reading together

my family reads all year long. we are definitely bookworms. i keep a journal of all the books i read and my husband keeps the books he reads but we don't keep track of what books the kids read or how many they read each year. as a kid, i'm sure i had some sort of system since i read books very quickly and i don't tend to re-read books. the one thing that stands out to me is the summer reading program at the local library. i always joined and i always met my goal. i looked forward to summer just so i could join the reading program. so it's a given that i sign my kids up every summer for it. their goals are based on minutes read and activities which is age-appropriate but kind of boring. because of that, i have created our own summer reading program. our goal is to read one hundred books we have never read before. we are on week three of summer vacation and we are more than halfway to our goal. yippee. we have actually read some fantastic books, some i'd like to share with you.

first, i must share one that i read called reading together (everything you need to know to raise a child who loves to read) by diane w. frankenstein

i found this gem at the library but it's now on my list of books to buy. not only does it have lists of books to read from picture books to books for kids in 6th grade and beyond but it also has conversation starters and story pages. this is a book i will use as reference for many, many years to come. definitely worth the investment of approximately thirteen bucks. the philosophy is:
help children find an appropriate book + talk with them about the story = children who connect with stories and love the stories they read.
what's even better is that we have not read any of the books on the picture book list so that's thirty one books to add to our summer reading list.

now, here are some of our favorites:

we were so lucky to find this book since we planted our pumpkins from seed. the kids (even the two year old) were excited to read more about how our pumpkins are growing.

i think all kids love to talk about poop, at least boys do for sure. we are a poop and fart loving family so we were excited to read this one. we learned so much and laughed even harder. science + humor = five stars.

we love butts, too. i saw this sitting on the shelf and i couldn't resist. my two year old who is a gal of few words ran around the house yelling, "bug butts" -- hey, whatever it takes, right? again, this one combines science with humor. we learned that butt juice is actually a favored treat. who knew?

a fascinating read with wonderful illustrations. we liked this one so much that we ordered all of gail gibbon's books. later that night, we watched the wizard of oz for the first time and my son was able to classify the tornado.

another wonderful book. this one gave step-by-step instructions about what you need to go to the moon and what you should do once you get there. beautiful illustrations. it ends with a reminder to take care of mother earth.

there really aren't many words to describe this book. it is beyond beautiful. my six year old son loved it. wonderful story, gorgeous illustrations, amazing message: the earth does not belong to us, we belong to the earth. even though the message is over a hundred years old, it is totally relevant and it's exactly what i want my children to know. we are lucky enough to own this book so we can read it over and over again. 

we just discovered this series by tedd arnold. hilarious! and so easy to read for a beginner. my son can read these on his own which as helped boost his confidence in becoming a reader. we have an older series by tedd arnold called parts which has been a favorite of ours for a few years now. cute books.