One of the most amazing things to watch is a child learning to read. However, finding appropriate books for emergent/beginning readers can be difficult. Many of the Level One readers are not simple enough for very early readers. In my opinion, they are too long and have words that are too difficult. The other problem is there aren't enough books at one level for mastery and confidence building. I finally found a set of books that is perfect for beginning readers.

The set of books is called Brand New Readers. There are five sets of books, with ten short books per set. They are the best for emergent readers that I have found. The pictures are great; they provide context clues if they reader gets stuck and the language matches the pictures perfectly. The sentences follow patterns and repetition for confidence and predictions. Even though the books are short, the stories are engaging. We look at the pictures; our daughter reads the book; I read the book; then we read it together for mastery. There are only about eight pages with one short sentence per page. There is also a parent book to help you teach your child how to use the books effectively and a sticker/achievement chart that keeps track of the books your child has read.

These books really build confidence and our daughter loves them. Since beginning to read these books, she is much more likely to sit down and read to herself. She knows that she can read and is more confident in her abilities.

There's an example of one of the books below. All of the box sets are about the same reading level.