Reading 3 year old wanting more of a challenge

bylromarha

Hi all

My 3 year old is a fluent reader. He's bored of his picture books and wants something he can use his bookmark in!

My concern is that I don't give him books which are scary for his actual age. I want to give him literature which is fun for him to read and not give him nightmares.

So I'm looking for titles of books that are friendly with their concepts, and are relatively easy to read and understand.

Thinking along the lines of the Faraway tree...Roald Dahl a bit too dark at this age IMO...any other titles you can suggest I pick up in the library?

thanks

Uniscots97

What about the "Read it yourself" series from Ladybird?

mrcow

The Mr Men

They are brilliantly hilarious stories and the language is quite challenging (although if your child is up to the Magic Faraway Tree, then they will bemore than capable of reading them). Pictures are wonderful and you can read them together if they are too challenging for him on his own.

My son is a very keen reader and the Mr Men stories helped endlessly with his fluency and expression.

Also - Cat in the Hat, GreenEggs & Ham etc.- great clean good fun - easy words and great pictures!

jellymid

Our library stocks the Oxford Reading Tree books, a series used by lots of schools. It's a scheme, so will provide progression, too. Usborne do a nice range, too. Good luck,
Al

mrcow

There is also the Happy Families series which is quite fun and Storyworlds by Heinemann which is another reading scheme......so be wary as some of the stories will be very basic as they will just be covering the Key Stage one key words......you need to get to about level 9 or so before the stories beef out a little.

I had exactly the same problem in that my son's ability did not match his age range and lots of the books were inappropriate. Now he's six, it doesn't matter so much as his understanding of more mature concepts and understanding of stuff like teasing/bullying/stealing lol means that he canvread sovmuch more stuff.

The way I used to get round it was to scour the library and if I found any suitable books, used to then get them to order in all the other books in that series for him. A bit of a PITA, but I dont regret it as he absolutely adores reading and I think doingthis helped a lot as he always had a stack of new stuff to read.

bylromarha

I'll be giving ORT a miss as the concepts in the stories at the level he's ready for are beyond a 3 year old.

Will look into the others though-I'm trying to avoid spending hours in the library reading books before I let him read them!

emg

my 3 year old niece has loved having Faraway Tree stories read to her and is now enjoying 'Teddy Robinson' and 'My naughty little sister'. Some of the children's film tie-in books (e.g. Ladybird do a 'Lion King' book) are also quite nice and have the advantage of you already knowing what the story is and whether it is likely to be scary.

hardpressed

I'm a bit out of date with children's book but mine loves the Ladybird books with stories that rhymed, nice harmless stories and the rhyming words help them to read with expression. The Cat in the Hat was another favourite, again that has rhyming words. I'd be a bit careful with any of the reading schemes that's used at the school he'll be going to as he might find it difficult if he's already mastered the scheme by the time he gets there and then he'll be bored if he whizzes through them.

Spendless

I had the opposite problem of a late reader with my son, and the books which finally interested him were the Horrid Henry series.

What about A A milne's winnie the pooh books. My 5yo loves these read to her, but she would find them too hard to read herself at the minute.

LindaS

He's 3 and a fluent reader!?! Wow congrats, you must be doing something right, what's your secret?

I couldn't read until I was 6, however when I was 3 I had fooled everyone into thinking I could read. I memorized all my books, when to turn the pages etc. =P

My mom bought me Beatrix Potter's tales of Peter Rabbit etc (to learn English) but they were very nice books=)

QuirkyChemistry

I would recommend the books by David Henry Wilson about Jeremy James. They are fun and I enjoyed reading them as a kid. I think they would be suitable although maybe a bit too hard for a 3 year old.

I would advise going to the local library and browsing the shelves and asking the librarians what they recommend.