I'm just curious about when your early readers started on real (i.e., not Amanda Pig or Frog and Toad type) chapter books.

My DD (just turned 4) reads very, very well, and has been able to read at at least a 4th grade level for 6 months or so. But, with a few exceptions, she prefers to read books with pictures on every page. I wouldn't mind, and really I don't mind, but she reads in the car on our weekly drive into town and it's gotten to the point where I can bring a stack of twenty books and she'll read them all before we're even there. And then she wants to talk to me the whole way home (which isn't really possible due to our noisy old car) and gets angry when I can't hear what she's saying.

So, basically, I'm wondering if anyone else has had a very fluent early reader who was reluctant to read chapter books, and if so, when it finally happened and, especially, what books were big hits. Just to be perfectly clear, I'm not hoping that she'll give up picture books at all. I just wish she'd read chapter books on trips. I think it'd significantly reduce the frustration level on Mondays.

I'm wondering if there's a way that you can listen to chapter books on tape or CD in the car. Could she hear your car stereo? Or do you have a some higher-tech device that she could listen to with headphones? Or a tape-player with rechargeable batteries that she could have next to her in the back seat?

Nope. Like I said, the noise level is really high already. To hear anything at all, it has to be _really_ loud, and I don't think that'd be safe for her little ear drums. I suppose noise-canceling headphones might work, but we totally can't afford them.

The first books my dd, now 5, enjoyed were the Magic Treehouse books.

She had the ability to read them at the age of 3.

However, she still much preferred to have us read them to her. She said there were too many words on the page and her eyes got tired.

Honestly, it took until recently for her to want to pick up and read a lengthier chapter book although she's been able to read at that level for quite some time.

I think her eyes had to catch up with her brain.

Oh, and she also loved the Daisy Meadows Fairy Books. There are dozens of them. But she's a self-described "Friend of the fairies" ... so it was a natural fit.

Not sure if that helps.

Yes, that helps, Irish. It hadn't really even occurred to me that it might be her eyes, because she reads small print beautifully. But I suppose there might be something to that.

Magic Treehouse, unfortunately, is a no go. We did try them a few months ago, but she didn't enjoy them at all, though they are easy for her to read. She didn't even want to listen to us read them after the first couple of chapters, which is rare around this house. But I will check out the fairy books.

At 4, DS loved the Magic School Bus chapter books. The font is a decent size and there are pictures every few pages.

He also read several of the Junie B. books (like mentioned earlier) and the Stink series (Junie B's little brother). These too have enough pictures to keep kids entertained.

Too bad, the Magic Tree House series was popular with our DS at age 4!

It took a while and a number of those step readers before DS actually had the endurance to read a chapter book. He had the reading ability long before he had the endurance/patience. Good luck!

Thanks, cricket. I've put Flat Stanley on hold. It looks really cute. We do non-fiction as well as fiction, and these days it's mostly non-fiction because DD has read most of our library's selection of picture-book and easy-reader fiction within her reading level. It's awfully hard to find non-fiction that's not too easy but not too boring, though. We usually end up with a bunch of books that are so easy that DD breezes right through them and a few books that are hard enough that she just looks at the pictures and doesn't bother reading. Sigh. She did go through a map stage, which was lovely in the car, but she's over it (for) now.

I've been avoiding these because they're based on a TV show (aren't they?). Would they make sense to someone who's never seen the show?

http://www.scholastic.com/magicschoolbus/books/

Our DS read the books before he ever saw the tv show. The show certainly isn't a prerequisite to the books.

There are a few different levels of Magic School Bus books with the "science chapter" books being the longest and most complex.

I wonder if you could get some of the easier (non-chapter) Magic School Bus books to get her hooked and then present her with the chapter books. That might help bridge the gap.

Not sure if other series offer the same span of ability level books.

My Son LOVES the Franny K. Stein Series. They are chapter books and are leveled at ages 7-10. They also happen to have pictures on every page! My son also enjoys pictures and didn't really enjoy chapter books very much because of lack of pictures. (i didn't realize this until I got the Franny books). He reads these books better than the other chapter books he was reading that were at a lower level. He is five and also reads them to my 4 year old who also loves to hear his brother read them.

