Books for a reluctant, under-confident, seven year old reader

[maybedog]

We're supposed to be reading together every day, but we don't really have any suitable books. We've got picture books that she likes listening to us read, but none of the style that usually get sent home with her from school.

Can anyone recommend some, please? Any good sets?

We did have a set of Biff, Chip and Twat books but they're a bit babyish for her now. Thanks!

Have you tried Billy Bonkers, Horrid Henry and Dirty Bertie? My 6 year old loves reading them. Also Flat Stanley.

If those are too challenging the Happy Families series are easier and fun to read.

My daughter likes hairy mclairy books

What sort of stories does she like?

My 7yo was being very reluctant with her school books- they were really boring. But now we are reading books she wants, and she's a lot happier. We're reading Zoe's Rescue Zoo at the moment. We alternate readers, so when she tires I take over.

My 7 year old found the rainbow fairy books great. I encouraged her to read them to herself.

We also have some fairy stories from m&s which are quite short and simple but not babyish
I have never done this but il understand Oxford owl online is good. You might get good choice there?

I think it’s all about finding something that they like. Can you look through some options on amazon and see what he likes? The book people sell sets of the book band type books.

They will kill your very spirit - but Rainbow Fairies, Horrid Henry kind of got us over that hump. Other than that - my 7 year old likes the Dog Man books (from the Captain Underpants guy) because they're comic book format so unthreatening in terms of text amount on a page but feel like "proper" books in terms of their size and paperbackness.

We use Reading Chest for book band books (or get sets off eBay). Reading Champions is a series designed to read alone.

The worst witch books are great, as there is text, wonderful story but also good illustrations. Willow Valley books, Ivy and Bean series and My Father’s Dragon books are all great series with illustrations too. Then the inescapable rainbow magic series help many start reading. They are totally formulaic from an adult perspective but kids seem to love them.

I'd second the dogman books. My son is a very reluctant reader and he will read these. Over and over.

He wont touch his banded books. They're set like a cartoon so not too many words on the page. They're great. 8 books in total. 9th out in September.

13 story tree house series

Tom Gates

Any of those comic book style ones - not babyish but fewer words per page so not intimidating, and ususlly funny.

Mr Gum.

Oh thank you so much for these suggestions! I'll go through the options with her tomorrow.

Massively helpful

At that age my DS has a real blip and hardly read. We bought him some football comics and the Beano for a few weeks and that seemed to get him back into it.

My DS 7 loves The Bad Guys series- similar time Dog Man (which he also loved) in that it’s comic style, full of humour- he laughed all the way through

We just got Dog Man and it is a definite hit!

Beasts of Olympus
Knight in Training
The Giggler Treatment

DD liked the Daisy series by Kes Gray

Remember that they don’t have to be fiction or story books. My DS is not keen on reading but loves the Guinness book of records, Ripley’s Believe it or not, and things like joke books and funny/disgusting fact books.

If you go to your local library website, you can borrow ebooks via an app, use it on a phone or tablet, and you can try lots of books without worrying about forking out for things that don't get read. If she doesn't like it, you can just "return" them and try something else.
My library service uses Libby, but there are others too. It was really easy to setup and download books and I'm a bit of a luddite tbh.

Just checked my app, and they've definitely got Tom gates and dog man (my youngest loved both of those)

My Weird School, they are American but got three of mine over the tricky bit where they arent interested in the babyish beginner books anymore but dont have the ability to read harder ones

The book that got my ds reading to himself were the Bad Guys series and Horrid Henry. He does also like Dog Man. He loves having much more challenging books read to him but lacks the confidence to read to himself. Those books were great at giving him more confidence.

Captain Underpants are also v funny and easy to read.

Oxford owl website is offering free subscription at the moment and the books are all set by age and book band which has helped me to find some form my daughter - she liked the winnie the witch ones and also the non fiction ones about space