Select a group of books below that corresponds to the main age range of your students (younger, middle, older) and read them aloud. If you have both younger and older students, you can read aloud to the younger and then assign a set of books for older students to read independently. The main goal is to select books that your family will enjoy and read them aloud together. If you read one chapter per day, you should be able to finish all the books in a group in one year.

We think the main objective of Literature is to enjoy well-written books. Ask for narrations if you want to, but don’t feel that you must do a study guide or literary analysis on each. These selections are not meant to be analyzed as works, but treasured as old friends.

You can use the links below to view all the books in a group in the CM Bookfinder for easy scheduling in our CM Organizer. You can also see our suggestions for where to find the books.

Younger Students (Grades 1–4)

Book Group 1 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

Trumpet of the Swan by E. B. White
All-of-a-Kind Family by Sydney Taylor
The Complete Tales of Winnie-the-Pooh by A. A. Milne
Five Little Peppers and How They Grew by Margaret Sidney
Mr. Popper’s Penguins by Richard and Florence Atwater
Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

Book Group 2 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

Stuart Little by E. B. White
Understood Betsy by Dorothy Canfield Fisher
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett
Five Children and It by E. Nesbit
The Borrowers by Mary Norton
Along Came a Dog by Meindert DeJong
Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White
Black Beauty by Anna Sewell

Book Group 3 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

Little Lord Fauntleroy by Frances Hodgson Burnett
The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
Heidi by Johanna Spyri
The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
The Princess and the Goblin by George MacDonald
At the Back of the North Wind by George MacDonald
The Railway Children by E. Nesbit

Book Group 4 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

The Magician’s Nephew by C. S. Lewis
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis
The Horse and His Boy by C. S. Lewis
Prince Caspian by C. S. Lewis
Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C. S. Lewis
The Silver Chair by C. S. Lewis
The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis
Pollyanna by Eleanor H. Porter
The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood by Howard Pyle

Middle Students (Grades 5–8)

Book Group 1 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

The Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan
Bambi: A Life in the Woods by Felix Salten
The Story of the Treasure Seekers by E. Nesbit
Swiss Family Robinson by Johann Wyss
Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George

Book Group 2 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

Little Britches by Ralph Moody
Man of the Family by Ralph Moody
The Home Ranch by Ralph Moody
Mary Emma and Company by Ralph Moody
The Fields of Home by Ralph Moody
Shaking the Nickel Bush by Ralph Moody
The Dry Divide by Ralph Moody
Horse of a Different Color by Ralph Moody

(Be on the alert for some coarse “cowboy language” in the first book of the series and some swearing in the others. You can easily skip it as you read aloud.)