Literature

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.)

Book Group 3 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

  • Laddie: A True Blue Story by Gene Stratton-Porter
  • The Call of the Wild by Jack London
  • A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
  • Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery
  • Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O’Dell
  • Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne
  • A Single Shard by Linda Sue Park
  • Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson
  • Esperanza Rising by Pam Muñoz Ryan

Book Group 4 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

  • Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
  • Little Men by Louisa May Alcott
  • Jo’s Boys by Louisa May Alcott
  • The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)
  • The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)

Older Students (Grades 9–12)

Book Group 1 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

  • The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien
  • The Fellowship of the Ring by J. R. R. Tolkien
  • The Two Towers by J. R. R. Tolkien
  • The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien
  • Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls
  • The Innocence of Father Brown by G. K. Chesterton

Book Group 2 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

  • Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott
  • The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle
  • David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
  • Watership Down by Richard Adams

Book Group 3 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

  • The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
  • Through Gates of Splendor by Elisabeth Elliot
  • Beowulf by Anonymous
  • Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
  • Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
  • Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
  • The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis

Book Group 4 (View on the CM Bookfinder)

  • Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
  • Lorna Doone by R. D. Blackmore
  • The Deerslayer by James Fenimore Cooper
  • The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper