These lists include some of the very best titles your library has to offer -- recommended by staff who: prepare and present storytimes, help children and parents make reading selections day in and day out, and watch and listen for positive recommendations made by library users about the titles they read. If you need other reading suggestions, ask a librarian for assistance.
Why read to your kids?
Parents and caregivers want to make certain that children come to school ready to learn. Research shows that if parents/caregivers talk to their newborns, play with them, sing to them, and interact with them for one hour and six minutes daily, those children will come to school with a 10,000 to 12,000 word vocabulary. In contrast, if a child arrives at school having only interacted with an adult for 10 minutes per day, that child will have a vocabulary of 4,000 words. The more words the child has in his/her vocabulary, the easier it will be to learn to read when entering school. (Hint: read 8 books a day to your baby!)
What about kids who already know how to read for themselves? Why should they read? It is important they read to continue raising their reading levels and adding to their vocabularies.
And how can kids do that? Children need to spend time reading independently, and reading many books at their reading level. When a student reads at least 6 appropriately grade-leveled books during summer vacation he/she maintains the reading gains made during the previous school year. By reading 8 or 10 or 20, the student may gain ground!
