs. Could you relink, please? There are kids and parents with whom I’d like to share your ideas.
Thanks for catching that! They should be fixed now — hopefully!
We have a favorite book from my childhood that we like to read aloud, “There are Rocks in my Socks said the Ox to the Fox.” I don’t even think it’s in print anymore! We like reading just about any books. When we go to the library we come back with a huge tote of books because we go through so many at a time. I just introduced my daughter to Madeline and I can’t wait until she’s old enough to read Anne of Green Gables. I’m planning to start Tales of a 4th Grade Nothing with my almost 8-year-old son this summer.
I LOVED that book as a kid!
@Kristine, You are the first person whose ever known that book! Awesome! I read it to my son’s Kindergarten class when I was Mystery Reader and even the teachers never heard it before.
@Heather, Anne of Green Gables is wonderful! The movies are also excellent.
@abbie, I love the movies, too! I just loaned them out to a 9-year-old friend who I’ve been loaning my books to as well.
A lot of the Little Jewel books are available from Rod & Staff too (actually, I was thinking maybe they published them?). However, seeing them reminded me of some of our family’s favorite books that are also available from Rod & Staff and those are “Storytime With the Millers”, “School Days With the Millers”, etc. They teach great values! Occasionally some pacifism is thrown in, but overall, superb fodder for young minds!
“Stories From Grandma’s Attic” there are a few in the series. These are great stories about growing up on the farm and honoring the Lord in what you do.
We LOVE books. Or I love books.. my son isn’t too into them yet! 🙂 But, I’m hoping that will change. I have tons of children’s books from when I was little and I’m always looking to add more books to our collection!
We also really like Little Jewel books. They can also be found at http://www.clp.org They are very wholesome, sweet and full of character training in sweet simple ways.
When my daughter was born I started reading The Little House on the Prairie series to her (maybe more for me than her- I enjoyed reading them now as much as I did when I was a little girl). She is a year old now so she is more into books with colorful pictures but I plan on reading the Little House books to her again when she is a bit older.
I agree with Jessica Lynette…. the Bill Peet books are great! They have great messages.
I’d just like to say that you definitely have a list of winners here! I was homeschooled until 7th grade and we read many of the books on the list.
Some that I would definitely recommend are the Trailblazer books by Dave and Neta Jackson. Each one is about a missionary told from the perspective of a young boy/girl who interacts with them. VERY good, entertaining and historical.
When your girls get older, the Betsy-Tacy series by Maud Hart Lovelace is SUPER. The series goes from when Betsy and Tacy are in about kindergarten till after Betsy gets married. The first four are pretty juvenile-level, but as they go into high school they get longer and a smidge more difficult. They’re just GOOD books. Nothing scary or bad or anything. Wonderful.
If you want more books that Mom read out loud to us while I was growing up (I have a fantastic list 🙂 ) let me know!
@Ellen Maria Wrede,
Trailblazers are great books! I read them as a child and plan to pick them up for my boys next time I visit my parents!
Another big thank you from our home. We have gotten a few you suggested and my kids have LOVED them. Thanks so much for the new reads!
This has been a great series and I have gotten some new ideas to look for!
My favorite author for my children (ages 2 and 3) is Bill Peet. He wrote and illustrated his own books and they are just so creative.
We read a lot of books – about an hour to two worth each day – and if I had to pick just one children’s author to keep in my house I think Bill Peet would be it!