This is our kids' bookshelf:
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| I may have straightened this up a little before taking the photo... |
Apart from the shelves, we also have a couple of piles of books around the place:
We have a LOT of kids' books. This is a good thing (so grandparents etc, don't feel you need to stop buying books for birthdays and Christmas!) But, because we have so many we only tend to rotate between about 10-15 favourites. The others get pushed further to the edges of the shelves, or the bottom of a pile, and are sadly neglected.
This morning I decided upon a strategy to ensure that some of our wonderful kids' books still see the light of day - author or theme of the week.
So, each week (or thereabouts - I won't be too strict about it), I will pull out a collection of books with either a common author or a common theme. These books will sit separately for the week, and we will choose from that collection for our evening stories and any other shared reading time throughout the day.
I made it easy for myself to start with. For this coming week, we have chosen Mem Fox. I doubt any of you haven't heard of Mem Fox (except perhaps some non-Aussie readers). She is a prolific and wonderful Aussie kids' author. Here are the Mem Fox books we have at home:
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| We even managed 2 copies of "Time for Bed"! |
Despite owning 7 different Mem Fox books, we are not even close to having all of her work. She has published 36 kids' books.We might even try and get a couple more at the library next week.
As an introduction to our "author of the week", we sat down and read our 7 books this morning. We uncovered a couple of forgotten books, even among the Mem Fox. A couple of the books are perfect for reading to preschoolers, toddlers and babies (Where is the Green Sheep?, Time for Bed). A couple are good because of their rhythm and rhyme, but the subject matter is a little more subtle (The Magic Hat, Shoes from Grandpa). The other 3 are probably intended for a slightly older age group (Wombat Divine, Wilfred Gordan MacDonald Partridge and Whoever you are), but are still enjoyable to read together.
What happens with kids' books at your house? Do you try to rotate your books, or stick to a few favourites?
(I love to hear your opinions. Please click on the title of this blog post if you would like to view comments or add your own comment).
