Reading aloud is the one part of our school day that has never once needed rescuing. Everything else moves. That does not.
So we put together the list I wish somebody had handed me years ago. It is free, it is a PDF, and you can have it in about ten seconds.
What is on the homeschool read-aloud list
Fifty-eight books, sorted by age, in four bands:
- Ages four to six. Picture books that survive the fortieth reading, and the first chapter books. Make Way for Ducklings. Frog and Toad. Winnie-the-Pooh.
- Ages seven to nine. The ones where a child stops asking how many pages are left. Charlotte's Web. The Wind in the Willows. My Father's Dragon.
- Ages ten to twelve. Longer books that hold a mixed-age room, which is most homeschool rooms.
- Thirteen and up. Books worth reading together even when they could read them alone, because the talking afterward is the point.
Every book has one line under it telling you what you are actually picking up. Not a review. Just enough to know whether it suits the child you have and the week you are in.
Why read-alouds are worth the time
A child who cannot yet read a word can follow a story years above her own reading level. That gap is the whole reason to do it. A read-aloud is not reading practice. It is where a child meets sentences she could not decode on her own, and hears what good writing sounds like before she can produce any.
It is also the cheapest fix for a bad morning I know of. Nobody is behind during a chapter.
How to use it with a mixed-age family
Read to the middle child. The youngest takes in more than you expect and the oldest is rarely as bored as he pretends. A book that suits everybody perfectly usually suits nobody.
And put a book down if it is not working. Ten pages is a fair trial. Grinding through one for six weeks teaches a child that books are a chore, which is the opposite of what you were going for.
Get the list
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