Halloween is one of my favorite holidays. It has costumes, candy … and lots of ways to make learning fun. Building little moments of literacy practice into everyday activities is the best way for parents to raise a thriving reader. So we’ve put together some favorite tips for how to make Halloween a reading holiday.
For many parents, teaching your child to read can feel a bit scary. But with these fun tricks, Halloween reading becomes a real treat for kids—and their mummies, too!.
Bring Characters to Life
This Halloween, make books come alive with your Halloween costumes or decor! You or your child can dress up as a favorite book character for trick-or-treating or a Halloween party. You might even find a book that offers characters for everyone in the family. After all, why let kids have all the fun?
Some options from picture books include Max and the Wild Things from Where the Wild Things Are, Where’s Waldo and all his buddies, Winnie the Pooh and his pals from the 100-Acre Woods, Madeline, Curious George and the Man with the Yellow Hat, or Anansi the spider!
Chapter books also offer loads of costume ideas, from classics like Alice in Wonderland and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory to Harry Potter, Hunger Games, and beyond.
Is your child’s heart set on being Elsa or a mummy? No problem! Carve or paint your pumpkins to look like book characters, instead! Kids will love giving the pumpkins accessories, too. After all, Pete the Cat definitely needs white shoes, and Cinderella could probably use a slipper.
Write Halloween Cards
We all know that candy is the most common thing kids give and get on Halloween. However, you can also create Halloween cards. Have your child use stickers, paper, markers, or any other art supplies to create festive cards. Use this as an opportunity for children to practice writing and spelling. If your child is younger, you can draw letters of dotted lines for them to trace. If they are more advanced readers and writers, let them take the lead and create the text themselves.
You can mail the cards to family and friends. (Children love sending actual mail and getting mail in return!) You and your child can deliver them to neighbors or (if your child’s school allows) deliver them to classmates. You can even hand out the cards with candy to trick-or-treaters!
Bonus: Help your child make cards to send to elderly people who may be isolated, through groups such as Love For Our Elders or Doing Good Together. (See our post on helping kids write to seniors.)
Candy Wrapper Reading
Here’s a quick and easy one: Practice reading the names of the candy! When you buy candy to give out or go through the candy your child collects, try reading the names on the wrapper together before they gobble it up.
With younger children, you can simply focus on naming the letters or the first sound of the candy’s name. For older children, encourage them to try reading the names. They can even write a list of every candy they were given on Halloween, and rank their favorites or tally the number of each. It’s all about working reading into everyday moments that help children flourish.
Play with Your Food
What do you do with all those pumpkin seeds once you’ve carved your pumpkin? Don’t just throw them out! You can reuse them for reading.
Simply wash the seeds until they’re free of the stringy goo that surrounds them. Pat the seeds dry, and get ready to spell!
Ask your child to use the seeds to create the first letter of their name. Then see if your child can spell their whole name out using the seeds. You can use them to practice upper and lowercase letters, as well as spelling. And if you’re not a family that carves pumpkins, don’t worry! You can do the same thing with Halloween candy.
Bonus: Roast the pumpkin seeds first with a little oil and salt to make a tasty snack your child can eat after spelling with it! Just follow our Read With Me Roasted Pumpkin Seeds Recipe.
Cast a “Spell” Over Decorating
This Halloween, integrate writing and reading into your Halloween decor and fun wherever possible. Write down Halloween-themed words for your child to read, or use our free Halloween-themed alphabet spinner printable to choose words.
Once they’ve read the word, have them create a decoration that goes along with it. You can use simple words for younger children, such as web, bat, or cat. For older children try words like pumpkin, witch, or even vampire. Have them draw a picture of the item or cut a shape from construction paper to hang on the wall.
Sometimes, I’ll even do the opposite. I’ll ask the kids to spell a word for me and if I read it correctly, I get to make that decoration. It helps children practice their spelling, and they love getting to “be in charge” of adults.
This way, you’ll be integrating reading into your Halloween decorating and making literacy so much fun.
Halloween Story Time
Finally, let’s not forget one of the key parts of learning to read: Spending time reading books. Snuggle up with your little monster and read your favorite Halloween books.
Bonus: Hold a costumed story time or a Halloween party story time with friends for extra fun.
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I woke up at 3 a.m. on the morning of my daughter’s return to full-time in-person school this year and cracked open Unwinding Anxiety by Dr. Judson Brewer. It seemed like the perfect book to help set the right tone for the long day ahead.
I was anxious because it was my daughter’s first day at a new school in a new state. I was anxious because the school had sent a heads-up email the night before warning that there could be pick-up delays due to a bus driver shortage. I was also anxious because of the pressure I felt to have a great day at work myself. As all parents can attest who’ve labored in months-long distraction with COVID-disrupted childcare, school, and work routines, having eight uninterrupted hours to do your thing is a godsend not to be frittered away.
