Books About Homeschooling

These are books about homeschooling that either I or my friends have read and highly recommend.

 

GENERAL HOMESCHOOLING

Teaching From Rest
I listen to this at least yearly. It calms the anxiety of feeling like I’m not doing enough. It brings peace to my heart. It helps me refocus on the most important things. This is the most commonly mentioned book when new homeschoolers ask for suggestions!

Rethinking School
This book would be especially good for those of you who plan to put your kids back in school next year. It is not a homeschooling book but is written to everyone with children. Some really good information here.

The Call of the Wild and Free
If you are a new homeschooler, this book will help open your eyes to the possibilities of a freer, richer education.

Brave Learner
How to make education an exciting, enchanting experience for your kids. (Some advice here leans a little too close to the unparenting side of unschooling for my tastes, so use discernment as you read. Don’t let that dissuade you, though! This is a very popular book and will help inspire you and loosen you up if you are an anxious, Type A person!)

The Read Aloud Family
Inspiring book that will convince you of the benefits of reading aloud to your kids. This one always gets high praise.

Better Together
A guide to what Morning Time is and how it can enrich your family life.

Homeschooling Gifted Kids
Great guide for those new to homeschooling and raising bright, intense, asynchronous kiddos.

 

CHARLOTTE MASON SPECIFIC

For the Children’s Sake
The most often recommended book for people who are curious about the Charlotte Mason method. This is the book that started the movement in the United States. It feels a bit dated now, but very inspirational. It will give you a new vision for your family. This is my Goodreads review: “A ‘must read’ for every Christian parent, no matter where your children go to school. This will give you a vision for what a good education and a good childhood can and should look like.”

Know and Tell
THE book about narration from Kindergarten through graduation.

The Living Page
All about the various notebooks in a Charlotte Mason education. Enlightening.

Consider This
One of my tippy top favorite homeschooling books. This discusses Classical and Charlotte Mason education. Enlightening. Convincing. Paradigm-shifting. This is the book that convinced me to use the Charlotte Mason method and allowed me to ALSO call myself a Classical educator.

A Philosophy of Education
If you are only going to read one book by Charlotte Mason, let this be the one. This one was written last and lays out her philosophy, going over each subject individually. This would be a fascinating read for any schoolteachers out there! Your mind will be blown! I basically underlined the whole thing.

 

MISCELLANEOUS

Last Child in the Woods
The power of nature in a child’s life.

Mere Motherhood
A view from the other side of the trenches. Written by a mom of 8 boys and 1 girl who has become an inspiration to thousands of homeschooling moms around the world.

A Thomas Jefferson Education
If you are looking for a mix of classical and unschooling, this is your book!

FREE Audio Books for Kids

These audio books from LibriVox are always free! There is an app that might make these easier to access for your kids. The Pro version with no ads is $2. Sometimes the narrators are unpleasant to listen to since they are all volunteers and don’t always have good recording equipment, so you need to check first. I’m including ones that seem pretty good from the samples. If you don’t like a particular narrator, check the site/app to see if there is another version you would like better. These are all books we did use in our homeschool or would have used if I’d known about them. The age ranges are just my best guess and may not be right for your particular children. If they aren’t used to listening to audio books, start with those meant for younger kids. I did try to note any that I remembered being somewhat scary. Don’t skip the ones with “princess” in the title if you have a boy. These are great stories for all!….

 

AGES 4+

My Father’s Dragon (This is the most adorable thing you will ever hear!)

Collection of Beatrix Potter Stories (Dramatic Readings by a cast of children)

When We Were Very Young (delightful poetry by A.A. Milne)

A Child’s Garden of Verses

Poems Every Child Should Know

The Aesop for Children (various narrators)

Aesop’s Fables

The Adventures of Peter Cottontail

The Adventures of Reddy Fox

The Adventures of Sammy Jay

The Adventures of Bobby Coon

The Adventures of Buster Bear

The Adventures of Chatterer the Red Squirrel

The Adventures of Bob White

The Adventures of Jimmy Skunk

The Adventures of Johnny Chuck

The Adventures of Lightfoot the Deer

The Adventures of Old Man Coyote

The Adventures of Old Mr. Toad

The Adventures of Paddy Beaver

Blacky the Crow

Bowser the Hound

Mother West Wind “Where” Stories

Raggedy Ann Stories

Fifty Famous Stories Retold

Just So Stories

 

AGES 6+

The King of the Golden River

The Reluctant Dragon

Five Children and It

Five Children and It (Dramatic Reading)

The Phoenix and the Carpet

The Story of the Amulet

The Railway Children

The Railway Children (Dramatic Reading)

The Magic City

The Book of Dragons

Rikki Tikki Tavi (short story)

A Wonder Book for Girls and Boys (Greek Myths)

A Wonder Book for Girls and Boys (another version)

The Light Princess and Other Tales

The Princess and the Goblin (possibly scary for sensitive children)

The Princess and Curdie

At the Back of the North Wind

Puck of Pook’s Hill

Andrew Lang’s Fairy Books (some stories are scary for sensitive children)

Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

Hans Brinker (or The Silver Skates)

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (The whole series is available on the site here.)

Eight Cousins

Five Little Peppers and How They Grew

Understood Betsy (This is especially good for fearful/shy children to listen to!)

