The Best Read Aloud Chapter Books for Kindergarten

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The best read aloud chapter books for kindergarten have been what I’ve searched for this year.

My children are 5, 3, and 1 and we do a read aloud every morning over breakfast.

We all love it and I so appreciate the togetherness it brings to our family.

My favorite memories of being homeschooled are the times spent listening to my mother read to us from one book or another.

Getting lost together in the storyline of a good book was a really special experience and one I’ve wanted to pass on to my children as well.

However, knowing which books to choose can be tricky.

I mean, kindergarteners are young and therefore you may wonder how to even begin reading chapter books to your childeren.

If that’s you, check out this post with great tips for doing read alouds with littles.

For the sake of this post, I’m sharing some of our favorite books as well as other great recommendations from fellow homeschool moms.

Good Read Alouds Chapter Books for Kindergarten

We’ve read several chapter books together this year and I’m listing those, along with other recommendations down below.

Don’t feel as though you have to continue a book if your children have no interest in it.

You can always revisit it after some time to see if it is better suited to when they’re older.

We all have our preferences and sometimes certain storylines just don’t engage your children in the way that you think they will.

Stuart Little

I’m listing several of E B White’s books here because they really are lovely chapter books to read to little ones.

Stuart Little is a classic tale of a little mouse who is adopted into a human family.

My children enjoyed all the imaginative details and loved thinking about what it would be like to be mouse-sized.

This is quite a quick read if you’re doing a chapter or so per day as there are only 15 chapters in the book.

We read this after having read several of the Little House on the Prairie books and that made it feel like a very easy read.

Trumpet of the Swan

The Trumpet of the Swan is another raved about book suggestion and we have just started reading this as a family.

I actually can’t believe I’ve never read this myself so I’m enjoying it right along with my children.

Again, this seems an easy read and the chapters are quite short and really the perfect length for engaging your kindergartener.

All three of my little ones seem to be enjoying it.

Charlotte’s Web

Finally, my last suggestion from E B White’s books is Charlotte’s Web.

Following along on Wilber’s journey was enjoyable for our whole family.

I love that this was a living book that taught so much about the seasons, farming, and relationships in general.

It makes you think about loving others that perhaps don’t look the same as you but are deserving of love all the same.

We enjoyed watching the movie of this after we finished the book and my kids loved to note what actually happened in the book and what had been dramatised.

The Little House on the Prairie Series

We loved reading through several of the books from The Little House on the Prairie series this year.

My children were engaged and learned so much about history and what life was like back then.

I often found them playing “Ma & Pa” outside in the afternoons. They would use their bikes as horses and hitch up a wagon to use as their carriage.

I appreciate that even though not all of the attitudes and thoughts in the books are what we would consider right today, it gave us opportunity to discuss those as a family and work through what we believe.

We got about halfway into By the Shores of Silver Lake before we hit pause.

By then, my children weren’t quite so engaged in the storyline. Laura was getting older and I just felt like it was time to give the series a break.

We’ll return to it in a few years, but for now, we’re enjoying some other titles.

The ones that we did read were:

Mr Popper’s Penguins

Mr Popper’s Penguins is likely the next book that we’ll be reading as a family.

I’ve never read it before and I’ve seen it recommended many times over in several homeschool groups online.

If you’re looking for a list of living books to choose from for your younger children, the book list over at Simply Charlotte Mason is incredibly helpful for this.

Beatrix Potter’s Complete Collection

Before we did any other read alouds, I read through Beatrix Potter’s Complete Collection.

These stories are full of beauty, adventures, nature study, and so much more.

We love the illustrations and the life lessons that are presented in all of them.

In fact, next year I plan to use the homeschool curriculum A Year of Tales which is based on the Beatrix Potter books.

What a wonderful time we live in where such materials exist!

I was homeschooled and now frequently chat with my mother about what I’m doing with my children. She is so jealous of all the resources and options available to us that didn’t exist when she was homeschooling.

We are blessed indeed!

Conclusion

Doing read alouds with your children can be one of the most precious times during your day.

It is so wonderful to get lost together in the imaginative world of the story you’re reading.

I particularly love how it gives each member of the family creative licence to imagine the characters and story in just the way that seems right to them.

Movies have their place, but they don’t add nearly the same value as a good living book does.

I hope that the list of books I’ve mentioned gives you a good jumping-off point and that they’ll bring enrichment to your homeschool day.