I’m pretty darn passionate about the written word. It’s an ancient technology, but, unlike much modern tech (I’m looking at you, 8-track-tapes), it hasn’t lost its usefulness or its relevance with age. In fact, like Patrick Steward or Meryl Streep, it has aged remarkably well. (May we all be so lucky.)
I’ve read a lot of books over the last 30+ years of my life, and some of them were great, and some of them were decidedly NOT great. Sometimes, when it comes to those less-than-great books, though, it can be really hard to decide when to put them down, and when to plow on. What we read – what we feed our mind – has immense impact on our inner lives and mental health. Just like your body would revolt if you fed it only Snickers bars, your mind won’t grow and thrive if you feed it only twaddle (a delightfully descriptive term for not-worth it fluff coined by the 19th century educator Charlotte Mason). It’s my opinion that we should avoid twaddle whenever possible and feed our brains well-written literature.
All of this applies to what we read to our kids, or encourage them to read on their own, too. As a mom of three small kids, I’ve read a LOT of picture books. Some of them are great, and some of them are the twaddliest twaddle that ever twaddled. And of course, there’s another catch when reading to little kids: they want to read the same book over, and over, and over again. There’s evidence that this repeated reading is actually really good for them, but that doesn’t make it easier when you’re 10 repeats into a poorly written, badly illustrated book that is slowly sucking your life force away.
Enter Literature for Littles. My goal is give you carefully curated recommendations for books you will love reading to your kids, even on repeat. They’ll be rated based on a few simple, mostly-measurable criteria: Content, Illustrations, and Repeatability, each rated on a 5/5 scale.
Content: This measures the creativity, word choice, story line, and subject matter of the actual words (or pictures, for silent books). A 5/5 would use well-written text (not talking down to children) and feature a creative or important story that encourages thinking for your child (creative thinking, other-thinking, or self-reflection).
Illustrations: This category measures the artistry and care that goes into the illustrations. A 5/5 would have pictures that not only follow the story, but add depth to the text with clear attention to detail and artistic mastery.
Repeatability: This category is harder to quantify, but basically, it’s a measurement of how many times I can read a book before I want to gouge my eyes out. A 5/5 would be re-reading three times in a row, every day for a month, and still not hating it.
Below is a list of books I’ve featured so far on the blog. Each is hyper-linked to its corresponding post, or you can search using the tag Literature for Littles. Happy reading!
Literature for Littles Book List
The Lived-in Life 