Children's Book Recommendations
From PBS 'Between the Lions' Show
When you're at the library or bookstore, staring at shelf after shelf of titles, how do you choose something your child will enjoy? Here is a good, all-purpose book list with alphabets, fairytales, poetry and rhymes, songs, story collections, biographies and other non-fiction.Alphabet Books
- Gathering the Sun: An Alphabet in Spanish and English by Alma Flor Ada. Poems celebrating farmworkers and the harvest.
- I Spy: An Alphabet in Art by Lucy Micklewaith. Find the letters in each piece of art!
Biographies
- Duke Ellington by Andrea Davis Pinkney. Here is the life of the great jazz musician.
- Eleanor by Barbara Cooney. This biography tells about the girl who became Eleanor Roosevelt.
Collections
The 20th Century Children's Book Treasury edited by Janet Schulman. Celebrated children's picture books to read aloud.
Counting Books
- Let's Count it Out, Jesse Bear by Nancy White Carlstrom. There are lots of different things to count every day.
- Ten, Nine, Eight by Molly Bank. A little girl and her daddy count backwards until she falls asleep.
Folk and Fairy Tales
- Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain by Verna Aardema. A rhyming story from East Africa.
- The First Strawberries by Joseph Bruchac. A Cherokee myth of how strawberries came to be.
- Lon Po Po by Ed Young. A Chinese version of Little Red Riding Hood.
- Moon Rope by Lois Ehlert. How Mole climbs up to the moon.
- Swamp Angel by Anne Isaacs. A tale tale about the girl who grows up to be "the greatest woodswoman in Tennessee."
Non-fiction
- The Big Book of Dinosaurs by Angela Wilkes. A really big book about those really big creatures.
- From Tadpole to Frog by Wendy Pfeffer. Discover the stages of a frog's life.
- Home: A Journey Through America by Thomas Locker. Take a very special trip across the country.
- Market! by Ted Lewin. An international tour of the sights and sounds of the marketplace.
- The Moon Book by Gail Gibbons. An easy-to-read book of information.
- A River Ran Wild by Lynne Cherry. A pictorial history of the Nashua River, from it's settlement 7,000 years ago.
Poetry and Song
- Pass it On: African American Poetry for Children edited by Wade Hudson. A beginning collection.
- Read Aloud Rhythms for the Very Young edited by Jack Prelutsky. Easy poems for reading together.
- This Land is Your Land by Woody Guthrie. A beautifully illustrated version of the well-known folk song.
