Great Find! Collection of Easy Reader Printable Books from Growing Book by Book

God bless Jodie from Growing Book by Book! She is always putting up quality information and her Facebook shares are great, too. But this time she must've really read my mind. My favorite thing is to find free printable books for beginning readers on all of the fantastic teaching blogs. Mostly because it is a) very hard to find books that are easy enough for beginning readers and b) way easier and cuter than me making them by myself. Plus, I have found that my early readers really respond well to thematic books connected to the seasons and holidays. She has saved you and me time and made a beautiful list all in one place. I love it! Be sure to check it out here if you have a young reader in your house. Thanks Jodie!

Great Article: Three easy ways to get your kids to read better and enjoy it

Love this article by Ryan Spencer that I saw go by on my Facebook feed recently. I love it because it's a concise way of telling parents how to help their kids right now. I also love that he used the term "instant word factory." Do you ever find yourself doing that? Spitting out each word that your child has trouble with? I've definitely had my moments. Sometimes it becomes necessary, when I notice that a child is in a book that's way harder than either of us anticipated. Most of the time, though, I notice the power in staying quiet and seeing what happens. Sometimes it's harder, but it really is the best thing.

Post Discovery: Great Struggling Reader Tips

A fabulously written post about helping your reader! Find it here on IThinkWeCouldBeFriends.com. I love the author's suggestions, especially having kids read to younger relatives or friends. It's great to have a baby around and have them read board books with simple words and pictures. They get the words solid in their learning memory while having a fun interaction with someone little. Great confidence builder! I know some libraries have programs where you can go read to dogs now, too!

Parent Tip Sheet for Reading at Home

I've been using this parent tip sheet for my parent workshops and in my classroom. I love it because it is a very accessible way to understand how you can help your child interact and comprehend what they read. We had the discussion recently about how some parents want to read the entire book with no interuptions because that's how they think it "should"be done. It is in fact the opposite of what should be done. Educators researched what good readers do and they found that good readers are constanly interacting with their reading. If you pay attention to yourself while you're reading, you'll find that this is true. You ask yourself what a word means, you catch yourself if you're mind is wandering, you reread a part that was confusing. It's an interactive process. Hope you enjoy this handout! It's available for free download here at Teachers Pay Teachers. You have to sign in to get an account, but it's super easy. I encourage you to search for other fun free downloads at that site, too!! There are amazing treasures to be found!

Finding Books for Beginning Readers

One of my own personal struggles as a teacher was to find easy books for my beginning readers. Even books that usually say "Level 1 - Beginning Reader" are way too hard for actual beginning readers. I just found this great post from www.123homeschool4me.com that has a good list of books for our young readers. Some of these books are not necessarily so easy that you could just hand them over to your reader and expect her to be able to read it on her own, but after a few readings together she could easily manage it.

Though parents are sometimes worried kids have just "memorized" the book, it is not something to be concerned about. They need to see themselves as readers and see and say those words over and over again before they are cemented in their minds.

Anna over at The Measured Mom has solved the problem of finding easy books by creating a ton of fabulous FREE printable books for beginning readers.You can find those here.

Happy Reading!

What can you do before or instead of sounding it out?!?

Another great post from Anna over at The Measured Mom that you simply must check out if you've got a little person beginning to read or going in that direction. So often, as parents, all we remember as children was being told to "sound it out," so we tend to rely on that as our sole teaching strategy when helping our kids read. Anna does a great job in this post helping you understand all of the knowledge that has to come before they're ready to sound something out. Also, it's really important to use many reading strategies when a child gets stuck on a word. I need to do a longer post on this but, here's an example of a picture from Literacy Links that you can print out and use to encourage your child to try different things if they're stuck on a word. There are also lots of sheets like this available on Teachers Pay Teachers like this one for free or for a small cost.

Great Alphabet Resources!

You just can't miss some of the great resources from one of my favorite sites, The Measured Mom. This is your go-to source for anything you need letter by letter.

The Measured Mom's Tips and Tricks for Teaching Emergent Readers + Great Battle Bunny Book Talk!!

To go along with the last post I did about finding those "easy" books for our earliest readers, I am thrilled to share an excellent explantation of emergent readers by The Measured Mom. She did a guest post about this on another great site, Teach Mama. Please go visit the post here and print out your free books! 

I think it's hardest for parents to understand the beginning reading process because when we think of reading, we picture a kid reading The Cat in the Hat or another kid's book. It's hard sometimes to see the value or interest kids will have in those teeny little boring books. Yes, I've had many a parent tell me those little books are boooorrrriiiiinnnnggggg. All I can tell you is that I have never thought those books were boring because I look at them as little treasure chests holding such great possibility for our little readers. Your attitude does play a huge part in your book choices and your child's attitude about books, so try to give the little easy books a chance. I must admit, they are getting better as educators realize that high interest subject matter is super helpful in engaging young children (especially boys!!). I also can honestly tell you that I have never had a child complain to me that those little books are boring. They get excited to actually be able to read a book and they don't seem to compare them to the bigger "real" books like adults do. So don't be afraid to show a little love to the emergent readers!

This also brings me to a new book I heard about over the weekend called Battle Bunny. 

The people on the radio station giving the review could not stop talking about how much they loved this book. It sounds hilarious and like a great idea to share with kids. What happens is that a child gets the somewhat lame book Birthday Bunny for his birthday and then he changes it all around to become Battle Bunny. It may be because I have a six-year-old boy who would completely love this book, but I can't wait to get it! Of course, the teacher and children's librarian in me cringes a teeny bit at encouraging children to color all over books, but in the right context it can be a great encouragement for imagination and writing. So, if you do end up wanting to change around some of those little books, you can always create your own versions! What is so genius about the author of Battle Bunny is that he actually has the whole Birthday Bunny book at mybirthdaybunny.com so you and your child can make your own version! So great!  For those of you who live close to me, I just ordered three copies. So the first two people to email me and tell me you read this post, I will give your child a copy for free!