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Reading lists: Children's Literature

Picture Books

The Children and Young Adult Literature collection is shelved on the 2nd floor of the Library. 


Alphabet Books

Letter knowledge is the ability to recognize the different letters and their associated sounds. Research has shown that you should start by teaching children upper OR lowercase, but not both to start with. So far, there is no known benefit to teaching lowercase verse uppercase and vice versa.

Concept Books
Concept books are instructional books that help children start to label and identify their world. The best of these books teach and entertain children at the same time.   -ALSC

Easy-to-Read Books

"Children often love to be in control of story time, which usually means they want to pick out the book (for toddlers, this might mean the SAME book every day), and they may not even sit for the whole book. Instead of allowing this to create conflict, let them guide the time spent together and make it fun! Repetition is a great way for them to learn words..." Dr. Amy Emerson.

Graphic Novels

"Graphic novels can be a way in for students who are difficult to reach through traditional texts... Graphic novels can dramatically help improve reading development for students struggling with language acquisition, including special-needs students, as the illustrations provide contextual clues to the meaning of the written narrative. They can provide autistic students with clues to emotional context that they might miss when reading traditional text. English-language learners will be more motivated by graphic novels, and will more readily acquire new vocabulary and increase English proficiency."   -Scholastic Inc

Multicultural Books

Picture Books for Older Readers

Postmodern Books

Baby Books / Board Books

Books are for infants too! High contrast books with simple shapes help caregivers talk with their babies. Babies also enjoy looking at faces. Here's a list of recommended baby books.

Counting Books

Helping children understand basic math concepts helps them develop positive associations towards math learning and deepens their understanding of math. Pointing out and talking about numbers, shapes, patterns, measurements, sorting, and spatial relationships are all great ways to increase math literacy.  - NAEYC

Engineered Books

Interactive Books

Multicultural Picture Books, African American Literature
To build a positive sense of self, children need to see themselves, their families, and their cultural traditions in the books we read to them.  - ALSC

Picture Storybooks

Predictable Books

Predictable books allow for use of the cloze technique, where words are left out of the story and children are required to fill them in. This is used to increase comprehension. Unconstrained skills like vocabulary and comprehension are the biggest long term indicators of reading success.  -Susan B. Neuman

Transitional Books

Wordless Books

Books without words encourage caregivers to talk with their children; an early literacy skill. Picture walks are also a great way to build reading comprehension.