This is the first summer that I will have a child who is seriously into silent reading. I love how he can get lost in a book. I love how excited he is to choose new reading material. I love how engaged he is in the stories and characters. I do not love catching him reading in his bed at 11:30 at night with a flashlight, although I hope we have solved that problem now.

My seven year old and I decided to create a ‘Summer Reading List’ as part of participating in the Summer Reading Program at the local library and to keep him reading a (hopefully) more diverse group of books.

The goal is to read two chapter books a week. (Even though he argued with me that he could read seven a week. I won.) We had collected several recommended reading lists and just browsed a little online at Powell’s Books and Amazon. A couple I remember reading as a kid.

photo credit: flickr

We have 11 weeks of Summer vacation. He added one extra because it is more of a “guide” than a story. We’ll see how it goes. Here is the list….

Summer Reading List

1. Mr. Popper’s Penguins by Richard Atwater
2. Magic Tree House #29: Christmas in Camelot by Mary Pope Osborne
3. Magic Tree House #38: Monday with a Mad Genius by Mary Pope Osborne
4. Leonardo da Vinci: A Nonfiction Companion to ‘Monday with a Mad Genius’ by Mary Pope Osborne
5. Magic Tree House #42: A Good Night for Ghosts by Mary Pope Osborne
6. Magic Tree House #46: Dogs in the Dead of Night by Mary Pope Osborne
7. Lincoln: A Photobiography by Russell Freedman
8. Puppy Power by Judy Cox
9. Smarter Than Squirrels (Down Girl and Sit) by Lucy A. Nolan
10. My Father’s Dragon
    by Ruth Stiles Gannett
11. If America Were a Village: A Book about the People of the United States by David J Smith
12. The Cricket in Times Square (Chester Cricket and His Friends) by George Selden
13. The Mouse and the Motorcycle by Beverly Cleary
14. The Borrowers by Mary Norton
15. Bully for You, Teddy Roosevelt! by Jean Fritz
16. Half Magic by Edward Eager
17. The Dreamer by Pam Munoz Ryan and Peter Sis
18. Billy the Kid: A Novel by Theodore Taylor
19. The Chameleon Wore Chartreuse (Chet Gecko Mysteries) by Bruce Hale
20. Captain Underpants and the Attack of the Talking Toilets by Dav Pilkey
21. The Adventures of Super Diaper Baby by Dav Pilkey
22. The Lightning Thief: Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Book One by Rick Riordan
23. The Dangerous Book for Boys by Conn Iggulden and Hal Iggulden

Will you be doing a Summer reading program or list with your kids this year? I would also love to hear any more suggestions of books to add to our list, for now or in the future!