What Are Your Favorite Teen Reads?

We've talked numerous times on this blog about fav books for boys, for littles, for tweens, and so on. However, we really have not touched too deeply on reads for older teens.

Sixteen-, seventeen-, and eighteen-year olds are in a whole different ballpark. They've entered that rhetoric phase. They're thinking more deeply, asking thoughtful questions, and looking at how their own lives integrate with the world at large. They're also able to handle more mature subjects. We, as parents, have given them the tools to discern the good from the bad and so leave more room for their discretion.

I think that most of us (mothers of older teens) have given up on pre-reading ALL of their book choices. There are only so many hours in the day after all. Yet, we have not given up on guiding their choices and helping find the good stuff when we can.

My request to you Dear Reader is to tell me in the comments some of your favorite books for older teens. I'd love to hear from teens and young adults as well as moms. What do you love and why?

My goal here is twofold. One this is a great forum to help one another. I love that we can learn from each other. Two, I'm in the depths of reading high school level books for my upcoming nonfiction book, 100 Books for Kids Who Love to Read (working title).

Did I tell you that I'm actually doing three different books? Well, my publisher asked for one book for grade school children, one for middle school, and one for high school. I think it's a great idea. I'm starting with the high school book. The really fun part is that my 18-year-old daughter has agreed to be my co-author.

So, please give me some ideas on books to include. And give all the other readers here some ideas for their trips to the library and bookstore.

Awesome Deal Picture Perfect Childhood

In celebration of Picture Book Month Cay Gibson's A Picture Perfect Childhood is offered on e-book for only $1.99 until the end of November. This is an awesome deal. The e-book format is PDF so you can read it on the computer or your e-reader.

I already own the print version but for $1.99 I can't resist putting it on my Kindle. How nice to be able to have it easily available in my purse for library visits.

Buy it today and celebrate childhood with your favorite snuggle-bug by clicking here: A Picture Perfect Childhood.

Thank you Cay for this wonderful gift to us book lovers!

What Are Your Favorite Read Alouds?

I received the following question in my email box today:

Do you have a top 3 read aloud suggestion for lower elementary and a top 3 for middle school age?

That is not as easy a question to answer as I thought. There are just so many great read alouds. Off the top of my head:

Grade School:
Princess and the Kiss
The Squire and the Scroll
The Weight of the Mass

Middle School
The Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe
Railway Children
Little Princess

However, if I think about it another minute, there are so many other titles that could take a place on the list. Well, except for The Lion, Witch, and the Wardrobe. That book is undefeated as number one. If I ask my children what their favorite read alouds were, they would each have their own top-3.

So, what would be on your top-3 list? And why? Please let us all know in the comments. Maybe by putting all of our heads together we can come to some kind of a consensus. Or, at least, discover some new read aloud titles.

... And what about high school? Do you still read aloud in high school? The Hobbit and LOTR would be at the top of my list. What would top your high school read aloud list?

Favorite Art and Music Living Books

I'm putting the finishing touches on my Power Point presentation for the webinar on Wednesday, Teaching Art and Music Appreciation with Real Books.

Even though I have loads of book titles to share, it is oh so very possible that I've missed a jewel or two. (I'm pulling the titles from For the Love of Literature.)

If you have a very favorite, please share here in the comments. That way everyone can benefit.

Art doesn't have to be restricted to classic paintings. There is also architecture, photography, and sculpture. And music doesn't have to be restricted to classical. There is also opera, Gregorian chant, modern, and jazz. There are also lovely living books on dance to consider.

There are picture books, nonfiction, biographies, and historical fiction that fit into the art and music mode.

So many beautiful books. So little time.

What are your favs?

Book Suggestions Needed for 6 to 12 Year Olds

From time to time, I get letters from moms desperately searching for good fiction for their children. It's a pretty common problem among us Catholic homeschooling moms with veracious readers on our hands. They go through books like water and we're kept on our toes searching out acceptable literature. Books that are well written, fun to read, and raise up their hearts. Is it really so much to ask?

