Books to Read Together: Pre-K and Kindergarten Edition

Reading a good book is always fun, but it's even more fun reading with someone else.  There's something particularly relaxing about finding a comfy spot and diving into a big pile of books.

Here are a few options for reading with your littlest book lovers.  

The Bear's Song

This was a random library pick because the illustrations caught my eye while browsing.  It's about a little bear who chases after a bee to find honey and the daddy bear follows to find little bear.  There are a few pages with lots of things going on so we could stop and find the little bear or other surprising things happening in the scene while we read.  It's a fun read with a sweet story and it really is beautiful to look at. 


Creepy Carrots

We got this book thanks to the Instagram of Janssen over at Everyday Reading. This is where I admit that I stalk friends of friends through social media because her daughters are adorable and they have impeccable taste in books.  Creepy Carrots did not disappoint.  I don't really know how to explain it, except to say my two year old nephew LOVED it and spent a good part of the book pointing to various carrot shadows and saying, "Ooooo! Ghosts!" and pretending to be so scared.  Also, there's a twist at the end that is delightful. 


And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street (and almost anything else by Dr. Seuss)


This book holds a special place in my heart because my Grandmother used to read it with me when I visited her.  It's a multi-generational favorite! It's the story of all the wonderful and amazing things a little boy sees as he walks home from school down Mulberry Street.  As much as I love this story, you pretty much can't go wrong when it comes to Dr. Seuss.


Leonardo the Terrible Monster (and, again, anything else by Mo Willems)

It's hard to pick just one Mo Willems book.  We read so many of them together and the whole family generally enjoys any of his books.  This one is especially good for younger ones.  The illustrations are eye-catching and Leonardo is a loveable little guy. 

Dracula (and other BabyLit Primers)

My nephew, who goes by Squish on the internet, is two and a half and has a small speech delay.  He's highly functional and pretty darn clever and kind of just seems to be avoiding certain parts of communication, but we are all working on helping him and his language skills are continually improving.  I bought these primers mostly for me, because they are clever and so pretty, but he loves them.  His favorites are The Jungle Book, Jabberwocky, and Dracula.  These give him a good mix of things to practice and a lot of things for us to point out to him outside of what is written on the page.  We can count the creatures on the pages of Jabberwocky and animals throughout the Jungle Book (although he does not struggle at all with making animal noises, it's his favorite thing to do). The whole collection is entertaining and, after multiple readings of the same books repeatedly, I haven't soured on them. 

The Quiet Book/The Loud Book

These books have the best pictures ever. There's so much going on in each of them, and they are so clever. They list different kinds of quiet and loud (swimming underwater quiet, surprise visit from Aunt Tillie quiet, hiccups loud (this one has a picture of the hiccuper being held upside down while holding his hands over his mouth during a concert). There are so many fun things hiding in the background (like the bunny heading into the woods with a roll of toilet paper on the campfire loud page) that we find something new every time we read them.

Anamalia

Did anyone else have the experience of finding this was the "cool" book when you were in like 1st grade? I remember it constantly being checked out or off the shelves in our classroom. We recently rediscovered it and it is a huge hit. The detailed pictures, the clever alliterations, plus who doesn't love an alphabet that isn't super boring? It's a win and it just gets better the older the kid gets and the more they understand.

The Princess and the Pig

This book is hilarious. It's about a princess and a piglet who accidentally get switched as babies, and everyone just assumes that they have been put under spells by fairies ("It's the kind of thing that happens all the time in books,")  instead of figuring out what actually happened, so the pig is raised as a princess and the princess is raised by a farmer. The pictures are beyond delightful, the writing is fantastically funny, and it's just the perfect way to flip several classic fairytales on their heads.

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