What's the best read-aloud you've done with your dc?

[thescrappyhomeschooler]

So far, my kids have liked best:

 

The Trumpet of the Swan

The Penderwicks and The Penderwicks on Gardam Street (we listened to this one in the car)

Smells Like Dog

[nmoira]

A few I don't think have been mentioned: :)

 

Here Be Monsters by Alan Snow (ability to do voices is a must)

The Little Grey Men by BB (we loved the sequel, Down the Bright Stream, as well)

The Night of Wishes by Michael Ende

The Magic Pudding by Norman Lindsay

Sea of Trolls trilogy by Nancy Farmer

Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Salman Rushdie

anything by Padraic Colum

The Rose and the Ring by Thackeray (get an edition with Thackeray's illustrations and preferably the couplets that run across the tops of the pages. University Microfilms is a good edition.)

 

Plus perennial favourites Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, and Roald Dahl (especially The Twits and The BFG).

 

ETA: and The Dog Who Wouldn't Be by Farley Mowat.

Edited September 26, 2010 by nmoira

[shanvan]

Owls in the Family, by Farley Mowat.

 

I remember that book in particular because it is the only one that the kids wouldn't let me stop reading until it was done.

 

We loved this one too!

 

[Merry]

Freddy the Pig Goes to Florida

Alice in Wonderland

[mammaruss]

Red Sails to Capri

Rascal

Hatchet

The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate

[Jlynn]

Watership Down was our all time favorite that we compare everything else to.

 

The Hobbit comes in a close second...and some other fun ones were:

 

Mysterious Benedict Society

Detectives in Togas

Freddy the Detective

 

He's an 11yr old 6th grader and we still read aloud...using the Sonlight and WTM lists

[Jilly]

Our favorites would be Bambi, Five Children and It, The Magician's Elephant, and The Twenty-One Balloons.

 

[Imprimis]

In addition to many of those already mentioned, my kids and I also enjoyed:

The Sherwood Ring

A Murder for Her Majesty

White Stallions of Lipizza

[HRAAB]

Our no. 1, all time favorite read aloud (and mom's favorite to read aloud) is The Wind in the Willows. It is just so beautiful. Love it. Also, The Hobbit, Mr Popper's Penguins, Narnia, and probably a bunch more I can't think of right now.

[shanvan]

Understood Betsy

Rebbecca of Sunnybrook Farm

Doctor Doolittle

Smoky the Cowhorse

Cobblestreet Cousins: In Aunt Lucy's Kitchen

 

and all of the Mr. Putter and Tabby books ( I still love these too even though they are more beginning readers!)

[bettyandbob]

I haven't read any responses. But I would never call Charlotte's Web a good read aloud. I picked the wrong child to read it too. But I didn't know that until the Charlotte died. It was awful. My child didn't want me to read anything again, ever (well we did get over that).

[Mommyfaithe]

I just wanted to add that my kids are loving Shadow Spinner and they really enjoyed Beowulf!

I have looked on Amazon and a lot of these are in the buy 3 get the 4th free offer!

 

I read my kids Beowulf...in the dark during a blackout with a flashlight and candlelit room...with a fire in the hearth. It was so creepy! And so much fun. This was a real memory!

 

We also loved :

Little House series

Narnia Series

Mary Poppins

Beatrix Potter stories

A Wrinkle in Time

Pilgrim's Progress

Hinds Feet on High Places

 

~~faithe

[AngieW in Texas]

All three of my girls said the best book I ever read aloud to them was The Sherwood Ring by Elizabeth Marie Pope.

[shanvan]

I read my kids Beowulf...in the dark during a blackout with a flashlight and candlelit room...with a fire in the hearth. It was so creepy! And so much fun. This was a real memory!

 

We also loved :

Little House series

Narnia Series

Mary Poppins

Beatrix Potter stories

A Wrinkle in Time

Pilgrim's Progress

Hinds Feet on High Places

 

~~faithe

 

How could I forget Beatrix Potter! Even my 12 yr old DS stills loves to hear her stories! :thumbup:

[Caroline]

I remember my mom reading Heidi, All of a Kind Family, Five Little Peppers, Little Women, and Taffy of Torpedo Junction. I actually remember her reading a lot of books, those are just a few of my favorites.

 

My kids have enjoyed The Hobbit, Peter Pan, Wind in the Willows, Charlotte's Web, and Little House in the Big Woods.

 

(I was tempted to say Captain Underpants and Junie B Jones, but I refrained.:lol:)

[KuniMom]

One of the many favorites of my kids are the YWAM Christian Heroes books. Especially the missionary stories. They always end the chapter in a way that wants you to read the next one.

[LaissezFaire]

Top fave ever was The Sign of the Beaver.

[6packofun]

We loved The Doll People, too!

 

2 others that were big hits were Trumpet of the Swan (I didn't think they'd love this one as much as they did!) and Jotham's Journey for Advent.

 

Fantastic Mr. Fox; The Series of Unfortunate Events...uh, series, read by dh; The Mysterious Benedict Society; Harriet the Spy and Ralph S. Mouse.

 

We loved The Skeleton Man and The Return of Skeleton Man by Joseph Bruchac for fun, scary, read-in-the-dark times in the fall! Not quality literature, obviously, but fun at Halloween.

 

Also, the Chet Gecko books. LOL Our favorites tend to be the funny, less classic ones. ;)

Edited September 27, 2010 by 6packofun
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[Miss Sherry]

There have been quite a few over the years but with the holidays coming up, some that we've read at Christmas time have been :

 

Jotham's Journey : A Storybook for Advent.

 

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. We enjoyed the book and it was very humorous but I thought the movie was boring.