Magic School Bus books were around before the TV show. My D2 loved them when she was on the cusp of reading chapter books. Although she really accelerated rapidly. Went from books with a lot of pictures (Magic School Bus, Frog & Toad) to Lord of the Rings in about a year... I wouldn't worry too much if I were you Just keep visiting the library, she will find her way. And also keep reading aloud. I still read aloud to D2 even though she is 14 years old (just finished Dune, and we are on to Sense and Sensibility now).

Aw, you guys are awesome. Thanks for all the tips.

When DD6 was reading chapter books she liked, junie b jones (ugg) and Ivy & Bean, the magic kitten series, the magic puppy series, the magic ballet shoes, all the disney fairy books, she's a girly girl, she also went though many of the American Girl books, and loves these, I liked them because there's a bit of history to be learned and their wholesome. She really loves the self help type ones or the ones that have information to share. hope the helps

You might also try some drawing or a leapster in the car. I reccomend ed emberly books for drawing. He has a web site with lots of drawings and projects. magnetic activites like tanagrams are fun too.

How about the "Pony Crazed Princess" series or the "Weather Fairies" series or the "Jewel Fairies" series. Also, the "Clementine" series is great, as is the "Just Grace" series and the "Ivy and Bean" series. "Violet Bing" is good, too. They have a "Nancy Drew and the Clue Crew" series and a "Nancy Drew Notebook" series. And, I second the American Girl Books recommendation - each book is fiction with a non-fiction section and they all have beautiful illustrations.

Oh, my gosh, yes. The Jewel Fairy books. D2 was addicted. Even spent her own money on them. And Junie B Jones (agree with the ugh!), but she loved them. The Boxcar Children (the first one) is a book without pictures, but with a fairly simple story that might catch your D's attention. D'Aulaires Book of Greek Myths was another favorite at that level. How about Catswings, by Ursula Le Guin. And I don't know any early reader who is not taken with the My Father's Dragon series by Ruth Stiles Gannett.

You are lucky to have a reader who likes to read! Our DS6 was always a sneaky reader, and it's rare that he wants to read to us or for long by himself. He has tested very high with his reading skills, but he's always preferred us reading to him. I have caught him reading Geronimo Stilton chapter books. These are fun chapter books with lots of pictures and different fonts. He also likes the DK readers, which have several levels and topics of interest (DS likes Star Wars).

As an aside, he told me a couple of weeks ago that he hates reading aloud, since it takes too long. He prefers to read silently to himself.

Thanks for all the new book ideas DS5 won't read chapter books but I keep looking for that one that catches his interest enough to get him to read it.
We do stock up on higher lvl picture books as well as interesting non-fiction - preferably space, dinosaurs, and the human body (especially blood right now, lol).
He loves to listen to Young Cam Jansen, Bones (same author), Stink, Flat Stanley, Dinosaur Cove, Magic School Bus (chapter books), etc.
He'll only read books with pictures so I think to ease him into it we will have him read 1 chapter each day of a book and then talk about what he read.
We're reading the Happy Hollisters to both kids at bedtime and they do seem to enjoy it (I wanted a longer book to see if DD could sit through and follow 1 chapter a night).

I second the recommendations for Catwings, Magic Schoolbus, and Cam Jansen. My girls also enjoyed Cobble Street Cousins at age 3/4, and Pony Pals. Of course this is irrelevant if she reads easily in small bites, but can't process whole pages.

I suspect it may be that large blocks of text make tracking difficult for your dd. This can change as she grows, or she may benefit from vision therapy.

Have you tried the Geronimo Stilton books? They are chapter books (about 3rd grade level), but they have large text, interesting fonts, and pictures on every page. They're the first chapter books my DS would read at that age. They just weren't as intimidating as a regular chapter book. He quickly transitioned to regular chapter books after this. You can take a look at a few pages of the book on Amazon to see the format.

http://www.amazon.com/Race-Across-A...=1265893931&sr=8-1#reader_0545021375

I tried one Geronimo Stilton book but it was borrowed from the library. I think if I buy one and leave it in his room it may get picked up and looked at.

