A Stick is an Excellent Things: Poems Celebrating Outdoor Play by Marilyn Singer

I love poetry, and I think if you expose children to it early, it won't seem so intimidating when they're adults. In first grade, my daughter learned about a new poem each month and she thought they were really cool.

A Stick is an Excellent Thing: Poems Celebrating Outdoor Play by Marilyn Singer is the perfect book of poems for children during the summer months. The poems are great for reading out loud together, and as the subtitle says, they celebrate playing outside. I rarely follow illustrators, but I'm beginning to recognize LeUyen Pham's work and I love her illustrations.

Do you have a favorite book of poems for children?

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A Stick is an Excellent Thing: Poems Celebrating Outdoor Play
By Marilyn Singer
Illustrated by LeUyen Pham
Publisher: Clarion Books
Year: 2012
Ages/Themes: Picture Books, Early Readers, Poetry

What to Do with a Box by Jane Yolen

Another fun library find, this book is illustrated to look like a cardboard box and imagines the different things you can do with a box. It's a simple, sweet story told in rhyme. But I think it's the illustrations that make my kids choose it night after night. It also sparks their imagination because they've spent time turning cardboard boxes into houses and ships and airplanes.

What do your kids turn boxes into?
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What to Do with a Box
By Jane Yolen
Illustrated Chris Sheban
Publisher: Creative Editions
Year: 2016

Best Mother Goose Ever by Richard Scarry

Richard Scarry's Best Mother Goose Ever really is the best collection of Mother Goose ever. Here's why: It's the Mother Goose collection I grew up on. Once I had children and saw this in a store, I had to get it. To relive my childhood a bit, and to enrich theirs. What's a childhood without Mother Goose?

What's your favorite edition of Mother Goose rhymes?

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Best Mother Goose Ever
By Richard Scary
Publisher: Golden Books
Year: 1999 (this printing)
Ages: Young Children, Early Readers
Themes: Rhymes

You can find this book on Amazon (affiliate link) or at your local independent book store.

Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse (Newbery Winner)

Once upon a time I made a goal to read all the Newbery Medal books. It's a goal that once met, was easy to maintain as it requires I read one new book each year. There are some weird stories that won back in the early days, but there are some beautiful books sprinkled throughout, especially in the last thirty or so years.

Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse stands out to me as a great book among other great books. The novel is told in verse form by young Billie Jo as she and her family live through the Dust Bowl of the 1930s and as she goes through unimaginably hard challenges. Since it's told in verse, the writing is especially sparse and beautiful--every word has a reason for being there. And the story is engaging, at times heartbreaking, and ultimately inspiring.

This book is great for middle grade and young adult readers alike. It's a good introduction to verse, or poetry, because it tells a story. The story is interesting enough to keep their attention, and it teaches about a part of American History. Many adults will enjoy this book too--it was well received when the women in my book club all read it.

(I will warn that there is death in the book. Not that children and young adults shouldn't read about death. But I've learned to be aware of recommending books with death and loss in them to children who have experienced a recent death in the family. Wait till emotions are less raw.)
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Out of the Dust: A Novel
By Karen Hesse
Publisher: Scholastic
Year: 1997
Info: won Newbery Medal, told in verse
Ages: Middle Grade, Young Adult
Themes: family, Dust Bowl, the Great Depression, historical fiction, loss, coming of age
Source: my bookshelf