Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Books to read to gifted 4yo

We were just looking today through some of DD6's "little" books So many awesome ones, but Sparkle and Spin stood out to me as being so nice and 'languagey' we just had to read it again right then. It's by Ann and Paul Rand

By 4 my daughter was heavily into all the Roald Dahl books and the Harry Potter series. Absolutely loved them. Most nights she'd sneak her light on again after we finished reading aloud to her, and read ahead in the books.

Anything by Oliver Jeffers!
Violet the Pilot
Curious George
Corduroy
Elephant and Piggie
Mercy Watson series
Dodsworth in [New York] series
Ladybug Girl and Bumblebee Boy
Fantastic Flying Books for Mr Morris Lessmore
Animalia
The insomniacs
Poppleton Series
Clementine Series
Harry Potter
Magic School Bus
Harold and the Purple Crayon
Danny and the Dinosaur
Neville
The Curious Garden
Shrinking Violet
The Cloud Spinner
Extra Yarn
I Want My Hat Back
Red Knit Cap Girl
Lemony Snicket Series of Unfortunate Events

Have fun!

And how could I forget William Joyce!

My DD loved The All of a KInd Family series at that age, especially because the youngest sister was also 4 in the first book. Same with the first in the Ramona series. She loved having a character her age. I strongly second the Shoe books. They are really wonderful. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James and the Giant Peach and Peter Pan were also big hits. We waited until she was 7 for the Harry Potter books but then they were huge favorites. I I would not have been comfortable doing them with a 4 year old.

If you are reading aloud you can still do some editing if needed. We went through a lot of the classics on audio books but there is a lot of racist language, death and violence it would have been nice to edit out if we were reading them aloud instead. Especially Doctor Doolittle.

Thanks everyone! Some fantastic ideas here!! Someone at work suggested the Enid Blyton faraway tree series and I hadn't considered them before because my son only discovered them when he was 6 (and quickly read the lot)! So we started with that last night and she is loving it. It is her first book without pictures other than Alice in Wonderland which we have listened to as an audiobook on our long commute to school pickup (my son is in an autism unit about 30mins away).

I told her when we started that there aren't any pictures but the words help you to make pictures in your head. She kind of brushed me off and said "don't worry mum, I can make pictures with my imagination!" She has asked me to read chapters at times other than bedtime, retelling bits of the story to her brother and asking in depth questions as we go, so it seems like it is the right level for her.

She will be starting school herself next term so will have lots of readers and picture books that she can borrow then. So I will focus on chapter books I think.

My current favorite book for precocious little girls is Fanny by Holly Hobbie. It deals wonderfully with many issues little kids face, such as being different, being left out, and not getting what you want from your parents. Fanny takes thing into her own hands, solving her own problems. But the best part, is I used this book to introduce my DD to the concept of recursion.

Of course, my all time favorite book to read is Wet Dog by Elise Broach. It's really a fun to read poem combined with amazing illustrations by David Catrow (who I think has become by wife's favorite illustrator... which is really saying something if you knew my wife and her artistic capabilities).

Uh, yeah, I'll bite! You didn't read to them when they couldn't read??

Suggestions:

Catwings
Jenny and the Cat Club
The Moomin series by Tove Jansson
My Father's Dragon
Pippi Longstocking

Enid Blyton's "the magic faraway tree" is what we are reading to our 4 year old (well when he lets us read instead of taking the book from us! lol )