RAR #187: How to find books that engage both an 8- and a 4-year-old

Speaker 1 (00:00): Hi, Sarah. Holly (00:01): Hi Sarah. My name is Holly. April (00:03): Hi Sarah. My name is April. Speaker 4 (00:04): I'm in Melbourne, Australia. Speaker 5 (00:07): I have a question about... Juliana (00:09): My name's Juliana and we live in India. Speaker 7 (00:11): I am wondering. Crystal (00:12): Hi, Sarah. This is Crystal from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Speaker 9 (00:15): Can you give me a suggestion for an especially fabulous book? Sarah MacKenzie (00:23): Hey, there I'm Sarah Mackenzie. This is the Read-Aloud Revival. And in this short episode, I'm answering one of your questions. Sarah (00:31): Hi Sarah. This is Sarah. My question is how do you find a book that keeps an eight year old and a four-year-old actively engaged while you're doing your Read-Aloud? Sarah MacKenzie (00:43): Hey Sarah. Okay. First thing that comes to mind is picture books. Picture book is almost necessitate our kids to be actively engaged because they're looking at the pictures as we're reading aloud the words, and your eight year old is definitely not too old for picture books. We've talked about this recently on the show, but I'll say it again because it's so important. Picture books tend to have more sophisticated language patterns, better word, choice, vocabulary, diction, more sophisticated, rich, and beautiful language than chapter books and novels. So when we go from reading picture books up to reading novels, we're actually taking a step down in the beauty and complexity of the language. This is just really helpful to remember. So if picture books keep both of your kids interested, I'd stay at picture books longer and not even feel the need to really move up to anything else yet. (01:35): Now a couple of specific recommendations. Torben Kuhlmann, K-U-H-L-M-A-N-N, I believe. His books would be a good fit here. They're called Armstrong, Edison, Lindbergh, Moletown, I think is another one. They're basically a hybrid between a picture book and a chapter book because they have longer texts, longer story, but tons and tons of full color, really big illustrations. They're gorgeous. Another really good recommendation would be Jonathan Auxier's Fabled Stable series. Starts with Willa the Wisp. The second one is something about the truth about tattle-tails or something like that. Tattle-tails, isn't it title? And he wrote those with the intention of being read aloud to various ages. He's a father and he wanted a read-aloud that would engage his older kids and his younger kids at the same time. He's also a fantastic author. And that's longer than a typical picture, but doesn't look like a picture book either. It looks like a chapter book. So that might help your older child. I think I was assuming you had a son. Might not be a son. Your eight year old. (02:44): But the other thing just to keep in mind though is you don't need to move out of picture books. So if that still engages your eight year old and your four year old, stick with those. They're going to get so much good language for those. You don't need to move up because like I said, moving is not exactly moving up when we're talking about complexity of language. When you do want to include some chapter books and novels, I would encourage you to keep reading the picture books. So don't replace picture books with chapter books and novels. Just expand it. If you can imagine, it's not a ladder where we go from picture books to chapter books or novels. They're more like expanding concentric circles where we're reading picture books and now we're also reading picture books and chapter books or novels. (03:26): A few that work really well for a four and eight are My Father's Dragon series. The first one's just called My Father's Dragon. It's by Ruth Stiles Gannett. We will put this in the show notes. It is an excellent first chapter book. In fact, all six of my children. This was the very first successful chapter book that I read aloud to them that engaged them. They loved it. It's short and funny and interesting. And even my twins now who are eight now, when they were four, this was the first longer narrative that I read to them. The Mouse and the Motorcycle by Beverly Cleary is also an excellent choice for one of your very first longer narratives, because it's very interesting and pretty quick paced. And everybody loves Ralph, the mouse. So The Mouse and the Motorcycle might be another good choice. (04:14): And then the other thing to keep in mind is when you're reading aloud a novel or something that does not have as many pictures, let your kids do something with their hands. My kids are always doing something with their hands. There's some interesting research that shows for a lot of kids, when they're doing something with their hands, they're listening better and paying attention better. So you could have some coloring books, you could have stencils, Play-Doh, any kind of thing they can... Even playing with Legos, a small set of Legos that you have out that can keep their hands busy will free them up to listen really well. We did a whole episode on this. It's episode 73. So you can go to readaloudrevival.com/73, or just go back and look for it in your podcast app. (05:01): We talk about just ideas for different ages for keeping their hands busy during read-alouds. But I almost always, before we do a read aloud, give my kids a five or 10 minute warning and say, "Get stuff to do. I'm reading aloud in five or 10 minutes." And then they can go get whatever it is, whether it's finger knitting or for older kids, crochet or their sketchbooks, or their knitting needles, or for younger kids, it might be Play-Doh, or a coloring page, or paper dolls or something. That way they keep their hands busy while I'm reading. And there's a whole list of ideas of things to keep their hands busy at that episode 73. I hope that helps. (05:41): The books I recommended to you in this show are in the show notes at readaloudrevival.com/187. So if you wanted those titles again, you can just head to readaloudrevival.com/187 to see them. Thanks so much for that question, Sarah. Now let's hear from a couple of kids about the books that they're enjoying. Speaker 12 (06:02): [inaudible 00:06:07]. Speaker 13 (06:09): How old are you? Speaker 12 (06:11): Three. Speaker 13 (06:11): And where do you live? Speaker 12 (06:11): South Carolina. Speaker 13 (06:15): What's your favorite book? Speaker 12 (06:15): [inaudible 00:06:17]. Speaker 14 (06:23): What's your name? Bear (06:24): Bear. Speaker 14 (06:25): And how old are you, Bear? Bear (06:27): Three. Speaker 14 (06:28): Bear, where are you from? Bear (06:30): Ohio. Speaker 14 (06:30): Living in Ohio. And what's your favorite book? Bear (06:33): Armadillo Rodeo. Speaker 14 (06:34): Armadillo Rodeo by Jan Brett. What do you like about Armadillo Rodeo? Bear (06:39): The Bo [inaudible 00:06:40]. MacKenzie Taylor (06:41): Hi, my name is Mackenzie Taylor. I'm 11 years old. I live in Ooltewah, Tennessee. My favorite book is Frindle by Andrew Clements. I like this book because this boy makes up a funny word because his teacher said that he can make up the funny word and he becomes famous. Sarah MacKenzie (07:09): Thanks for listening. If you've got a question for an upcoming episode, leave me a voicemail at readaloudrevival.com/message. Until next time, go make meaningful and lasting connections with your kids through books. 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