<p>I should have mentioned Treasure Island and Kidnapped, too. And *Ivanhoe<a href=“right%20after%20%5Bi%5DKnight’s%20Castle%5B/i%5D,%20of%20course,%20although%20Edward%20Eager%20probably%20never%20imagined%20that%20anyone%20would%20read%20%5Bi%5Dhis%5B/i%5D%20first”>/i</a>.</p>
<p>Ooh, can’t believe I forgot the Moomintrolls. Unfortunately, my daughter never cared for them…but I still read them. I also loved, as did she, the Green Knowe books by L.M. Boston.</p>
<p>When very young Pat the Bunny, The Telephone Book, ** and *Make Way for Ducklings! *Also, can’t remember the title, but all the military ranks in a poem with each one doing something new, reapeat, and last line was and “Private _ fired it off!”</p>
<p>My D loved The Boxcar Children series. She preferred it to The Bobsey Twins, but liked both. She also loved an English series called The Adventures of Tim. It has large type and wonderful illustrations.</p>
<p>My D and I still love mysteries…and her favorites when young were The Westing Game and The Mysterious Disappearance of Leon (I Mean Noel). </p>
<p>Charlotte’s Web was wonderful, but IMO, The Trumpet of the Swan was even better. </p>
<p>Another not yet mentioned Caps for Sale.</p>
<p>Dahl was a favorite. Of his my D liked*Danny, The Champion of the World *, Boy and Going Solobest.</p>
<p>Nobody’s mentioned Zilpha Keatley Snyder–my D and I both loved her books. My favorite was The Egypt Game. She liked it but preferred The Headless Cupid and *Black and Blue Magic.*There are many more–she liked all of them. </p>
<p>Nobody’s mentioned Beverly Cleary yet either. Ramona was so much fun! A kid who is just a kid, not a goodie two-shoes, not supersmart or very talented. Just a kid. </p>
<p>There were so many great ones!</p>
<p>Mathson loved Snyder’s fantasy trilogy Below the Root, And All Between,and* Until the Celebration*. His class read The Egypt Game in 4th grade, but he didn’t like it nearly as well. </p>
<p>I loved Boy and Going Solo. Kind of explains why those Dahl books are so strange!</p>
<p>Probably too many to mention, but some: Dr. Seuss, Sylvester and the Magic Pebble, I can’t take you anywhere, The Ordinary Princess, Little House, Charlotte’s Web, Betsy books, You Forgot your skirt Amelia Bloomer, Blueberries for Sal, Where the Wild THings Are, Lily’s Purple Plastic Purse, Rainbow Fish, Harry Potter, Inkspell, Phantom Tollbooth, Mary Jemison Indian Captive, Amazing Grace, Mufaro’s daughters, Mixed up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler</p>
<p>Anyone else a fan of “The Secret World of Og”?</p>
<p>Big time faves:</p>
<p>Madeline books (“in an old house in Paris that was covered with vines lived 12 little girls in two straight lines…” I can recite half that book)</p>
<p>Eloise at the Plaza</p>
<p>Shel Silverstein poems</p>
<p>British classics by E Nesbit</p>
<p>‘His Dark Materials’ trilogy by Pullman</p>
<p>I was really into many of the series books as a girl…Nancy Drew, Trixie Beldon, Connie Blair (was she the one with a color in every title?), plus older ones that were already “classics” at that time, such as the Boxcar Children and Bobbsey Twins. The summer that I was nine, I decided I should read every Newberry winner, so I did, and then made it a point to read each new one all through my school years. I think A Wrinkle in Time was my favorite of those, though Island of the Blue Dolphins was a close second.</p>
<p>The first book I remember loving was Charlotte’s Web. I had afternoon kindergarten but actually faked being sick one day so my mom would let me stay home. She never did know that it was just so I could finish my book. She came in to check on me just as I finished, and since I was crying, she was convinced that I really didn’t feel well at all.</p>
<p>My own girls loved the Little House and Narnia books. Their favorite learning to read book was Chicka Chicka Boom Boom.</p>
<p>Oh, and I’ll second all of Beverly Cleary’s books–favorites for two generations in my family.</p>
<p>It was driving me nuts…the book I was trying to think of is *Drummer Hoff<a href=“who” title=“fired it off!”>/I</a> </p>
<p>How did I ever forget to list Phantom Tollbooth?</p>
<p>Just cheated and looked at a list. Others I forgot: Julie of the Wolves, Carry On, Mr. Bowditch, The Cricket in Times Square, Shiloh, The Callendar Papers, The Summer of the Swans, and Hello, God, It’s Me, Margaret</p>
