Nonfiction

Animal books are perennial favorites for pleasure reading and report writing. This spring, series about pets, both common and unusual, are prevalent, as are titles about attention-grabbing (big or scary) creatures. While many of the sets cover standard report elements such as habitats, life cycles, and the food chain, others have a more specific focus.

Kings and queens. Generals and enlisted men. Flamboyant outlaws and gangsters. Intrepid explorers and treasure hunters. Much of the world’s history has been made by people who lived outsized lives, pursued outsized dreams, or achieved outsized deeds.

This spring’s life-science entries offer an assortment of possibilities for refreshing your 500 and 600 sections. Most of the series come with the expected set of nonfiction tools (e.g., TOC, index, glossary, bibliography), but in some cases, publishers are including more text cues to aid the youngest readers with decoding and comprehension skills. Series for older readers are adding questions to help students read to learn.

Students are inundated with status updates, tweets, instant feeds, and more. Many children and teens define themselves by whom they are virtually connected to and what they “like” on social media sites.

Some books are read for pleasure, some for study. But the series in this section show kids that books can be real-world instructors as well. Converting manual activity into language is often an overlooked skill, but it is one that helps develop observational faculties and linguistic precision.

While vampires and Greek myths remain popular, they’ve taken a backseat to some perennial favorites. Ghosts, aliens, and mythical monsters appear more than once in this season’s sets. Fairy tales, too, have a foothold.

“It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities,” says Albus Dumbledore in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. What the wise wizard (and his creator) understands is that children face difficult decisions every day.

Books about bears and pandas are super-popular with K–4 kids and a great way to encourage them to read.