My daughter had been jittery the night before. She asked me, her human alarm clock, to rouse her at 5 a.m. to make sure she didn’t miss the bus expected at 7:03 a.m. That morning, before she ventured out of the door, she checked and double-checked the list of items to bring to school on the first day. Water bottle. Check! Lunch. Check! Extra masks. Check! And, despite the foreboding email of the night before, our cheerful driver pulled up a few minutes early.
We didn’t speak of it directly that morning, but sending her into an elementary school building full of hundreds of under-12 (and therefore unvaccinated) children is in and of itself a major cause for concern. She’s a super-conscientious kid, and her first day of school recap included the observation that they should let kids out of the cafeteria and onto the playground sooner, to lessen time in an enclosed space with unmasked kids eating. She has a point.
All of that’s to say that if you and your child are feeling a bit nervous amid these early school days, you’re not alone. We’re in it with you, and can offer a few practices that we return to again and again. These practices help us respond well to the worry we feel in the moment and (hopefully) reduce its duration, intensity, and likelihood of return.
Plan your response to anxiety in advance.
The specific circumstances that trigger anxiety in a child (or parent) may vary from day to day, but worry, doubt, and concern tend to be recurring forces in all of our lives. So it just makes good sense to plan our basic response to anxiety in advance, so that we can respond quickly, effectively, and consistently when it shows up. My chosen response, for example, consists of three elements inspired by tidbits I’ve picked up from books and articles, along with my own personal experience of what works.
When I notice that my daughter seems ill-at-ease or worried about some future event, I take a deep breath and tell myself to be a VIP. I love a good acronym, and this one does double-duty. To begin with, it’s a label and reminder for how I want to show up for my daughter: as a very intentional parent. Secondly, it stands for what I need to do to fulfill that aim: value and validate her feelings; investigate and imagine the ways anxiety manifests in her thoughts, body, and behavior; and preserve and predict positive outcomes.
Value and validate feelings.
The first order of business when you observe fear and worry in your child is to acknowledge their feelings and confirm that they’re fine with you. You might tell them that you can handle the outpouring of emotion they’re feeling. They needn’t hold back or censor their fears or feelings on your account and, more importantly, they can feel their feelings and handle them, too.
I usually start by saying, It’s okay to feel what you feel. Don’t try to fight whatever’s coming up for you. Just recognize that it’s there and relax into it. Accept and allow the feelings. This wasn’t always my default response, but years of telling her the opposite (Don’t worry. It’ll be fine.) didn’t work. When you tell a child to quickly turn the page on an emotion, it tends to make them only cling more strongly to it. If she could eliminate anxiety with just the desire to eliminate it, she wouldn’t be anxious and I wouldn’t be writing this post. Rather, I’ve learned that dispelling incessant worry is a process, and it starts with fully acknowledging feelings.
The mindfulness language of awareness and acceptance is very familiar to my daughter, because her dad and I speak it daily. The words, gestures, or actions that you choose to value and validate your child’s feelings will likely be different from mine, adapted to the age, stage, and needs of your child, plus your own unique ways of speaking with them. The point is always to do what works best for your particular child and circumstances, tweaking over time. As author Michael Hyatt puts it, “Everything good in our lives is the result of extensive, exhaustive trial and error.”
Investigate and imagine how anxiety manifests in our thoughts, bodies, and behavior.
The I in my VIP acronym is for both investigation and imagination. After you’ve validated your child’s feelings of uncertainty or worry, prompt them to get curious about their experience of the emotion, by asking them how anxiety shows up for them. Your goal is to help your child become more aware of the thoughts and emotions fueling their worry, so they can begin to change their relationship to them.
When kids become observers of their fears, they create the space to think, feel, and behave differently. As Brewer (the author of Unwinding Anxiety, the book I cracked open so early that first morning of school) puts it, “Simply bringing a kind, curious awareness to those sensations and feelings will help you move from habitually feeling like you have to do something to fix a situation to simply observing your experience, watching the problems lessen and disappear on their own.”
I say things like, How does worry show up for you? What does it feel like in your body? How does it affect your behavior? My daughter once told me that worry felt like “drawing inside my stomach with a pencil.” But sometimes kids can’t easily articulate what they’re feeling. That’s when the imagination part comes in. You can offer up some ideas or observations to help. You might gently ask, Is there a tightness in your stomach? Do you have a headache?