Here are a couple recent letters:

I am hoping you can help me by offering some specific suggestions for authors that I could allow my 12 year old daughter to read. I currently dread library time because the books that I look over are so full of "stuff" that I have to say no. She reads very quickly and is looking for more books similar to [Regina Doman's]. We have read all of [Regina Doman's] books and the first JPII book (and anything else I can find). Do you have any suggestions of authors who write in modern times that I can give to her? "I can't stand not being able to read--you're soooooo mean!" can only be heard so many times. I completely understand her need--I am like that also. Unfortunately, as a child, I had no monitoring and I was well-versed in all things Harlequin (to my true misfortune). Thank you for any help you may be able to offer.

And also

I have tried to find a guide in Catholic homeschooling sites about this question I have but not finding much. I thought of asking you.

My daughter is 6 yo. She is reading so well right now that I am worried I can't keep up with providing good literature ... I know it sounds silly but last night I brought home the James Harriot Treasury for Children and she read one hour before bed and one hour in the morning and she finished it! Her reading comprehension is really good but I am still surprised and unsure. We read a lot at home and have bookshelves full of books. I also grew up like that, but I wasn't reading the Little House in the Prairie series by myself at 6 years old! This morning she just asked me if she could start Charlotte's Web. Last night I brought home all the books for this year's curriculum, but I think she'll be done with them in a couple of months ... What do I do?

Let's help these two moms out. What are your suggestions?

Ann's Fifty Fav Kids Books

One of the great things about being a library rat is getting to know the library clerks. They're not only helpful at solving problems, but often have great book recommendations. When I mentioned to my dear library friend Ann (who, btw, is mentioned in the Appreciation of LOL) that I've begun work on a new book, she offered her help. She put together a list of her Fifty-Plus Favorite Kids Books. She sat down in front of her bookshelves at home and wrote down the following for me:

Actual Size, Steve Jenkins
Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, Judith Viorst
A Bad Case of Stripes, David Shannon
Bedtime for Frances, Russell Hoban, illus. Garth Williams
Believe, Paintings, N. A. Noel & John Wm. Sisson
Brown Paper Teddy, Neil Reed
Callie Cat Ice Skater, Eileen Spinelli
Children of the Earth Remember, Schim Schimmel
Coat of Many Colors, Dolly Parton, illus. Judith Sutton
Comet’s Nine Lives, Jan Brett
Corduroy, Don Freeman
Dear Children of the Earth, A Letter from Home
The Empty Pot, Demi
Fancy Nancy, Jane O’Connor
Gingerbread Baby, Jan Brett
Goodnight Moon, Margaret Wise Brown
Harold and the Purple Crayon, Crockett Johnson
Honey Paw and Lightfoot, Jonathan London, illus. Jon Van Zyle
How I Became a Pirate, Melinda Long, illus. David Shannon
I Love You the Purplest, Barbara Jousse
I’m Sorry, Sam, McBratney, illus. Jennifer Eachus
If You Give a Moose a Muffin
If You Give a Mouse a Cookie
If You Give a Pig a Pancake
If You Take a Mouse to the Movies, Laura Joffe Numeroff, illus. Felicia Bond
Imagine a Day
Imagine a Night, Sarah L. Thomson, illus. Rob Gonsalves
The Land of Colors, Margaret Lundell
The Legend of Mackinac Island
The Legend of Sleeping Bear
The Legend of the Loon, Kathy Jo Wargin
M is for Mitten, a Michigan Alphabet, Annie Apple Ford and Kathy Jo Wargin, illus. Michael G. Monroe
Mama Do You Love Me, Barbara M. Joose, illus. Barbara Lavalle
McDuff Comes Home
McDuff Moves In, Rosemary Wells, illus. Susan Jeffers
The Midnight Unicorn, Neil Reed
Miss Spider’s Tea Party, David Kirk
Nighty-Night, Wendy Lewison, illus. Giulia Orecchia
Not Just Tutus, Rachel Isadora
Olivia, Ian Falconer
One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish, Dr. Seuss
One Grain of Rice, Demi
The Polar Express, Chris Van Allsburg
Priscilla McDoodlenut Doodle McMay, Jane Sinke
Sophie Skates, Rachel Isadora (author of Lili at Ballet)
Stellaluna, Janell Cannon
Swimmy, Leo Lionni
The Trellis and the Seed, Jan Karon
Today I Feel Silly & Other Moods That Make My Day, Jamie Lee Curtis, illus. Laura Cornell
Up North at the Cabin, Marsha Wilson Chall, illus. Steve Johnson
The Valentine Box, Maud Hart Lovelace, illus. Ingrid Fetz
What’s Heaven?, Maria Shriver, illus. Sandra Speidel
The Willow Umbrella, Christine Widman, illus. Catherine Stock
Wings, Jane Yolen and Dennis Yolen

I wonder if Ann realizes the extra work she's created for herself. I'm now off to the library's website to read reviews and place lots of holds for Ann to pull for me.

