Library Notes
March 3, 2013
Erika Kosin

Dr. Seuss and Beginning Readers

    Each year thousands of children’s books are published due to the various stages of development and reading abilities of children such as chapter books, picture books, and informational books, but there are also books that help children learn their reading independence called beginning readers.  Beginning Readers are those books that help children transition from having picture books read to them to reading books on their own.  They are great for building basic vocabularies and providing context for new words to help encourage children as they learn to read.  Beginning readers may take the form of early chapter books, known to libraries as the “easy readers”, or they may fall into the picture book category, using distinct vocabulary and large format pictures as Move Over, Rover!  by Karen Beaumont and Not a Box  by Antoinette Portis.

Since 2006, the Assocation for Library Services to Children (ALSC) a division of the American Library Association (ALA) has an annual award to the “author and illustrator of the most distinguished American book for beginning readers, recognizing the winner’s literary and artistic achievements in demonstrating creativity and imagination to engage children in reading”.  This award has been appropriately named the (Theodor Seuss) Geisel Award.  Past winners and honor books have included picture books and “easy readers”, but they all have a story told in words and pictures that an emergent reader can use to learn to read on their own. 

    Why would Theodor Geisel, best known as Dr. Seuss, have this award named after him?  Not only are his books funny and popular, but The Cat in the Hat was created to provide first graders with a new reading primer that they would not want to put down using only 225 words (it actually ended up with 236) from a list of 348.  The Cat in the Hat was so successful that Geisel and his wife decided to launch “Beginner books” a division of Random House publishers that would focus on fun reading primers for children.  With this imprint, the first Berenstain Bears book and P.D. Eastman’s Go Dog Go were published along with another challenge for Dr. Seuss, a book with only 50 words, Green Eggs and Ham.  This endeavor has led to the standard in children’s beginning reader books, a fun story with a limited number of words that encourages children to learn to read.  

Some favorite characters for beginning readers that can be found at the Rowan Public Library, by those other than Dr. Seuss, include:
 “Elephant and Piggie” series by Mo Willems – Elephant and Piggie are best friends, even though they are very different.  Look for special guest Pigeon on the back cover of each book!
“Frog and Toad” by Arnold Lobel – Each book includes five short adventures of frog and his friend Toad, from flying a kite, to cleaning house, each adventure will keep kids entertained.  While published too early to win an award, a definite favorite among children.

“Fly Guy” series by Tedd Arnold – Follows the adventures of Fly Guy, an actual fly, and his human friend Buzz. 
“Pearl and Wagner” by Kate McMullan – Tells about the adventures of two unlikely friends   Pearl, a hardworking rabbit, and Wagner, a daydreaming mouse, as they spend time in and out of the classroom.
“Henry and Mudge” by Cynthia Rylant – Henry learns about life, loyalty and love with the help of his bullmastiff Mudge.