Mind you, the goal of this exercise isn’t to name a litany of ailments, but to model getting curious about feelings and developing a rich vocabulary to describe them. Think quality of exploration and observation versus quantity of issues. Shifting focus to a sensory exploration of the symptoms of your child’s anxiety pulls you out of rumination about the object of your anxiety (the late bus, the new teacher, COVID, etc.). Intentionally observing thoughts and emotions dampens the restless, antsy quality of worry with the calmer, expansive spirit of inquiry.
Attending to their own breath, body, thoughts, and feelings in the moment can be a powerful tool for breaking habitual cycles of anxiety, unlike, say, using a fidget spinner or Pop It! Despite their marketers’ claims, the benefits of toys designed to relocate worries from brains to hands are unsubstantiated. They may calm a child momentarily, but distracting from anxiety is different from unseating it altogether. For the latter, teaching mindfulness practices are our best bet.
Pro tip: Sometimes enjoyment is enough reason to let a kid play with a toy. We don’t have to pile pseudoscience on top.
Preserve and predict positive rewards.
After you’ve validated your child’s feelings and nudged them to get curious and investigate the nature and manifestations of those feelings, be sure to end on a positive note. Cement any positive benefits your child experienced from investigating their feelings by asking what they got out of the exercise. Maybe their stomach feels a little less knotted or they are no longer picking at their cuticles.
Whatever their response, it’s a step toward balancing out the negativity bias that makes us humans accentuate the negative more than the positive. Even if your child says I don’t know or Nothing, you did good work by raising the possibility that observing worry can dissipate it.
I also like to project some positivity into the future by leading my daughter through a visualization or mental walkthrough of the fearful event ahead. Imagine that the bus is pulling up. When the doors open, you can greet the driver with a smile, introduce yourself, and pick out a great spot to sit.
Other times I’ll simply affirm my belief that something good’s about to happen. I think it’s going to be a great day and you’ll meet kids who will become wonderful friends over time. The latter may have a don’t-worry-it-will-be-fine ring to it, but, trust me, it resonates better after the validation and investigation steps happen than when you bring the positivity alone.
VIP is my practice for helping my child with her worries, but you may recall that I opened this post talking about my own anxiety. Sometimes we teach what we most need to learn. So the next time anxiety creeps up for you or your child, start by valuing and validating the feelings (versus ignoring or suppressing them), then take it from there.
By Chrysta Naron
Arrr, me mateys! It’s the 19th o’ September, which means we be celebrating “Talk Like a Pirate Day!” For this silly and seaworthy occasion, we’re taking the opportunity to create a pirate treasure map reading activity and story time. And, along the way, we’ll be working on literacy and an important life skill: the ability to follow written directions.
With that goal in mind, the treasure map we’ll be creating today isn’t any ordinary one. Instead of pictures, dotted lines, and a giant X, you’ll be writing out the clues in sentences to help your small swashbuckler sail the seven seas. That way, your little pirate will have to read their way to the loot!
Materials:
- Small prize of your choosing
- Paper
- Pen or pencil
- Pirate books (e.g., Treasure Map by Stuart J. Murphy, Jack and the Flumflum Tree by Julia Donaldson, Pirate Princess by Sudipta Bardhan-Quallen)
Cost: Free, if you have these materials at home!
Start with Story Time: Set the mood by reading one of these great pirate books together: Treasure Map by Stuart J. Murphy, Jack and the Flumflum Tree by Julia Donaldson, Pirate Princess by Sudipta Bardhan-Quallen, or another pirate-themed book of your choosing. I highly recommend Treasure Map, a very cute book that builds important literacy skills. A group of kids go on a treasure hunt similar to the one you’re going to set up, so it’s a great preface for the activity to come.
Step 1: Find a spot around your home to hide a small prize. As a chocoholic, I usually opt for a Hershey’s kiss as a prize, but you should choose something that you and your child find enticing. It could be a fun pencil or a temporary tattoo.
Step 2: Decide where the starting point of your treasure hunt will be. The front door is usually a good place to start.
Step 3: On a sheet of paper, write directions that lead your child to the “buried” treasure. Each individual instruction should be on its own line. Create directions that lead children in a fun expedition across the house, even if it means they walk by the treasure (unbeknownst to them) once or twice. Fun directions could include: “Hop 10 steps to the left.” and “Turn right at the couch.”
Step 4: Have your child read each direction out loud to you. Follow the directions together throughout the house, until you reach your goal.
Step 5: “Dig up” the hard-earned treasure and enjoy!
Step 6 (optional): If you’re ready to keep the fun (and literacy practice) going a little bit longer, you can invite your child to hide a prize and write treasure map directions for you to follow, too!
Now you’ve got the hang of being a pirate! So put on your best peg leg and your favorite eye patch, and keep a weather eye out for other ways to work literacy practice into your child’s life. Read up, me hearties!
What other ways do you work reading practice and literacy skills into your child’s everyday life? Let us know in the comments below, or connect with us on social media and share!
Fun facts: Every word has at least one vowel, as does every syllable. (In fact, that’s the definition of a syllable: a word segment with a vowel sound!)
Yet vowels are among the trickiest letters for kids learning to read, write, and spell. Every vowel can make a “short” sound, like A in cap, and a “long” sound, like A in cape. What’s more, they make different sounds when they’re doubled or combined with other vowels. Whew!
Mastering all this takes practice, and as we know, practice with kids is best accomplished through play. So, if you want to teach vowels at home the fun way, try using our pumpkin vowel clip-cards with your child.
This free, autumn-themed printable consists of ten seasonal word cards with missing vowel letters and five pumpkin-shaped vowel cards. You can use it to introduce vowels and their sounds to your child, as well as to practice reading and spelling words with different vowels and vowel combinations. Have fun!
Materials:
- Printer & cardstock paper (5 pieces)
- Clothespins (5)
- Scissors
- Glue
Step 1: Begin by printing out your free pumpkin vowel clip-cards template on five pieces of cardstock. Cardstock is better for clip cards than regular paper, since it’s sturdier.
Tip: If you don’t have cardstock, print on normal paper and then carefully glue the cards onto cardboard from a shipping box or old cereal box.
Step 2: Next, you have to cut out the template. Cut out the cards, along with the pumpkin-shaped vowels. If it’s tricky to cut out the pumpkins, just cut out a circle around each.
Step 3: After cutting out the template, glue each pumpkin-shaped vowel onto a clothespin and let dry.
Activity: If your child is already familiar with vowels and their sounds, this is a good moment to review those together before proceeding.
If you’re just starting to introduce vowels and their sounds to your child, stop here and use the clothespins alone. You can show them each letter and demonstrate its sounds. Then repeat a vowel sound and let them pick which clothespin corresponds to the sound.
Remember, this is tricky! Stay patient and work for short lengths of time according to your child’s attention span.
How to Play
Now it’s time to clip the missing vowel letters onto the word cards! Help your child identify the picture, and then help them find the right letter(s) to clip over the blanks. Give them a chance to figure each out for themselves, but don’t hesitate to work with them as needed. After all, the goal here is for them to learn, not to get frustrated.
Tip: If you like, you can demonstrate a process of elimination as you play. For example, try clipping on the wrong vowels and reading them out, until you come to the one that works: “Let’s try an E here. Epple. Does that sound right? No? Let’s try U instead.”
We hope this easy-to-make educational tool to teach vowels is a fun addition to your family’s literacy journey toolkit. You can also make your own word cards to add more words to spell with your pumpkin clips—or invite your child to draw and write their own words on index cards to play with. It can also be helpful to group the cards into easy, moderate, and hard-to-spell words and return to them again and again. Enjoy!
Knock knock.
Who’s there?
Boo!
Boo who?
Don’t cry. It’s only a joke!
Or in this case, it’s only reading. Sometimes the OO spelling pattern can throw kids for a loop! The letters don’t make the short O sound (like hot) they learn to read first. And it doesn’t make the long O sound (like rope) that they know as the letter’s name. So just how can you teach your child the sounds that O makes when it’s doubled up? Play this happy Halloween-themed spelling game with your child and they’ll be mastering the double-O in no time.
Follow the instructions below to make your own DIY Halloween spooky spelling game, or just enter your email in the box to get a free printable template!
Materials:
- Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson
- White paper
- Orange paper
- Scissors
- Black marker
Cost: Free, if you have these things at home!
Set the Scene: Cozy up and read the Halloween classic Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson. It’s a sweet Halloween story and offers ample practice for those pesky OO words. Be sure to point them out as you read together.
Step 1: Cut out several ghost shapes from the white paper.
Step 2: Using the black marker, write OO in the middle of the ghosts. (These are the eyes, and will also form part of words!)
Step 3: Cut out about 15 pumpkins from the orange paper. If you need a little guidance in making a pumpkin shape, you can trace a pumpkin cookie cutter or print and trace this picture.
Step 4: Now, write one letter on each pumpkin. Choose letters that are commonly found in OO words. Some great choices are: B, L, T, M, C, and K. It’s fine to make multiple copies of letters. Many OO words end in K (look, book, shook, took, hook) or T (root, hoot, boot, foot), so I especially recommend making multiples of these two letters.
How to Play: Explain that OO makes the same sound as a ghost would, /oo/, as in BOO! Make sure to really emphasize the /oo/ sound. Optional: This is a great place to review the words from Room on the Broom.
Explore: Let your child try different letter combinations with the pumpkins and ghosts to see if they can make words. Let them explore. Even if they make nonsense words, that’s fine! Read them aloud anyway and laugh together. This is all about learning the sound /oo/.