Jack and Jill

Teddy’s Button

A Little Princess

A Little Princess

Little Lord Fauntleroy (Dramatic Reading)

The Secret Garden

Heidi

Heidi (Dramatic Reading)

Pollyanna

The Story of Doctor Dolittle

Tales from Shakespeare

Black Beauty

Our Island Story, Part 1

Our Island Story, Part 2

Peter Pan (Dramatic Reading)

The Wind in the Willows

The Jungle Book

The Story of the Treasure-Seekers

 

 

AGES 9+

The Children of Odin

The Adventures of Odysseus and the Tales of Troy

The Golden Fleece and the Heroes Who Lived Before Achilles

Children of the New Forest

The Story of Rolf and the Viking’s Bow

The Story of Mankind

The Story of the Other Wise Man (Christmas story)

What Katy Did

What Katy Did at School

Anne of Green Gables

Anne of Avonlea

Rilla of Ingleside

Grammar-Land (Good intro to parts of speech)

Under the Lilacs

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

Treasure Island

The Prince and the Pauper

Black Beauty

The House of Arden

The Song of Hiawatha

 

Ages 14+  (I haven’t read all of these, but all are on trustworthy lists for high schoolers.)

The Innocence of Father Brown

The Wisdom of Father Brown

The Man Who Knew Too Much

The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare

Oliver Twist

Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc

The Black Arrow

She Stoops to Conquer

Pride and Prejudice

A Tale of Two Cities

The Scarlet Pimpernel

The Pilgrim’s Progress

Twelve Years a Slave

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

Up From Slavery

Alexander the Great

The History of Julius Caesar

Margaret of Anjou

Richard II

Richard III

Frankenstein

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Silas Marner

Jane Eyre

Orthodoxy

Unknown to History

 

 

Books we haven’t read but I thought looked interesting

The Book of Art for Young People (This would be good for art study during school!)

Little Bear

Our Little English Cousin

Royal Children of English History

KayRay’s Storytime

Stories of Great Composers for Children

A Little Brother to the Bear

Uncle Wiggily on the Farm

Uncle Wiggily and Old Mother Hubbard

The Story of Abraham Lincoln

Historical Tales

American Fairy Tales

Bird Stories from Burroughs

Squirrels and Other Fur-Bearers

The Magic World

History of France

 

 

And here is a list of books for you to find in your library app if possible

  • Winnie the Pooh
  • The House at Pooh Corner
  • Just So Stories
  • Books by Thornton Burgess
  • Farmer Boy
  • The Blue Fairy Book by Lang (may be scary)
  • The Wonderful Wizard of Oz series
  • Charlotte’s Web
  • Mr. Popper’s Penguins
  • Peter and the Wolf (music and story)
  • Fifty Famous Stories Retold
  • Little House in the Big Woods
  • The Little Duke by Yonge
  • The Wind in the Willows
  • Homer Price
  • Five Little Peppers and How They Grew
  • Otto of the Silver Hand (child loses a hand, combat to the death)
  • Along Came a Dog
  • The Door in the Wall
  • The Light Princess by Macdonald
  • King of the Wind
  • Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
  • The Secret Garden
  • Peter Pan
  • A Wonder Book and Tanglewood Tales by Hawthorne
  • All-of-a-Kind Family
  • Five Children and It
  • The Hundred Dresses
  • Pippi Longstocking
  • Children of Noisy Village
  • The Voyages of Dr. Dolittle
  • The Indian Captive
  • Little Britches
  • Day Boy and Night Girl
  • The Princess and the Goblin
  • Call It Courage
  • Stuart Little
  • The Cabin Faced West
  • The Sign of the Beaver
  • Bud, Not Buddy
  • A Bear Called Paddington
  • The Mouse and the Motorcycle
  • The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and sequels
  • Ben and Me
  • Mr. Revere and I
  • Rabbit Hill
  • By the Great Horn Spoon
  • Carry On, Mr. Bowditch
  • Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang
  • The Great Turkey Walk
  • My Side of the Mountain
  • Understood Betsy
  • A Little Princess
  • Our Island Story

Newer Publications

  • The Green Ember and sequels
  • American Tall Tales by Osborne
  • The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place series
  • The Wolves of Willoughby Chase
  • The Borrowers
  • The Moffats
  • The Saturdays
  • Redwall
  • Where the Mountain Meets the Moon (and others by Grace Lin)
  • Peter Nimble and His Fantastic Eyes
  • On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness and sequels
  • The Vanderbeekers of 141st Street
  • TumTum and Nutmeg series
  • Wonder
  • The Wild Robot
  • Because of Winn Dixie
  • The Phantom Tollbooth

Great Book Lists

Most of these are book lists I have used and enjoyed for our family while homeschooling through the years! When you have one or more voracious readers, you’ve got to stay ahead of them! There was no way I could preview all books before my daughter read them. These are the lists I trusted (or would trust if I’d known about them at the time) to give me high quality selections that promote the True, the Good, and the Beautiful. (That doesn’t mean there is nothing ugly or evil in these books. Far from it! But sometimes you need to see how dark evil is in order to see the true strength and light of the Good.)

A little plug: Our family owns and operates BiblioHaven.com where we sell vintage children’s books! After looking through the lists below, you can find many of the books for sale on our website so please check it out and support our small business!  🙂

1000 Good Books

Read Aloud Revival

Charlotte Mason Plenary

Well Educated Heart

Reshelving Alexandria (now free to the public!)

Sonlight (Christian)

Bookshark (secular)

Sabbath Mood Living Science Books

Living Math Books

Ursa Minor (7th-12th grade)

Ambleside Online (check especially the literature and read aloud sections)

Wildwood Curriculum