We borrowed Bad Kitty Gets a Bath the other day and he was very interested and reading it until he 'realized' it was really a chapter book. Silly boy!!!

DD 2.11 is not reading chapter books by herself yet, although I bet she will be by that age since she is reading fairly well now....anyway, she loves having the Mercy Watson books read to her. i think there are 6 right now, and they have a lot of pics. They are about 70 pages long. Hope you find something.

CourtneyB - this is a suggestion for your ds5, not for the younger child of the original poster.

If you're not opposed to a little potty talk, I would suggest getting the Captain Underpants series of chapter books. As you can imagine, there is quite a bit of bathroom humor, which I am normally against. However, a little boy we carpool with (also 5) really turned the corner on reading when he came into contact with these books. They are chapter books, but most chapters are short and they also have pictures. And there's something that seems to contraband about them, that some kids just eat them up. The author is Dav Pilkey.

I wouldn't suggest them to everyone, but since I saw your ds5 enjoyed Stink (something we also enjoy), he might really like these. Check one out the next time you're at the library and see what you think. I wouldn't be surprised if you left it somewhere in his room, if he picked it up to see what it was all about.

If it's not in your comfort zone, please disregard

Have you tried Astrid Lindgren books

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Astrid+Lindgren&x=0&y=0

for that age Pippi Longstocking, Emil and Children of noisy village might be good. I think there are few version of the books with more or less pictures.

This was on another thread a while back but what worked for us was sharing chapters. DS chose left or right and I read the opposing page. After a month or so, he decided the process was too slow and moved on without me.

I'll have to grab one tomorrow and see what he thinks. He's 'pretty' good about not saying things he shouldn't (even when he hears them at school) so I'm not too worried. I'm sure we'll have a few talks about it but maybe it will interest him, lol

Another book I need to grab is the 2nd Dinosaur Cove book as he seemed to really enjoy the 1st one and it had a decent amount of pictures.

no5no5,
the magic school bus books are complete stories and not books about a tv show, though there is a show that exists. They are high quality book, both the picture books and the chapter books, and my children both liked them very much. I would just totally go with what your child picks, and not try ot move up to chapter books before they are seeking them out. I did this with my kids and i regret it. I recently brought it up with my DS7 and he said that he read chapter books when he was 5 because i "talked him into it".. i felt so bad. I did it with the best of intentions and i did think he enjoyed them. But what he remembers is that he did not pick them himself. He has alsways loved complex picture books like Graeme Base and the quality is amazing. Some chapter books are really poorly written and not that interesting.

irene

Aww. I still pick out most of DD's books for her, but I do make an effort to stay (or at least appear) neutral as to what she reads. Fortunately (or not, lol) she has the sort of personality where I can't talk her into anything she doesn't want. She does pick out real chapter books on her own, but rarely reads more than a few pages. (The one exception is the first chapter of Sideways Stories from Wayside School, which, to my chagrin, she's read almost to the point of total memorization.) And she loves, and has loved for months & months, some of the easy reader "chapter" books like Amanda Pig and Fly Guy. (But of course she can read one of those books in five or ten minutes, and there are pictures on every page, so I don't even think of them as chapter books.)

I will definitely check out the Magic School Bus books. Yay for another option. We already read & love Graeme Base and I make an effort to get a few of the more challenging picture books every time we visit the library.

I still pick books for D2, and she is 14! Yesterday she asked me to walk through the adult fiction section and the library and pick some stuff for her. Which I did. So you may be doing that for a long time... In fact, I now remember that D2 had a VERY hard time picking her own books until she was about 10.

I agree about not pushing the chapter books too hard. If you read chapter books aloud, that will help draw you child's interest. D2 was HOOKED on Harry Potter when I read it to her starting at about 3. Finally bought her the tapes after too many readings! She actually read chapter books fairly late for a gifted child... end of first grade. But as I mentioned earlier, she accelerated VERY rapidly once she hit her stide.