Challenge: After a few minutes, separate the pumpkins from the ghosts. Spread the pumpkins out so all of them are visible. Hand your child a ghost.
Then, say an OO word aloud to your child. Ask them to create that word with the pumpkins and ghosts. You can start with simple words like boo, moo, or zoo. Then progress to words like boot, moon, or zoom.
Advanced: It’s important to note that OO can make two sounds. It can make a long OO sound like boo or a short OO sound, as in book, look, or wood. But no need to boo-hoo: When children begin to sound out words with the long OO sound, they easily and naturally make the jump to the short sound when they see it. For example, a child might read foot to rhyme with hoot, but once they say the word aloud, they’ll tend to self-correct and say “Oh! Foot!” So, when your child is ready, you can point out the short OO sound and practice these words together, too.
Incorporating this fun spelling game into your Halloween activities this year is sure to make spelling practice a hoot!
Whether your child is already turning cartwheels or loves to watch gymnasts soar, stories about gymnasts can be a great way to keep them turning the pages. Picture-book biographies of famous gymnasts, in particular, show real-life heroes who worked hard, stayed strong, and followed their dreams—both on and off the mat.
From Olympic gold medalists to young athletes chasing big goals, the gymnastics books in this list bring energy, action, and heart to storytime. If you’re ready to leap into inspiring reads, check out these picks of gymnastics books for kids!
With a cross-country move and book deadline looming amid a global pandemic, a long, lazy summer vacation on a beach somewhere just wasn’t in the cards for my family. But we rallied in August to squeeze in a few long-weekend trips by plane, train, and automobile, so all wasn’t lost. In fact, we found that shorter trips, though less relaxing, had some surprising benefits. Most pertinent to this blog, they ramped up our reading, writing, and learning in unanticipated ways.
Having just a few days to work with, we had to bring greater diligence to researching, selecting, and scheduling our activities. Every minute mattered, so we had to find out in advance what was open and how close those attractions were to where we were staying and to one another. We also wound up doing more formal tours than we ordinarily would, as a shortcut to plunging right into the history, culture, and geography that made the destination special.
Interestingly, the brevity of the trips also heightened our attention to informational signs, pamphlets, and placards. Since we weren’t going to be there long and wouldn’t be returning again soon, everything got a more careful read than it otherwise might. We read about the craftsmanship and donors behind the Thai Pavilion at the Olbrich Botanical Garden in Madison, Wis. We stopped to contemplate Bisa Butler’s gorgeous portrait quilts at the Art Institute of Chicago and also read the fine print, including the playlist of songs she and her husband (a DJ) curated to go along with the exhibition.
This got me thinking about ways to build reading and writing into weekend escapes and other short family trips. Working literacy skills into regular life with kids is a favorite topic on this blog. Vacations always offer new and different opportunities for family time, and every chunk of time together is a new chance to weave in a little learning, too.
So, with that in mind, here are five short-trip-inspired activities that you can incorporate to maximize reading, writing, and learning along the way and make your travel with kids as educational as possible:
Read print copies of local publications.
The free tourism publications stocked in train stations and the city magazines for sale in grocery stores both provide wonderful reading materials for traveling families. The youngest kids can turn the pages and gaze at photos, as well as listen to us parents read relevant bits out loud. Older ones can engage with the print at their level, reading headlines and photo captions or the whole shebang.
I sent my daughter on a scavenger hunt of sorts right from her seat at the Amtrak station, just by asking her to fold down the corners of pages featuring attractions she wanted to check out. Sure, we could look this stuff up online, but the print format was more immersive (no flashing ads or distracting popups) and provided a welcome break from her iPad.
Plus, reading the publications from cover to cover introduced us to things we might have skipped past when clicking through web page links. We even read the pamphlets intended for visitors to our own city, finding local things to do that we’d never heard of.
The takeaway for kids: Reading can help you find cool places and fun activities you wouldn’t otherwise discover. It can also teach you details that might help convince your parents to take you there.
Chart your course with a paper map.
We’ve become so accustomed to dynamic turn-by-turn navigation on our phones and in our cars that we often overlook the brilliance of old-school paper maps. During our August travels, we navigated museums, gardens, nature trails, train tours, and neighborhoods all with the help of visitor guide maps.
Besides showing us how to get from Buddha Shakyamuni Seated in Meditation in Gallery 140 to Jordan Castille’s Barack in Gallery 295, the guides also offered some tidbits on the local landscape and history. We learned, for example, that The Art Institute of Chicago is located on the traditional homelands for the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations, and that the city of Chicago itself is home to one of the largest urban American Indian communities in the United States.
The street maps that accompany sight-seeing bus tours are another great reading resource for visualizing a city’s layout, seeing where must-see attractions are clustered, and familiarizing kids with map-reading.
