Good reads for girls in junior primary

Popps is now 7 years old and in at least one thing in her life, she takes after me!

We both really love to read.

I have constantly found sourcing new books for her to be a challenge. Some classics are written in a language she doesn't understand or can not handle at this stage, modern books can be too simplistic for the 6 - 9 age group. Popps has made her way through close to 100 Enid Blyton books in the last year,  gee could Enid write! I googled to see exactly how many books she did write and it was 1802 books with 11,125 short stories! The lady could sure spin a tale.

But finding something more than Billy B Brown and not as full on as Little Women is hard for the junior primary girl. It could be for the boys too, but I don't have a boy and I have no idea what little boys like.

The things being re read here this term have included:

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Third Wheel

This is the 7th book in the series of Wimpy Kids. To be honest I don't get these books. But as a 7 year old Popps thinks these are extremely funny. She read the entire 217 pages on Monday night after I bought her this book as a reward for an excellent report from the dentist. She has marked some of her favourite pages - which is pretty much the whole book.

Next we have something more 'girly'.

 Bridget Lucy wants needs a pet
by Leonie Norrington

The highlight of this book is that the illustrations have colour, which is of course rare in chapter books, but really it is a shame that more don't have them. Young children's books have such beautiful illustrations at times and then all of a sudden as chapter books become the norm you start to miss out on the artwork. Note to authors of kids fiction - don't skimp on the artwork for your story.

This is the third book in the set of Bridget Lucy books. The font is a good size, the words that need emphasis are often highlighted with a different font, for children that need to improve their reading out loud or reading with expression this can be a useful reader.


More diaries...

Dear Dumb Diary

These books are all about coping with the dynamics of school. I have found so far that the politics of the playground can be much more distressing than any other part of daily school life. Dear Dumb Diary is funny. Really really funny if you are in grade one. Popps also likes this book because the characters are older than her, it is a bit like reading a book about the big kids at school. These books are not literary classics, this is not The Secret Garden, but if you are happy for your children to read for enjoyment, give Dear Dumb Diary a go.

Last for today is

Truly Tan by Jen Storer 

 

Tan is a female character that I like, she is smart, she is funny, she is adventurous and she is very interesting. The writing in Truly Tan is much more complex than in the other books I have mentioned today. I would suggest this book is for more advanced readers in junior primary, the website suggests it is designed for children aged 9 and above, I would expect that boys would also like reading Truly Tan, I am half way through it myself!  Truly Tan has some small illustrations scattered through it for those readers who are still keen for the text to be broken up. There is a second Truly Tan book called Jinxed.

Any other suggestions for the junior primary school years? 

P.S. I am Lighting the Night to help raise a cure for Leukaemia. Join in if you can.