Book Recommendations / Unschooling

Beautiful Books for Read Aloud Time

Every morning that we are home we sit down together with a big basket of books that we’re currently working through and read a couple of pages of each nonfiction book, some picture books, and a few chapters of our current novel. It’s such a nice time of day!

It has been WAY too long since I’ve shared what we’re reading and so I have tons of beautiful books up my sleeve. I’ve had to break them up into separate posts but I’m excited to share the first one!

Here’s some of what we’ve been loving this year…

Slow Down
Book Depository | Amazon

This is such a beautiful book! I got it with the younger girls (5 and 6) in mind, and it’s perfect. Just as the cover says, 50 stories from nature. The simple everyday magic all around us. From how a spider builds a web, to how a wave forms.

Whenever we read this book, one of the girls wants to draw or paint a picture from it after. Isn’t it so beautiful?

Myths and Legends of The World
Book Depository | Amazon

A beautiful book of stories passed down from generation to generation from all corners of the world. The 21 stories are divided by continent. We’ve had some great conversations about how different people see the world, where different beliefs come from, and alternative perspectives while reading this book. Conversations that I think are super important.

“The stories in this book link you to past generations; these tales have been passed down through a long line of oral traditions. The souls of ancestors, the lives of heroes and the fates of mortals are waiting to be discovered.”

Big Ideas for Young Thinkers
Book Depository | Amazon

When we finished up our last philosophy book, no one was ready. They enjoyed it so much they wanted it to continue. Thankfully we came across this one! It is perfection. More big ideas, deep thoughts, things to consider, and inspiring people to learn from.

So many topics that got us thinking about who we are, what we believe, our biases, etc. Really meaningful conversations and discoveries. Again, we are really sad for it to end, but I think it will get another read through in the future too.

Under the Stars
Book Depository | Amazon

You know I love a good book that explains complicated things in simple ways. Kids have big questions! Sometimes they are hard to answer in an honest but understandable way. This is one of those books. Just a little astrophysics for bedtime, LOL.

Lots of information about the universe and common questions children have like ‘why is the sky blue?’ There’s a short passage on each topic which gives just the right amount of detail for us. We read one a day.

‘100 Things to Know About’ series
Book Depository | Amazon

This whole series of books is SO good! I am collecting them all. I thought we’d read enough science and space books that I knew all the things that children’s books on these topics commonly contain. Well no, WRONG! These books amaze us every day with their wacky facts. They are so fun!

Raspberries? What the? We enjoy these books a lot! Not too much text and always making us say ‘wow!’

Young Dark Emu
Book Depository | Amazon

When I was in school, we learnt that Aboriginal Australians were nomadic hunter-gatherers. Not exactly true! Using the accounts of early European explorers, colonists and farmers, this book provides a much better understanding of what life looked like in Australia before Europeans arrived.

“A land of cultivated farming areas, productive fisheries, permanent homes, and an understanding of the environment and its natural resources that supported thriving villages across the continent.”

This book is a great way to start conversations about our history and the treatment of Aboriginal Australians. We were all shocked and angry at some of the ignorant notes by settlers that were contained within each chapter and it left us wanting to learn much more. This was a really important read.

Humanatomy
Book Depository | Amazon

We’ve had a few different books about the human body before, and this book still provided something new. I think it’s my favourite. All the information was presented in an interesting way, with lots of common questions kids ask, like ‘what makes my heat beat?’ or ‘what is the strongest muscle in the body?’

Each page covers a different body system and the pictures are so lovely!

Australian Sea Life and Australian Birds
Book Depository | Amazon

Look how beautiful! It is hard to find such gorgeous Australian nature books. I was so glad when these came out. Exactly what I had been looking for. We have read them both and loved them.

There is a write up on each animal and even though a lot of them were animals we were very familiar with, there were many things about each one that we didn’t know of before! It was really cool and written in an interesting way too. I hope there will be more in this serious because we loved them a lot. The girls still use them for inspiration for artwork.

And last but not least, a few of our favourite novels from the past few months. I read these ones with the older girls (11 and 9).

The Girl Who Drank the Moon – For weeks after we finished this one we kept saying to each other that we missed it. It was so good. So engaging. One of those ones we couldn’t put down. And bonus, the chapters were nice and short and I love that in a read aloud. It means I could pick it up and read a bit even if we only had a short amount of time. The story kept us on the edge of our seats and I enjoyed the underlying messages about power, love, hope, belonging, and more. The way it was written, the strong female main character, just everything about it was so good. Highly recommend!

A Tale of Magic – Also one that I myself enjoyed a lot! Chris Colfer is awesome and the girls had previously enjoyed ‘The Land of Stories’ series. Another strong female character who stands up for what she believes in and isn’t afraid to be herself. The story is captivating and we are all really looking forward to the sequel! Loved it!

Our Australian Girl – We have been reading the first books of this series, the Grace stories. There are tons of these historical fiction books set in different time periods. I honestly don’t think the stories are that engaging, but the girls are interested in them and they are a great way to learn some Australian history. They’re pretty quick reads too!

That’s all for this one! What have you been reading lately?

Comments

August 16, 2020 at 3:06 am

This is a great list! Thank you! We’ve recently enjoyed Saturday by Oge Mora, Izzy Gizmo by Pip Jones, and The Little Red Fort by Brenda Maier.



August 28, 2020 at 5:31 pm

Definitely bookmarking this post! Would really love for my kids to have fun reading and less time for gadgets. Thanks for the inspiration!





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