Children are such omnivorous readers that teachers and parents are constantly at their wit"s end, not only in naming enough books to supply their demands, but in grouping these books according to the order of difficulty. Most public libraries can furnish such lists based upon their experience with children. In fact no modern public library can carry on its work successfully without an especially prepared librarian in charge of the books for children. The arrangement of any list by grades must at best be only approximate, but if done in the light of a wide experience may be of the greatest practical help to the young teacher or to the parent. The following list is one issued by the Chicago Public Library, and is used here through the great kindness of Miss Adah F. Whitcomb, supervisor of the children"s room and director of the training cla.s.s. Any well-selected collection for children will contain a large proportion of these t.i.tles, and the list is extended enough and varied enough to furnish attractive reading material for any young person. At need it may be supplemented by the more elaborate lists found in some of the guides mentioned in the General Bibliography (p.
2).
FIRST GRADE
Banta, N. Moore, and Benson, Alpha B., _Brownie Primer_.
Blaisdell, Mary Frances, _Mother Goose Children_.
Brooke, Leonard Leslie, _Johnny Crow"s Garden_.
----, _Johnny Crow"s Party_.
Buffum, Katharine G., _Mother Goose in Silhouettes_.
Craik, Georgiana Marion, _So-fat and Mew-mew_.
Crane, Walter, _Beauty and the Beast Picture Book_.
----, _Bluebeard"s Picture Book_.
----, _Cinderella"s Picture Book_.
----, _Goody Two Shoes Picture Book_.
----, _Mother Hubbard, Her Picture Book_.
----, _Red Riding Hood"s Picture Book_.
----, _Song of Sixpence_.
----, _This Little Pig, His Picture Book_.
----, _Buckle My Shoe_.
Fox, Florence Cornelia, _The Indian Primer_.
Gaynor, Mrs. Jessie Love, and Riley, Alice C. D., _Songs of the Child-World_.
Greenaway, Kate, _Under the Window_.
Haaren, John Henry, _Rhymes and Fables_.
Howard, Frederick Ward, _Banbury Cross Stories_.
Lansing, Marion Florence, _The Child"s World Garden_.
Le Fevre, Felicite, _The c.o.c.k, the Mouse, and the Little Red Hen_.
Lucas, Edward Verrall, _Four and Twenty Toilers_.
Mother Goose, _The Real Mother Goose_ (illus. by Blanche Fisher Wright).
Noyes, Marion, _The Sunshine Primer_.
Saxby, Lewis, _Life of a Wooden Doll_.
Seton, Ernest Thompson, _Wild Animal Play for Children_.
Skinner, A. M., and Lawrence, L. N., _Little Dramas for Primary Grades_.
Smith, Elmer Boyd, _Chicken World_.
Varney, A. S., _The Robin Reader_.
Welsh, Charles, (ed.), _Mother Goose Nursery Rhymes_.
Wiltse, Sara E., _Folklore Stories and Proverbs_.
SECOND GRADE
Adelborg, Ottilia, _Clean Peter and the Children of Grubbylea_.
aesopus, _Fables_ (Dalkeith ed.).
Bannerman, Mrs. Helen, _Story of Little Black Sambo_.
Ba.s.s, Florence, _Nature Stories for Young Readers: Animal Life_.
----, _Nature Stories for Young Readers: Plant Life_.
Bryce, Catherine Turner, _Stevenson Reader_.
Burgess, Gelett, _Goops, and How to Be Them_.
----, _More Goops, and How Not to Be Them_.
Caldecott, Randolph, _Come La.s.ses Picture Book_.
----, _Hey Diddle Diddle Picture Book_.
Coe, Ida, _Story Hour Readers_. Vols. 3, 4.
Cooke, Flora J., _Nature Myths and Stories for Little Children_.
Craik, Georgiana Marion, _Bow-wow and Mew-mew_.
Crane, Walter, _Baby"s Own aesop_.