age 5

Our (then) 2 year old loved to hear book over and over, and I loved to read it. It starts out, " 'I'm too small!' wailed Puppy. 'I can't reach the doorknob.' 'But you can reach the cookies on the table,' said Mouse. 'Please share one with me.' And Puppy did." The whole book is like that, one situation after another where puppy feels he is too small to do something, but there is something helpful he can do, and he does it. The ending is a sweet acknowledgment by Mama. This is a gentle message of empowerment.

Published in 1929 this book is a classic, a story of a wooden doll carved in the early 1800s. In 262 pages we read about her first 100 years, being lost and found by one little girl after another. Her adventures were fascinating and the girls (ages 5 & 8) begged for more each time. In each chapter we encountered at least 2 words we had to look up in the dictionary. This is an outstanding story! We each give it 5 stars.

Our children adore these books (there's 2 in the series - this is book 1) and love to hear the stories over and over, year after year. This is one of the absolute best chapter books I've ever come across for children. 6 children live in 3 homes close together out in the country in Norway. We always laugh out loud together when we read these books.

We listened to the audio version of The Wheel on the School (320 pages), a 1955 Newberry Winner that had all of us interested in riding in the car so we could hear it. It was really neat to hear about life in Holland, during a time when the village school had only 6 children, with only one girl - Lina. She surprises the teacher by independently writing a short composition, wondering why storks don't nest in their fishing village of Shora but they nest in all the neighboring villages. This inspires them to figure it out and they are are encouraged to spend their school time to work out the solution. It sounds dry but this is a very exciting book! This is a fantastic book about the power of hope, and the idea that it take a village to raise a child.

Who would have thought that so many male sea creatures care for
their young? Mr Seahorse is a story about Daddies, how they guard
nests, carry eggs in their mouth or stick them to their head, and
babysit the little ones. We heard this one over and over, and then our (then)
5 yo shocked me by "reading" it - she recalled every word.

Our children adore these books (there's 2 in the series - this is book 2) and love to hear the stories over and over. 6 children live in 3 homes close together out in the country in Norway. We always laugh out loud together when we read these books.