Choosing books

[LornaVS]

I'm really curious to find out more about how parents choose books for young children - I'm doing a research project on books for young boys/girls and am very keen to hear views from parents! My research is inspired by the Let Books be Books campaign, so I'd love to know if you have/know children who prefer 'girly' books or if you would feel pressured into buying a certain 'type' of book for your child. I've made a blog to gather thoughts - please have a look or comment below! My blog is: labellingorlimiting.wordpress.com/ Thank you :)

I think you can choose books in the same way you choose clothes for them. You know their personalities, what suits them and what they like.

In books that's the themes that interest them, which ways of using language they respond to best (rhyme, repetition, silliness, OTT etc) and what kinds of illustrations attract their attention. When my two were small I knew they liked illustrations with loads of detail. The kind you could stay on one page for three nights, spotting more and more things in it (Each Peach; Richard Scarry etc.) They loved information and silly comedy and adventure. They had an inbuilt radar set against books that aim to charm adults (Charlie and Lola) but they liked old fashioned authors and illustrators such as Shirley Hughes, and they adored Judith Kerr.

Once they were a bit older, they loved interactive books - all the Ology series, science books about the body which lit up and had flaps, and all pop up books.

I work as a volunteer librarian in a girls' primary school. They love lots of different books, across a whole range, but the minute a Barbie book is returned, it is borrowed within minutes!

I am a nanny to an 18 month old girl.

When I go to the library on a weekly basis I change and choose upto 15 new books - which will encourage her interests etc.

She currently likes modes of transport and animals so I get board books of those, that we can sit and look at during the day - by herself or with me, then I get slightly longer stories based on things she likes, bright colours, maybe a nice rhyme for bedtime.