KINDERGARTEN

FIVE POINTS ON READING FROM ROSEMARY WELLS

·          Children who read succeed. The most significant part of a child's mental growth between the ages of three and seven is the ability to imagine. Books boost imagination. Our popular television culture degrades imagination.

·          TV and video are now our national babysitters. But a young child's growing mind needs active play and live conversation. Television puts a child into what neurologists call the passive Alpha state. A child cannot learn from screens because programs are meant to sell products not to teach.

·          Much like the first news about tobacco and cholesterol, early studies now link overdoses of TV, video games and pop music with learning disabilities, attention deficiency, speech defects and aggressive behavior.

·          Screen watching makes a child a follower and a consumer. Books exist because of the power of human ideas. Readers are leaders and producers.

·          After a tiring day nothing is more restful than reading with a child on your lap. Reading aloud offers a world of privacy, dignity, and love to both of you.

From a speech by noted author/illustrator, Rosemary Wells for use with the "Read to Your Bunny" library outreach campaign.

FIRST GRADE

 

SECOND GRADE

Jubal's Wish	Wood
Pablo's Tree	McMillan
Blueberries for Sal	McClaskey
Bread and Jam for Frances	Hoban
Goodnight Owl	Hutchins
The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash	Noble
Tacky the Penguin	Lester
Amelia Bedelia	Parish
Miss Nelson is Missing	Allard
Amazing Grace	Hoffman
Bear's Bargain	Asch
Frog and Toad Are Friends	Lobel
Stellaluna	Canon
Berlioz the Bear	Brett
Froggy Learns to Swim	London
Today was a Terrible Day	Giff
The Big, Fat, Enormous Lie	Sharmot
A Butterfly Life	Burk
What is a Fossil?	Goldish
Johnny Appleseed	Kellogg
The Race of Toad and Deer	Mora
The Story of Jumping Mouse	Steptoe

 

THIRD GRADE

Afternoon on the Amazon	Adler
Horrible Harry and the Purple People	Kline
The Littles	Peterson
Encyclopedia Brown Series	Sobol
Freckle Juice	Blume
Geronimo Stilton Series	Stilton
A Picture Book of John F. Kennedy	Adler
A Dinosaur Named Sue	Robinson
Amber Brown	Wesley
A to Z Mystery Series	Ron Ray
Boxcar Children Series	Warner
Appalachia	Rylant
Good Grief, Third Grade	McKenna
Godzilla Ate My Homework	Jones
26 Fairmont Street	DePaola
Bunnicula	Howe
Junie B. Jones Series	Park
Cam Jansen Series	Adler
Magic Tree House Series	Pope

 

FOURTH GRADE

Charlotte's Web	White
Caddie Woodlawn	Brink
Ramona and Her Father	Cleary
The Josefina Story Quilt	Coerr
Fat Jack	Cohen
The Gift-Giver	Hansen
In The Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson	Lord
The Sign of the Beaver	Speare
Child of the Owl	Yep
The Great Kapok Tree	Cherry
Wolfe Island	Godkin
Song of the Swallows	Politi
Snow White in New York	French
Buffalo Woman	Goble
The Elephant's Child	Kipling
Legend of the Milky Way	Lee
James and the Giant Peach	Dahl
The Wind and the Willows	Grahame
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe	Lewis
The Borrowers	Norton
Jumanjii	Van Allsburg

 

FIFTH GRADE

 

Ida Early Comes Over the Mountain	Burch
The Pinballs	Byars
Hazel Rye	Cleave
The Cat Who Went to Heaven	Coatsworth
Catherine, Called Birdy	Cushman
I was Born a Slave: The Story of Harriett	Fleischner
Time for Andrew: A Ghost Story	Hahn
Hurricanes: Earth's Mightiest Storms	Lauber
Zia	O'Dell
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry	Taylor
Dragonwings	Yep
Ann Frank, The Diary of a Young Girl	Frank
Chasing Redbird	Creech
Dear Mr. Henshaw	Cleary
Frindle	Clements
From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler	Konigsburg
Holes	Sachar
Island of the Blue Dolphin	O'Dell
Number the Stars	Lowry
Walk Two Moons	Creech
The Warm Place	Farmer
In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson	Lord

       

Book Equivalents

We encourage students to read a wide variety of materials! ALL of the following count as a book, depending on grade level:

¨ Every 50 - 100 pages of text or pictures with text depending upon grade appropriateness

¨ 4 – 8 SHORT STORIES

¨ 9 – 12 ARTICLES from periodicals or electronic media

¨ 15 - 20 POEMS

¨ READ-ALOUDS DO COUNT depending upon grade appropriateness.

¨ GUIDED READING & SHARED READING COUNT.

¨ INDEPENDENT READING COUNTS.

 

 

Our Goal: EVERY CHILD READS

A MILLION WORDS!