35 Best Homeschool Read Alouds (for all ages + stages)

In this post I share our current reading routine, some encouragement for you if all your kids are still small, and a list of the best homeschool read alouds that we have enjoyed over the past twelve years of parenting!

It’s no secret that we love to read in this one-room schoolhouse of ours! With five busy children in the home my husband and I do not have time for many hobbies, but we still manage to squeeze out a bit of time for personal reading during the week. The children don’t all love to read on their own (yet), but all of five of them adore our family reading times, and picking out some of the best homeschool read alouds is a big part of that.

Side Note of Encouragement if you only have littles right now (ages 4 and younger):

You are currently in the HARD stage of learning to read together. If it feels hard, that’s because it is. Your reading time will get so, so much more enjoyable if you don’t give up now! Keep persevering with your reading habits, even if it’s only for 2 minutes before they start fussing, even if everyone is squirming around and “not listening,” and I promise it will get better! Habits are amazingly powerful and your littles will learn, eventually, how to listen and enjoy a book.

Also, your youngest kids won’t have to go through this same learning phase because they will grow up in a home where read-alouds are already happening and they will (mostly) integrate into the activity without such a steep learning curve. Our youngest (2.5 yrs old) is already sitting through LONG chapter books at lunch, which I never would have attempted when our oldest was that age – but we’ve been doing this since before he was born so he doesn’t know any differently. Yes, he interrupts and spills things and distracts us, but he’s also grown accustomed to the habit with surprising ease.

We are in such a different place now than we were six or seven years ago, and if you keep going, you will get there too. I promise.

Our Current Reading Routine

Most weeks, I read aloud during our homeschool Morning Time, I read a chapter book just for fun during lunch, I read a few picture books during the day to the younger kids (and whatever assorted older kids happen to be hanging over the couch), and then in the evening Daddy reads another book to the three older boys. This is a lot of reading.

In the course of 11.5 years of parenting, we have read a lot of books. Some have been lousy, some mediocre, and many excellent. Here is a list of our top favorite, loved-by-all, best homeschool read alouds – though of course, read alouds are not exclusive property of homeschoolers, and therein lies their magic. Any family, in any situation, with any ages of kids can experience the shared joy of reading a great book together.

I have tried to be picky with this list. Some are classics, some are “twaddle”; but I have ONLY included the books that a) we have actually read, and b) that we have enjoyed enough to want to read again (many of which we did in fact read again). You can find many good books lists online, and my own shelves are full of many more books that we want to read someday, but sometimes it’s helpful to get a recommendation, from a real-life friend, of a book that her real-life kids have loved.

Furthermore, I have attempted to classify them based on the age of your children – easiest-to-listen-to for the youngest kids, and gradually longer, more complex stories for the older kids (though I purposefully did not give actual ages because every child is different; you know best what their attention span/listening ability is like). Enjoy!

Best Homeschool Read Alouds (organized by difficulty)

Easy Chapter Books (if your kids are younger)

If you are just dipping your toes into the chapter-book-world, you’ll probably realize that a) your children are NOT used to listening to books with no pictures and b) that chapter books have a LOT of words. The solution that worked best for us was to start with “transition” books; i.e., books with short chapters, frequent pictures, and slightly less text than regular chapter books. It also helps immensely if you read while they are eating: hands are busy, mouths are full, and ears are (more likely) to be open. Here are some of our favorites!

1. My Father’s Dragon by Ruth Stiles Gannett
2. The Fabled Stables by Jonathan Auxier (three books in the series so far)
3. Magic Treehouse Books by Mary Pope Osborne (you’ll probably get tired of these eventually, they are fairly formulaic, but our kids loved them for quite a long time and the short chapters worked really well for learning how to listen to chapter books!)
4. The Bears on Hemlock Mountain by Alice Dalgliesh
5. Mercy Watson books by Kate DiCamillo (so much fun and the illustrations are amazing!)
6. The Courage of Sarah Noble by Alice Dalgliesh
7. The Matchlock Gun by Walter Edmonds

Mid-length Chapter Books (if your kids are less young)

This is where the fun really begins – once you can get into slightly heftier chapter books, a fantastic world of literature opens to you and it is so much fun! We have laughed over these and cried over these (well, only Mom has cried) and most of them have been read more than once. As a point of reference, our recently-turned-five year old has trouble following some of these books, but she still enjoys listening along with her big brothers.

1. The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo
2. The Chronicles of Narnia series by C. S. Lewis
3. The Wingfeather series by Andrew Peterson
4. The Wild Robot (and subsequent books) by Peter Brown
5. Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder (and other Little House books)
6. Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder
7. Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White
8. Skunk and Badger by Amy Timberlake
9. The Penderwicks by Jeanne Birdsall
10. Snow Treasure by Marie McSwigan
11. Mr. Popper’s Penguins by Richard Atwater
12. The Mouse and the Motorcycle (and subsequent books) by Beverly Cleary
13. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
14. James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
15. Peter Nimble and His Fantastic Eyes by Jonathan Auxier
16. The Adventures of Jimmy Skunk by Thornton Burgess (and other animal adventures by him)
17. Winnie-the-Pooh by A. A. Milne
18. The Boxcar Children by Gertrude Chandler Warner
19. The Vanderbeekers of 141st Street by Karina Yan Glaser
20. My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George
21. Paddle-to-the-Sea by Holling Clancy Holling (technically probably a picture book, but it has enough words that we needed to split it up like a chapter book)
22. Rufus Redtail by Helen Garrett (unfortunately out of print and not worth paying hundreds of dollars for, but if you ever see it in a garage sale it would be worth grabbing!)
23. Little Pilgrim’s Progress by Helen Taylor

More Complex Chapter Books (if your kids are even less young)

As you can see from the brevity of this list, we are just getting old enough to really savor these more complex books. In our family, our recently-turned-eight year old had trouble following some of these stories, while the nine and eleven year olds loved them. They are longer and more complex but so worth the effort, once your child is ready! There are many more excellent books in this category that we haven’t gotten to yet, so I will most likely keep updating this list as we do. More of the best homeschool read alouds coming in the future!

1. The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien
2. The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
3. Christian Heroes Then and Now series by Janet and Geoff Benge (the boys’ favorite so far was probably Jim Elliot)
4. The Princess and the Goblin by George MacDonald
5. Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
6. Harry Potter (books 1-3) by J. K. Rowling

I hope this list is helpful and that you find some inspiration here for your next family read aloud. Reading to my children sometimes feels like cheating, because it’s fun for everyone and yet the children are still learning so much through it! Finally, if you need even more book inspiration (there’s no such thing as too many books, right??), check out my START HERE page which lists out the other blog posts containing book lists so that you can easily find one you’re looking for.

Happy reading!