Join award-winning teacher, author, literacy expert, and co-founder of The Nerdy Book Club, Donalyn Miller (The Book Whisperer) for an energizing and affirming PD book club centered on “The Commonsense Guide to Your Classroom Library”, her book co-authored with Colby Sharp. It offers a practical model for building… Read More

Below is a collection of books recommended by Nawal Qarooni, expert in family literacy, to share with your loved ones. They represent diverse and varied family makeups and reflect our multidimensional, nuanced world. Please enjoy a special discount of 20% and free shipping on purchases of $25 or more using the code NAWALQAROONI25. Read More

Books create space for caregivers to invite children into a topic that may be challenging for them to articulate their feelings about and discuss. Books naturally scaffold and differentiate when we read with our kids, let them take the lead in conversations, and give them options for response like art, building, movement, discussion, and quietude. Here are some topics caregivers often request titles for and some texts I recommend to broaden the perspective on the topic so young readers can find mulitple connections and points of entry for response: Read More

JoEllen McCarthy champions the power of read alouds and explores her vision for this work for teachers, families, and students in her book, Layers of Learning: Using Read Alouds to Connect Literacy and Caring Conversations. JoEllen believes there is no tool more powerful than a picture book and sharing stories can promote a love of oneself, a love of learning, and through a heartprint framework reflect limitless possibilities for both! She demonstrates the ways we can layer our academic and affective standards using books as our coteachers for lessons in reading, writing, and life! To invite conversations to do this work, you can check out her ever changing “unlist of books.” This will help to shift your thinking from that book… to books that….” because beyond the books, some of the most important lessons we can teach are often those led by children, stirred by a read aloud. Read More

February 1, 2023: Celebrating Black Authors: 10 Books to Add to Your Preschool Classroom Libraries As part of Black History Month, our littles at SproutFive participated in NCTE’s African American Read-In. (Click here to Read More). On February 1, classrooms were given a basket of books to add to their classroom libraries. In the basket were books by four authors/illustrators we’d celebrate together during February–one author/illustrator per week. Our goals were to: •  Celebrate books together as a community •  Get to know authors we may not know •  Share a variety of books in our classrooms •  Add new books to our classroom libraries •  Introduce littles, teachers and families to authors/titles that may be new-to-them We chose four authors/illustrators and a few books by each of the them. We wanted to highlight both authors and illustrators, and we wanted books that would engage young readers in a variety of ways. Our littles are just beginning to build their identities as readers. We know that conversions about authors and illustrators help young children begin to notice similarities in books, expect certain things in books, participate actively and develop tastes as readers. For our month-long celebration, we wanted books that showed joy, celebrated everyday experiences and gave readers much to talk about in the illustrations. Like any great picture book, so much of each of these stories is told in the illustrations. For our teachers and families, we hoped introducing them to a few authors would help them by inviting them to find other books by these authors. Oge Mora and Anne Wynter were the author/illustrator team we celebrated for the first week of African American Read-In. Everybody in the Red Brick Building is a book that is meant to be read aloud, so we chose this one to begin. As young children follow the story, they'll also want to join into the repeated sound effects and notice the interesting font changes. There is also so much to notice in the artwork. This is a great introduction to other books by both Oge Mora and Anne Wynter. Preschool classrooms also received the book Saturday by Oge Mora, and the two books together provide a great opportunity to start to talk to young readers about noticing similarities in illustrations. For Week 2, we celebrated Christian Robinson with You Matter, Another, and Milo Imagines the World. Christian Robinson’s books speak to readers of all ages, and giving preschoolers a chance to enjoy the books and notice how much of a story can be told through the illustrations. Nikki Grimes has a trio of books that we purchased for Week 3 of our celebration. Off to See the Sea, Bedtime for Sweet Creatures, and Playtime for Restless Rascals are similar in their format, artwork and interesting font; young readers will naturally come to expect certain things from this “series” of books. Art, Story and Music work together in C.G. Esperanza's books. For our final week, classrooms received Soul Food Sunday and Boogie Boogie Y’All. Esperanza’s books are a celebration of families and communities. Children will definitely notice the feelings and expressions of the characters in Esperanza's art. We’re confident that getting to know these four authors will be a great experience for our littles. Over time, we hope to add more books by each of these authors (and others) to our preschool classroom libraries. Read More

The Dublin Literacy Conference is proud to partner with SproutFive and Bookelicious to provide books to children in the Columbus area. In alignment with our Dublin City Schools district values, we believe in connecting and collaborating with our community, and we actively seek opportunities to help others. In celebration of literacy and togetherness, this book drive is our way of giving back to the community and supporting early learning for children. Thank you for supporting the development of lifelong learners and readers! At checkout, please use the coupon code DUBLIN2023 to receive 20% off, and ship your book(s) to: (First Name) SproutFive (Last Name) Bookelicious 113 Corporate Drive Radford, VA 24141 Read More

Please enjoy a special discount of 20% off the titles of your choice using the code JENNIFERLAGARDE. Here are Jennifer’s top picks! Read More