Thank you Ann!!!!

Virtues Reading List Continued

I continue to get good suggestions for the Virtues Reading List Project. It's not too late to put your two cents in as it's going to take me a while yet to get it pulled together. Or, just go check it out to get some new ideas for your next library visit.

The Training of Virtues

Charlotte Mason advocated the training of habits. She recommended focusing on one habit for 4 to 6 weeks before moving onto the next.

The idea of putting together a reading list to teach virtues made me think about Miss Mason's recommendation. As a parent, I can focus on one virtue at a time and arrange our reading schedule accordingly.

Virtues Reading List

For the Love of Literature is all about teaching core subjects through fun and interesting literature. However, I would like to put forth that there are more important things to learn in this world than math, science, history, etc.

I'd like to talk about teaching virtues through literature. And I would like your input.

Here are the seven virtues:

Humility (modesty)
Kindness (admiration)
Forgiveness (composure)
Diligence (zeal/integrity/labor)
Charity (giving)
Temperance (self-restraint)
Chastity (purity)

What books would you recommend to go with one or more of these virtues? Let's get a list going for everyone in the family -- preschool, grade school, middle school, high school, and adult.

I'll take all of your suggestions and pull them together into one great list. I'll post it here and at my Catholic homeschooling website for free download.

Read Aloud Curriculum

I stumbled upon this website today:

Read Aloud Curriculum Enrichment: Catholic Living Books.

Sounds like it's right up my alley! Anyone have experience with this company? It looks like it would've fit right into the appendices of For the Love of Literature.

CueCat Barcode Scanner

If you Library Thing, you just have to get the Cat Thing. Actually, it's called CueCat. What it does is scan the bar codes on the back of your books making cataloging on Library Thing very easy.

Mine came yesterday and I just scanned all my DK Eyewitness books. It only took a few minutes. In all honesty, it doesn't take tons longer to manually type in an ISBN number, but if you're doing a lot of books it is a very nice tool to have on hand. And besides, it's way more fun to scan the code than to type it in.

Just wait until the kids discover it!

The Kid's Library Thing

I stayed up far too late last night working on the Kid's Library Thing. It is far from finished, but I hope that when it's done it'll be a helpful resource to other Catholic homeschoolers, especially newbies. My plan is to have all of the books tagged and reviewed, plus I still have about 500 books to enter. Might be a while! And definitely not today -- we're off to the fair.

Literature by African Countries

I've got the African reading list up at the Love2Learn blog. Check it out and leave a comment.

Literature Lists by Geography

The Love2Learn Board is putting together all kinds of cool reading lists by geographical area. You all know how much I LOVE reading lists, so I can't help but join in on the fun!

Check out these reading lists in progress:
Across America: State-By-State
Canada
Mexico
Asia
Europe
South and Central America

This is a collaborative effort, so please go and add your ideas to the comments. Corrections, additions, and comments are all welcomed! Alicia will put the final lists up on the Love2Learn website. (Which, btw, is currently being completely revamped and improved and should be available soon!)

I'm working on a reading list for Africa which I hope to post in the next day or two at the Love2Learn blog.

Laura Berquist's English Literature List

I recently came across Laura Berquist's syllabus for British literature (for 12th grade I believe) in the latest Emmanuel Books catalog. She has a few titles we missed in our recent high school literature discussion.