My ds9 is also a reluctant book-selector, not sure why. Once he is hooked on a book or series however, he just devours them.
I will pick books and try to get him interested by having him try one chapter or reading a bit out loud.

My ds was also keenly interested in books with pictures, still is, frankly. We had an intermediate phase between picture books and chapter books where he was reading a lot of manga, and other books that are like comic books, captain underpants (franny k. stein is a good one like this, lots of pictures, but more appealing to girls, funny, etc.). Few words on a page, but lots more pages!!
I think lots of words on a page were sort of daunting to my ds at the time.

Come to think of it, I'm 30 and I still take my mom's book recommendations. I wouldn't have done it when I was 14, though.

Now I remember that D2 was also reluctant to read chapter books (it was several years ago!). I just kept helping her check a pile out of the library, and read her some books that I thought she could read herself. I would try to stop reading while she still wanted more... Then I would make sure to leave the book next to her bed. It took several months, but eventually she got tired of waiting for me and started reading ahead on her own. It was sort of like training wheels

I just want to say thank you, thank you, thank you for educating me about the Magic School Bus books. DD loves them, and she spent a good fifteen minutes in the car today totally immersed in just one book.

One down, 19 to go . . .

You could have been describing my five-year-old. Something has changed recently, and she can now eat those Fairy Books. Example: she started one last night for bedtime reading and finished it this morning. I had to run out and get the next one in the series, and we're halfway through it already.

We take turns reading pages out loud, though sometimes she just barrels ahead to a page that should be mine. She can now read a page almost as quickly as I can, but there's still some kind of fatigue thing going on. For example, she starts missing easy words (and, her) after she's been reading for a half-hour or so.

Nono5, have you tried giving your DD Level 3 or 4 DK Readers? They have lots of pictures. Other random DK books can be captivating even if you don't read them word-for-word.

Val

I don't know if I've seen any DK readers, but I'll keep an eye out. We've done the DK Eyewitness books. For a while, DD was asking for five or more of them each time we went to the library.

CourtneyB,

Have you tried the Ricky Ricotta's Mighty Robot series? It is a chapter book but has only a few sentences per page, has a picture on every page, and has a cool flip-o-rama section in every book. Each book involves Ricky (a mouse) and his best friend (a giant, good-hearted robot that Ricky meets in the first book) battling a different evil guy from a different planet trying to take over earth (a totally silly evil guy). The "confrontations" in the flip-o-rama sections are mostly foot-stomping and head-bopping, although there is an occasional punch (I hate violence in books, but this is really tame cartoon stuff). There is very little tension in the books and they mostly are just good clean fun. Both my boys loved them and were a good gateway to chapter books without a ton of words.

He has actually read a little of a Ricky Ricotta book at swimming. I wonder what happened to the book, hmm...

We have found a winner though. While in Idaho this last week we bought the first Franny K Stein book - Lunch Walks Among Us. In less than an hour he had it all read!! We had to buy the next two while there as well, and he's in bed reading the 2nd one now.
Not only did he read the first book but he had to show Grandma, Grandpa, Great Grandma, Grammy, Grampy, and his Aunt and Uncle his new book that he loved.

He is in a mad science class at school and Franny is a mad scientist so it just caught his attention I think. Lots of pictures throughout the book helped too.

Franny K Stein was exactly what turned my son on to reading for fun! I think there are 7 books now so that should keep him busy for... oh... three days :-) Shortly after that, my son fell in love with the Magic Pickle series. That was enough to make him a reader for sure!

Oooo... and I'm just loving the Tashi series. There's 2 stories in each book and it's easy to power through one story per night. Unfortunately, there's only 18 in the series and we're running out! I just picked up Olga da Polga from the library. I hope Michael Bond is a winner! jojo

Those Franny K Stein books are awesome. The only down-side is that there aren't more. I honestly don't understand why they aren't more known. We have given them as birthday presents (as recently as two weeks ago) and they always end up as favorites.