For extra engagement, consider letting your child take the lead on deciphering the map and guiding the family.
The takeaway for kids: Maps are miniature versions of real-life locations, so reading them can help you chart your course.
Find regional specialties on restaurant menus and at farmer’s market stalls.
One of the joys of travel is experiencing different food and drinks than you find at home. Encourage kids to get in on the fun by scouting out things that are different from whatever they normally eat at home or order at your local restaurants.
Treat it like a scavenger hunt and have them dive into menus and ingredient lists to discern what seasonings, food pairings, and cooking techniques set the destination’s dishes apart. What makes a pizza Chicago-style? Exactly what kind of fish are they frying every Friday in Madison? How is frozen custard different from ice cream?
Even if you wind up at the same old chain during a travel stop, encouraging your child to read the menu for themselves (or even—gasp—try something other than their usual dish) will up the learning and make the experience fresher for you, too.
The takeaway for kids: Menus tell stories about the origin and preparation of food, and reading them can help us find yummy favorites and point us toward new things to try.
Watch time fly with bus schedules, itineraries, and terminal signage.
There’s no better place to learn the vocabulary of travel than when you’re on the road. Show kids your itinerary and point out key features like arrival and departure times, gate numbers, and special boarding instructions.
Point out the directional signage in airports and train stations, or along the highway. It’s not always obvious to kids that you know where to go because of what you’re reading as opposed to innate knowledge or past experience.
Pro tip: When teaching travel words (or any vocabulary), tell your child what the word means, give an example, and then also give a counter-example or non-example to deepen their understanding.
For instance, you might share that arrival is the process of getting somewhere. Then when you, say, land at an airport, explain that you’ve just arrived in the arrivals hall. You could also point to the words arrivals and departures on signage and explain that you departed from point A and have arrived at point B. A non-example of arrival would be staying somewhere. Explain that after you’ve been in the terminal for a bit, you’re no longer arriving. Rather you’re sitting, standing, and staying awhile. These are the kinds of examples, comparison, and contrast of similar words that help kids grasp shades of meaning.
The takeaway for kids: Reading signs, schedules, and itineraries helps us get where we’re going on time.
Write to savor memorable experiences or express local inspiration.
All of the ideas above can be deepened or extended with the help of writing. Kids of all ages can record their thoughts, process their experiences, and make memories on the road if you provide paper, crayons, markers, or pencils.
Give your child a small journal to encourage writing about their travels, or just offer writing materials in the moment. We forgot to bring a little notepad on one museum visit and my daughter improvised by writing a rap on the back of a business card. Later, back at the hotel, she began writing a novel on an app she downloaded onto her iPad.
These weren’t journal entries or school assignments, but creative, authentic writing inspired by what she was seeing and experiencing while away from home—proof that literacy needn’t feel like homework.
The takeaway for kids: Literacy is a two-way street. You can take in all of the print surrounding you in the world; read, interpret and use it for your good; and also add to the body of language in the world by creating some writing of your own.
It’s fall, y’all! Time for the weather and the apples to get crisp, the pumpkins to plump, and the holiday season to get rolling. People from countries and religions around the world observe a wide variety of fall traditions that celebrate the harvest, change of seasons, and love of family and friends. To help you bring reading into your favorite fall celebrations or learn about those that are new to you, we’ve curated a list of a few favorite picture books for fall holidays.
Picture Books for Rosh Hashanah
Rosh Hashanah is the Jewish New Year and the beginning of the Jewish High Holy Days. During Rosh Hashanah, adherents reflect on their actions of the past year and examine where they have harmed others or done wrong, as well as how they can improve themselves and the world around them. It’s one of the most important holidays in Judaism.
Picture Books for Yom Kippur
Yom Kippur is the bookend for the Jewish High Holy Days. It comes 10 days after Rosh Hashanah. On this day, people atone for their wrongdoings. They apologize to those they have hurt and try to make their mistakes right.
Picture Books for the Mid-Autumn Moon Festival
This holiday is also called Moon Festival or the Mooncake Festival. It is traditionally celebrated in many parts of Asia, including China, Korea, Taiwan, and Vietnam. The day is based on the Lunar calendar and happens sometime between September and October. This holiday is a celebration of the Autumn harvest and is celebrated (as you might have guessed) at night! Families gather with lanterns, mooncakes, and starfruit to celebrate together.
Picture Books for Halloween
In the U.S. and an increasing number of countries around the world, October 31 means Halloween—pumpkins carved into jack-o-lanterns, spooky decorations, and costumed kids tramping door-to-door to the timeless refrain, “trick or treat!” All tricks aside, though, these books are total treats.
Picture Books for Día de Los Muertos
Día de Los Muertos means “Day of the Dead” in Spanish. It began in Mexico and is now celebrated in many Latin American countries and across the world. Día de Los Muertos celebrates the lives of loved ones who have died. Rather than being a sad and somber holiday, it is filled with love, flowers, sweet foods, candles, parties, and laughter.
Picture Books for Diwali
Diwali, or the Festival of Lights, is the biggest holiday of the year in India (though it is celebrated around the globe), observed by Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, and some sects of Buddhism. This holiday takes place over five days with prayers, feasts, decorations like intricate sand art called rangoli, and the lighting of lamps. Though different regions of India have different stories as to the origin of Diwali, all people recognize it as a holiday celebrating the triumph of good over evil.
Picture Books for Thanksgiving
American Thanksgiving is celebrated on the fourth Thursday of November. Originally, Thanksgiving was created to commemorate an Autumn harvest meal shared between Mayflower pilgrims and Wôpanâak Native Americans. In recent years, the focus and meaning of this holiday has shifted towards reflecting on family, thankfulness, and being together. Canadian Thanksgiving, with different origins but also a harvest feast, officially takes place the second Monday in October.
You may not be able to explore every country or celebrate every holiday in the world in person, but, as so often, books can be your ticket to carry you and your child wherever you want to go. We hope you’ll use this list of picture books as a jumping off point for delving into your own traditions with your little one and learning more about the world together. So grab a mug of cider and snuggle up with one of these fabulous fall books. Then add to the list by letting us know your favorite titles!
Like this list? Check out our other curated collections of kids’ books.
At a time when we need to reinvent a world of hope, literacy is more important than ever.
Audrey Azoulay, UNESCO Director General
Literacy offers a beacon of hope. Yet, according to UNESCO, some 763 million children and adults around the world lack basic literacy skills. That’s a huge number. Luckily for all of us, though, there are many incredible people and organizations striving to improve literacy around the world. And the best part is that you can help, too, just by supporting them!
Below, read about seven wonderful literacy initiatives in various parts of the world, which are always looking for donations, volunteers, and books. The nonprofits listed here are close to my bookworm heart. Each one has a specific goal and way to build reading and writing in its target community or area. There are also so many other wonderful projects and nonprofits supporting literacy around the world, so I invite you to find one that calls to you and get involved.
Reading is Fundamental
Reading is Fundamental makes my heart sing. They have truly thought about literacy from the point of view of the child, the caregiver, and the teacher. The organization has multiple programs to help children in a myriad of ways.
They give away new books to kids, offer a supplemental reading program for kindergarten through third-grade students, operate an interactive digital library, and host an online portal with customizable assistance and resources for parents and teachers.
Their online center, Literacy Central, is pitched for adults helping little ones read. It offers a full spectrum of lesson plans, games, and related reading ideas. Within their online programs and ebooks, the organization uses technology to enhance the reading experience for kids. For example, they use Beeline software to put digital text in different colors, so as to help children read line breaks. They also use technology that allows users to change the fonts of digital text to Dyslexie font for people with dyslexia. And parents or teachers can scan a physical book’s ISBN in the Literacy Central app to get to a page with ideas dedicated to that specific book.
In 2019, the group partnered with Mr. Reading Rainbow himself, LeVar Burton, to acquire Skybrary. Developed by Burton as a new evolution of Reading Rainbow, Skybrary is a digital library with floating islands of content that has everything you loved about this classic TV show—books, real-world videos, and lessons. Burton works as advisor for Skybrary and continues to create content for it, so today’s kids can grow up listening to stories and going on adventures with the same teacher many of their parents did. It’s truly magical. But you don’t have to take my word for it, you can try it yourself!
Get involved: Make a financial donation, volunteer, or partner with Reading is Fundamental.
Room to Read
This incredible nonprofit supports educating girls around the world, something that’s also close to my heart: The group’s main purpose is to advocate for gender equality in education and improved literacy for girls. They create libraries, donate books, and train teachers, among their multiple programs.
Another unique and important feature of Room to Read is that 87 percent of the leadership and board members are from the countries being served. So they create programs that they understand will best aid those communities, rather than outsiders imposing what they think is best. They work with local governments, communities, and schools to create excellent educational programs and opportunities for girls. They strive for systemic change, not just quick fixes, again making them stand out in the field.
Get involved: You can donate financially, host or join a book-a-thon, get your local school involved in a fundraiser, join their book club, share their newsletter, and spread the word on social media.
Imagination Library
I’m from Austin, Texas, and if there’s one thing we take as seriously as reading, it’s music. So of course, I wanted to focus on the wonderful nonprofit work from one of the best musicians in the world, Dolly Parton. Dolly Parton began her Imagination Library because her own father never learned to read. She didn’t want any other children to feel embarrassed or held back by their lack of access to books.
Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library sends every registered child one free, new, age-appropriate book every month. Children can receive books from birth until they turn five years old. The initiative has donated over 150 million books (including audio and Braille books) since 1995. It began serving one small part of Tennessee and now operates in the United States, Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Ireland.
Intrigued? Try watching Dolly read bedtime stories from the Imagination Library’s YouTube channel or watching a documentary about the project, called The Library That Dolly Built (available on multiple streaming services).
Get involved: Become a community champion and bring the program to your city. If your city already has a program, you can donate financially or volunteer with your local program.
Indigenous Literacy Foundation
Around the globe, indigenous populations have been denied access to adequate education. The Indigenous Literacy Foundation in Australia aims to repair that damage. They supply books to indigenous children and support literacy efforts like daily story times, especially in remote areas of Australia. The foundation also strives to publish children’s books by indigenous authors that are intended for indigenous populations.
To date, they’ve reached speakers of up to 26 different languages in 400 remote communities! They have donated over half a million books and published 103 books by indigenous authors. This level of dedication and support in a chronically underserved population is why I love to support this valuable group.
Get involved: If you happen to be in Australia, you can become a volunteer or host one of the group’s Great Book Swaps. If not, you can donate money, buy merchandise, or, if you own a business, donate a portion of your proceeds. They also greatly encourage people to follow and share on social media.
El Buen Samaritano
You might be familiar with this nonprofit from our previous post on Austin Literacy Nonprofits. Based in my hometown of Austin, Texas, El Buen Samaritano offers many services, including educational support. It has five levels of ESL classes for children and adults, after-school and summer programs for kids, and school readiness programs. The organization offers its classes in both English and Spanish.
El Buen Samaritano really sparkles because of its commitment to strengthening families by creating opportunities for families to learn and play together.
Get involved: Volunteer at El Buen Samaritano or at one of their many events. They also accept monetary donations.
Worldreader
As an educator for more than 16 years, I have seen the ways children learn broaden to include more technology at younger ages. Some of this change is unwelcome, but it’s undeniable that digital learning can be a helpful supplement to a broader literacy strategy that also includes face-to-face, person-to-person conversation, book sharing, and reading instruction. Unfortunately, children in low-income areas often lack access to tablets, smart phones, and laptops, as well as curriculum and learning materials. Worldreader tackles this problem head on.
Worldreader works in countries around the world to get digital books, as well as the technology required to access them, into the hands of children. They also train parents, teachers, and librarians on how to use the tools and platforms.
Get involved: Donate, sponsor a school, or subscribe to their newsletter and spread the word.
Behind the Book
This organization does truly well-designed and inspirational work. Based in New York City, Behind the Book aims to tackle low literacy rates in public schools from kindergarten through 12th grade. This directly benefits children of color and children who are English language learners, which I am incredibly passionate about. Behind the Book has a team that comes from the communities it supports, and their well-thought-out methods are backed by great intentions and actions.
The group has donated more than 17,500 books since 2003. They help teachers create strong curriculum that goes along with the Common Core State Standards and is culturally relevant. Behind the Book also gets authors into classrooms to talk to students about reading, writing, and exploring their creative process. They also create reading and writing workshops for students, encouraging children to get hands-on in growing their reading abilities.
Get involved: Volunteer, donate funds, or attend one of their fundraising events.
Literacy is the key that opens the door to almost every other avenue in life. By supporting organizations like these that are working to help end illiteracy around the world, you can be a part of handing millions of people that key.
But volunteering with or donating to one of these nonprofits is just one way to get involved. You can also start your own book drive for a local library or children’s shelter, or create a Little Free Library in your neighborhood. You can even simply take time and use your voice to teach others you know about the issue—and all the ways to help.
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Whether you and your family root for your college team or love to watch your favorite NFL players, you’ll all be a fan of these football picture books! These sweet reads capture the magic of a fall day in the stadium: the excitement in the stands, the heartbreaking losses, the underdog victories, the athletic feats, and the inspiring stories of the players themselves.
Aspiring football players and all sports fans—kids and adults alike—will enjoy learning about legendary players and the importance of teamwork, perseverance, and chasing your dreams. Kick off story time with these 10 inspiring reads, and then let us know your favorite titles.
To learn more about Ernie Barnes, try Between the Lines: How Ernie Barnes Went from the Football Field to the Art Gallery, an award-winning picture book by Sandra Neil Wallace.
For fans of By My Brother’s Side, explore seven other books by the Barber brothers, including Kickoff!, Go Long!, and Red Zone.
Read more: If the little fans in your life enjoy these football picture books, try reading our other lists of sports books, too.
What are your favorite sports reads for kids?
