I was listening to a podcast the other day and I heard a startling fact: There are over 1,000,000 books published each year in English worldwide, which means 3,000 – 5,000 books are published per day!
With that many books to choose from, how do we decide what to read next? Which books are going to sweep us away to a magical adventure? Which books are going to introduce us to characters that become lifelong friends? Which books will make us think, face hard realities and change the way we view the world? As a reader, I know books have the power to change my life. And as an educator, I know it’s my privilege to share that idea with others, especially teachers and students.
As a voracious reader who loves gathering new titles for her To-Be-Read TBR stack, I love talking books with anyone who will listen. And not just adult books, but children’s literature, too. I truly believe that all readers should carve out a special place on their To-Be-Read (TBR) stack for children’s literature. These books not only delight and entertain, but they help us see the world from a new perspective and bring a great deal of insight to our lives as adults.
Over the years, I’ve developed a master list of children’s literature selections that I believe every reader needs to devour, especially educators . This list changes based on our changing world and the newly-published books available, but ultimately captures a wide, rich, diverse selection of texts for adult readers. And I recommend them often.
At this point, I’ve curated a collection of 100 books across a variety of reading levels, genres and formats, from picture books, early readers and historical fiction to fantasy, graphic novels and young adult novels. Reading this particular set of books will help adult readers make wise choices about the children’s literature titles they add to their TBR stack so they can mind their reading gaps, experience books in a new way and ideally, share their newfound titles with the younger readers in their lives to build connection and community.
So, without further ado, here are 100 children’s literature books every teacher (and adult reader!) should read to broaden their breadth and depth of understanding of children’s literature, deepen their reading life and see the possibilities for their own classroom libraries. Now, this list is NOT exhaustive. In fact, I could have kept going to recommend the 1,000 books every teacher should read, but we need to start somewhere, right?
And while I curated this list on my own, it wasn’t without hours of reading, talking and sharing books with others. So, I’d love to hear what you think! What children’s literature titles do you think every adult reader and teacher should read and why?
