Winter Reading List

Spring is well under way even though we keep see sawing between 60 degree days and temperatures close to or freezing. We read some great books this winter and I'm sharing our list here. Read last year's winter list here, 2016's list here, 2015's list here, and 2014's list here.

Our Top Reading Choices From This Winter:

• Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak, This is a book that we already had and is obviously well known and popular. Someone grabbed it at the library and Elise loved it. She wanted to read it every day and each time we read it, she'd ask for me to read it again. I was lucky when she only requested it 3 times in a row. It is definitely her favorite book right now so I wanted to record that even though it's not a new book to us.
  
  
  
• Where Is Home, Little Pip? by Karma Wilson and Jane Chapman, This is another book that we've had for years. Carter just took a huge liking to it this year. I always liked the book but I enjoy it even more now that Carter likes it so much. He picks it as one of his bedtime books every night and sometimes asks to read it during the day. We also read it multiple times in row. It's a cute book because there are songs and different animals so I read them each with a different voice. One night I made up a song about where our home is for Carter like the ones in the book and he loved it. 
• A Small Blue Whale by Beth Ferry, We loved this adorable story about a whale in search of a friend. It had a lot of references to colors which were great for practicing colors with Elise. I loved the ending and how it showed what true friendship is and how friends help each other.
• Betty Bunny Loves Chocolate Cake by Michael B. Kaplan, This book about Betty Bunny and her discovered love of chocolate cake was a favorite of Carter's. He thought it was hilarious. I think his favorite part was when put cake in her pocket and it got smashed.
• George and Martha by James Marshall, I remember reading some of these books as a kid and not being all that into them. Carter picked out a whole stack of them at the library, saying he wanted to read the funny hippo books. This one was our favorite and left me laughing at the end of each story. It was just so cute and funny!
• Baa Baa Smart Sheep by Mark and Rowan Somerset, I expected this book to be a re-worked version of Baa Baa Black Sheep in song form so I was caught off guard when it was just a typical story. It ended up being really funny. Carter like it because there was poop in it. It would also be a good book to start a conversation about how some people just aren't very nice and will try to trick you, so you have to think for yourself.
• Let's Go, Hugo! by Angela Dominguez, I picked this book out because the illustrations reminded me of I Hatched by Jill Esbaum and we loved that book! I actually thought it may have been the same author, but once I looked up the author of I Hatched I realized the illustrations were just similar. This was a sweet tale of a bird who is afraid to fly and what he's missing because he won't fly. He meets friends who help him conquer his fears. It is the perfect book to illustrate that being brave doesn't mean you aren't scared, it means you don't let your fear get in the way.
• Marlo by Christopher Browne, Carter adored this book. It's a mostly wordless picture book about a dog taking a bath. The dog imagines it goes under the ocean and takes it's rubber duck with it. Carter noticed the rubber duck was on every page and we had a lot of fun searching for it on each page. Carter has always loved wordless picture books and the opportunity they provide for telling the story on your own. I think he also liked the dog and the name Marlo. 
• Elbert's Bad Word by Audrey and Don Wood, Carter loved this book. I think he liked it because they made the bad word a monster that crawled onto Elbert and followed him around. It was a neat concept that after hearing a bad word it could follow you around and then pop out of your mouth when something bad happens to you. I also liked that Elbert was helped when he was given other strong words he could use instead of the bad word.  
• Rosie's Walk by Pat Hutchins, This is a book that I have had for a long time and love using with students in class. I read it with Carter and he thought it was hilarious. It reminded him of Wily Coyote and the Road Runner with how the fox tried to follow Rosie and had lots of mishaps along the way. He was cracking up and I loved it!
• Malala's Magic Pencil by Malala Yousafzai- I loved this book. I read I Am Malala a while ago and when I saw this children's book by Malala I had to check it out. She did a great job of writing her story in a way that was appropriate for children. I loved how encouraging it was and the message that even a child can make a difference. It was very powerful and a book I definitely will use in the classroom when I go back to teaching.
• Sleepover Duck! by Carin Bramsen- The kids loved this book. They enjoyed searching the pages for the owl. There have been a few different books about this cat and duck and Elise especially has loved all of them!