Here is her list:
Beowulf
Ivanhoe (Scott)
Emma (Austin)
Henry V (Shakespeare)
Helena (Waugh)
Sir Gawain the Green Knight (Tolkien)
Midsummer's Night Dream (Shakespeare)
Vicar of Wakefield (Goldsmith)
David Copperfield (Dickens)
Space Trilogy (Lewis)

Other options:
Kenilworth (Scott)
Macbeth (Shakespeare)
Othello (shakespeare)
Gulliver's Travels
The Woman in White (Collins)
The Warden (Trollope)
The Everlasting Man (Chesterton)
Brideshead Revisited (Waugh)

High School Literature Course

A lot of great suggestions were left in the comments when I asked what you would include in an American/English high school literature course. Make sure that you check out the comments here. Marcia Neill, director of St. Michael the Archangel Academy, came in late with an excellent list. I was happy to see that my two high schoolers have already read several of the suggested books.

Below is what I came up with for my teen daughter and teen son. Teen Daughter is 9th grade, so her list is for 9th and 10th grade. Teen Son's list is for 11th and 12th grade. I haven't worked out the order that they will be read yet. There are 9 books for each school year - one per month. During the summer they can choose their own reading. Both teens are avid readers and make good choices on their own.


Daughter, 9th and 10th grade:

Huck Finn by Mark Twain
Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling
Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather
Short Stories of O'Henry
Beowulf by Anonymous
Animal Farm by George Orwell
The Little Flowers of St. Francis
Call of the Wild by Jack London
Love Poems by Emily Dickinson
Ramona by Helen Hunt Jackson
Withering Heights by Bronte
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Emma by Jane Austin
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austin
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
Up From Slavery by Booker T. Washington

Son, Grades 11 and 12

The Iliad by Homer (Lattimore translation)
Apology by Plato (Rouse translation)
Confessions by St. Augustine (Pine-Coffin translation)
Inferno by Dante (Sayers translation)
The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
In This House of Brede by Rumer Godden
Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
The Four Loves by C. S. Lewis
Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
Murder in the Cathedral by T. S. Elliot
Ballad of the White Horse by G. K. Chesterton
Edgar Allen Poe: selected stories and poems
Collected Stories by Flannery O'Connor
The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder
Here Comes Civilization by William Ten
The Quest for St. Aquin by Anthony Boucher
Jeeves by P. G. Wodehouse
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

I'll also give them a few math and science titles in addition to the above. I haven't decided on those yet. In the upcoming days . . .

Yet More Reading Lists

First an administrative note. I'm leaving later today for the state 4-H shoot. So if you leave a comment, it may take a day or two to show up.

Now to those lists:

MacBeth's Opinion This is one of my favorite online reading lists. Actually, it's more like an online bookstore. She links to amazon.com which I like so that I can read the reviews. Then I head over to my library website to put the books on hold. (Don't worry, I've talked to MacBeth about this and she doesn't mind at all.)

4Real Learning Preschool through 8th grade.

Living Math This is similar to MacBeth's website except that it focuses solely on living math books. Click on the sidebar to find the many booklists. I highly recommend looking into using math literature in your homes.

Even More Online Reading Lists

Even more online reading lists. Keep in mind that these are not Catholic lists, so use your good judgement.

Five in a Row Great reading list for grade school, whether you use the Five in a Row curriculum or not.

Before Five in a Row Literature list for preschool.

Beyond Five in a Row For upper grade school years.

Sonlight Books and The Well Trained Mind Sonlight books arranged by TWTM's four-year history cycles.

Tomorrow, I'll have yet more online reading lists.

More Online Reading Lists

More cool reading lists online:

100 Good Book List Reading list for adults. Provided by the Classical Christian Education Support Loop.

1000 Good Book List John Senior's reading list for primary school through high school. Provided by the Classical Christian Education Support Loop.

A Child's Reading List Provided by Eagle Forum. Sorted by reading level within genre.

Reading Your Way through History Alicia Van Hecke's terrific chronological reading list. A must see for Catholic homeschoolers! (Note: This website is currently under some serious construction and may be down momentarily.)

Seton Home Study School Seton's list of great books, for K to 8th grade, to supplement their Catholic home study school. Scroll down and click on "reading lists."

I'll have even more for you tomorrow.

Online Reading Lists

Continuing this thread on books, here are a couple of online reading lists that you all may enjoy:

The Ultimate Reading List – Classics That Endure
June 1997 Education Reporter.

Ten Books Every Student Should Read in College