<p>I forgot to mention 2 of my own childhood favorites - The Pink Motel and Gone Away Lake. They’re both old and not many people seem to be familiar with them but I loved them when I was a kid. I re-read them as an adult and was less impressed with The Pink Motel, but still loved Gone Away Lake. D was not the least bit interested in them - very sad.</p>
<p>LIMOM, I bet there’s still an old copy of The Pink Motel in my attic. Whenever I see a perfectly tanned individual, I wonder if her mom told her to sun for fifteen minutes on each side.</p>
<p>My older D liked it; younger D read the first chapter, but that was it.</p>
<p>"Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day "</p>
<p>OH MY GOD. favorite children’s book ever!! i remeber reading it at the library in 3th grade…i can still quote from it…</p>
<p>In art class, mr. blank liked another guy’s picture of a sailboat better than my picture of an invisible castle!!!</p>
<p>Both my D’s can recite, word for word, The Story of Ferdinand, by Munro Leaf, it was a favorite for both of them, and we just showed their much younger cousins the Disney short of the story…smell the flowers!</p>
<p>Ferdinand! One of my favorites!</p>
<p>Also, another book I associate with it – The Boy Who Ate Flowers.</p>
<p>I loved Ferdinand
also Leo the Late Bloomer</p>
<p>Also many Frances books
Bread & Jam for Frances was a niece in a nutshell.</p>
<p>“I had afternoon kindergarten but actually faked being sick one day so my mom would let me stay home. She never did know that it was just so I could finish my book.”</p>
<p>Sorry to divert the thread, but this drove me nuts when I was in elementary school, and it still does. The girl who wants to read skips school, because at school they take her books away and tell her to stop reading so much! If elementary schools were filling that time with something more valuable, this would make sense, but they don’t. The boy who can’t bear to put the book down is going to educate himself just fine…snatching his books away will only slow him down. Hey, teachers, leave those kids alone!</p>
<p>Applause for Hannah! Let’s hear it for the independent reader! </p>
<p>I learned more from the books I read on my own than I was ever taught. The best teachers were the ones who gave me the textbooks and then let me read what I wanted to. Since I got A’s on the tests (and scored off the charts on the NY State Regent Boards – not math!) without paying attention in class, they didn’t hassle me. The teachers who told me to <em>not</em> to read ahead were the worst! Okay, not as bad as the teachers who wanted us to read the books out loud. That was torture…listening to the other kids spell their way through books that I’d already read. Agony…I couldn’t sit still for it. Best thing that ever happened was getting skipped up to High School out of Middle School. More teachers who left me alone to get on with it and a much bigger library!</p>
<p>ReneeV - I ended up buying The Pink Motel online because I had borrowed it from the library and misplaced it. Since the book was out of print, I felt like I should make an effort to replace it. I ended up finding the library’s copy too, so now I am also the proud owner of The Pink Motel…lol. I think mine has a different cover than yours though. My D refused to read it because it seemed like a “happy” book. She discovered Roald Dahl in first grade and went over to the dark side as far as books are concerned…lol.</p>
<p>corranged - sorry, but I accidentally posted more favorite books on the other thread about books that made us cringe.</p>
<p>Some of my kids’ favorites …
Harold and the Purple Crayon
A Wrinkle in Time
The Phantom Tollbooth
The Mixed Up Files …
Bridge to Terabithia
Number the Stars
Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of Nimh
My Father’s Dragon (series)
Yertle the Turtle and Sneetches (Dr. Seuss)
The Twenty-One Balloons</p>
<p>Some of my favorites:
all the Dr. Dolittle books
all the Lad-a-Dog books
My Friend Flicka
A Wrinkle in Time
The Phantom Tollbooth
all the Pippi Longstocking books</p>
<p>another book I spent hours with when I was little…The Red Balloon. My kids never cared for it all that much, though. :(</p>