 

A Christmas Carol After I read this book aloud to my daughter she liked watching a couple of versions of the movie and pointing out what parts in the movies were different from the book.

 

Some other favorites when my older children were young were

Charlotte's Web

The Chronicles of Narnia (their favorite but not my favorite )

The Little House Books. My two oldest loved these books but my youngest did not. She likes something with more adventure and mystery in the plot, such as Nancy Drew (the old editions) or Sherlock Holmes.

When she was little, my youngest daughter liked Paddington Bear and Pooh Bear books.

 

My youngest daughter loved all of the Anne of Green Gables books and Little Women, but I didn't read them aloud. But I think they would be good as read alouds.

 

My son liked Pilgrim's Progress.

 

Beatrix Potter was a favorite when my children were little.

Edited September 27, 2010 by Miss Sherry

[Miss Sherry]

I haven't read any responses. But I would never call Charlotte's Web a good read aloud. I picked the wrong child to read it too. But I didn't know that until the Charlotte died. It was awful. My child didn't want me to read anything again, ever (well we did get over that).

Ahhh, some children are very sensitive to sad or terrible events in books.

When my daughter was pretty young - I don't remember now how old she was - she got very upset when I started to read the American Girl Abbey books to her because there was a part about a black man who was a slave and he was beaten by his owner. I think it was Abbeys father. It upset her so much that she didn't want to read the rest of the Abbey books and I had just purchased the set. But she did like the Molly and Kirsten books.

[Ellie]

Our top favorites:

 

Understood Betsy, The Little White Horse, and The Chestry Oak

 

There were so many more that we enjoyed, but those were our top three. (I'm reading Understood Betsy to myself right now. :) )

[Mabeline]

One I rarely see included on these lists is The Real Thief by William Steig. One of my very, very favorites to read aloud...

 

 

Can you believe my library only has this book in Spanish and Korean?:confused:

I will keep looking for this book.

[Shawneinfl]

My favorites to read aloud are The Tale of Despereaux and The Great Turkey Walk. Both make for doing great voices for each character.

[jujsky]

We spent last year reading the entire Harry Potter series. Those were by far the best read-alouds we've done :)

[MariannNOVA]

By far, the read aloud we are doing right now, OUT OF MY MIND by Sharon Draper has been the BEST!

 

Until now, it was PETEY by Ben Mikaelson -- granted, I cried aloud while reading a couple of the chapters and so did the kids, but it was an excellent story with so many lessons and discussion topics.

 

We read PETEY just before our current read-aloud -- Daisy (I think) told us all here about OOMM, and I am so grateful to her.

 

PETEY and OOMM make an excellent unit for upper elementary/junior high -- Petey is born in the 1920s with cerebral palsy and lives most of his life in an insane asylum owing to the lack of knowledge at that time regarding CP. Melody is an 11 year old in 2009 or 2010 with CP and a wonderful family. We literally stumbled upon these two books, and they have been the BEST.

[Laurie4b]

Lord of the Rings. I read it to each of them when they hit age 8.

[Kathleen in VA]

My BOYS love the whole Little House/Ingalls series.

 

My BOYS loved them too - especially Farmer Boy and The Long Winter.

 

And also Dominic by the same author. We have the audiobook and have worn it out on car trips.

 

Dominic was a favorite here too.

 

Mine also loved:

 

The Thirteen Clocks by James Thurber (just plain silliness and fun)

Understood Betsy

Carry On, Mr. Bowditch

The Ghost of Opalina by Peggy Bacon (out-of-print, unfortunately)

Stuart LIttle

Paddle-to-the-Sea

Wheel on the School

The Gammage Cup

Justin Morgan Had a Horse

Freddy and the Men from Mars

[Merry]

Right now we are reading Freddy and the Detective...I think I'm hooked on that series:) My ds likes them a lot too...

[Miss Sherry]

.........

Fantastic Mr. Fox......... ;)

Is the movie "The Fantastic Mr. Fox" based on the book ? I've never read the book but we saw the movie and it was fun.

[nmoira]

Is the movie "The Fantastic Mr. Fox" based on the book ? I've never read the book but we saw the movie and it was fun.

It is true to the spirit of the book, though the film's plot is more elaborate. We're big fans of both.

[Hedgehogs4]

ralph moody--little britches series. love it. can't put it down.

[lllll]

..

[Kidlit]

My girls love, love, love the Little House books, so those are definitely favorites. They've also enjoyed Betsy-Tacy and the sequel, Betsy-Tacy and Tib. We're reading Pinky Pye right now, and it's a hit. FYI-- I host Read Aloud Thursday on my blog every week. If you blog ( and if you don't!), I'd love for you to stop by sometime and link up your own Read Aloud Thursday post or just comment. My blog link is in my siggy.

[nukeswife]

I've tried many times to read Little House in the Big Woods and my kids never let me get to far in before asking for something else. Is there something about that one that is different? I've heard the other ones are all much better.

 

One of my kids favorites was George's Marvelous Medicine, they didn't want me to stop. They also really liked McBroom's Wonderful One Acre Farm, and Bunnicula. After I read the first in the Bunnicula Series, my oldest read Howliday Inn, The Celery Stalks at Midnight, and Return to Howliday Inn to his younger sister and brother. They own all 7 of the books as audiobooks and listen to them over and over again at night.

 

I can't wait until we conquer the Harry Potter series starting next year. Right now we're reading The Capture: The Guardians of Ga'Hoole, and so far so good.

[LibraryLover]

For older kids, Sea of Trolls is quite exciting.

[Alphabetika]

I LOVED reading them The Wolves Chronicles by Joan Aiken (starts with Wolves of Willoughby Chase) and the Swallows and Amazons series. Those two are probably my favorite. I also loved reading The Borrowers series and the Betsy-Tacy series.