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Classics to Read Aloud to Your Children: Selections from Shakespeare, Twain, Dickens, O.Henry, London, Longfellow, IrvingAesop, Homer, Cervantes, Hawthorne, and More
A perennially popular collection of short stories, poems, legends, and myths from great works of literature that are especially appropriate for parents to read aloud to their children aged five to twelve. Line drawings.
324 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1984
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
October 21, 2009
I can't decide if it was after the humorous reading of O. Henry's The Ransom of Red Chief when my ten-year-old went and retold it to three other friends and his grandparents, then asked to have it for his own quiet reading... or when I cutoff half-way through Romeo and Juliet and my seven-year-old daughter begged me not to stop. Somewhere during this time, I decided that this book is an excellent introduction to the classics.
They loved Sherlock Holmes, Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer and even Rip Van Winkle.
I discovered an admiration for Jack London's Call of The Wild, which I would never have picked out for myself.
I did skip The Red Badge of Courage and will introduce that when they are a bit older.
One note: I read with accents and voices and would guess that this contributed to our enjoyment.
They loved Sherlock Holmes, Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer and even Rip Van Winkle.
I discovered an admiration for Jack London's Call of The Wild, which I would never have picked out for myself.
I did skip The Red Badge of Courage and will introduce that when they are a bit older.
One note: I read with accents and voices and would guess that this contributed to our enjoyment.
May 29, 2019
A good collection of excerpts from classic stories to whet a reader's appetite for more. For example, after reading a selection from Call of the Wild by Jack London, I was inspired to pull my copy of the book from my bookshelf and re-read it. I liked many of the selections but some of the poetry and then religious writings at the end dampened my enthusiasm for the collection. I would have preferred if Russell had stuck to classic fiction -- but that's just me.
May 7, 2020
I pull this down off the shelf to read aloud periodically every school year. Wonderful classics! It's very helpful to have them divided by age.
September 30, 2021
A sentimental re-read for sure. We'll keep coming back to these stories.
May 16, 2022
An excellent concept—an anthology of classical works suitable for elementary school age children to listen to. The pieces were mostly well chosen, with some caveats. These are generallly robust stories or poems, with a preponderance of American authors, but quite a few English authors, and some others, usually a few pages long. I found two longer than twenty pages, with Jack London’s Call of the Wild at thirty-two pages the longest.
The two stories I had concerns about were a Robin Hood adventure, and a chapter extracted from Anna Sewell’s Black Beauty. I can understand others skipping Stephen Crane’s Red Badge of Courage and two retellings of bible stories by William Canton. The Robin Hood story was the oddest telling about that character I’ve ever read. Maybe it was because this version had an American author, but it completely missed the whole point of these stories, that are good-natured romps starring a folk hero who was a hero to the poor who lived under the heel of an evil sheriff. In this telling, Robin Hood hides from the sheriff (literally) behind the skirts of a crazy old woman, who is left to deal with him the evil sheriff by herself. Some hero. There is also an entirely gratuitous telling of an incident (pp. 32-33) in which a man sees an old woman one dark night carrying a bundle that turns out to contain a human head. This is recommended for five-year-olds!
I’ve yet to meet a small child who liked Black Beauty, not surprisingly since this book was written to shock adults into understanding the extreme degree of cruelty horses in the 19th century often endured. This book only contains the first chapter, in which Black Beauty, after four wonderful years in a pasture, is broken to crupper, bit, and blinkers. Another book placed in the 5+ section.
I also skipped two retellings of Exodus and the Gospels by the Victorian religious writer William Canton. For the first of these two pieces, the editor earnestly recommends that historical accuracy is less important than exploring your children’s feelings about enslavement and liberation. Apparently, children are never to be allowed to just enjoy stories.
Generally, I was confused about who the editor thought the adult readers were, at least their reading level. There are a fair number of glosses of words and proper names, annoyingly often interspersed in the text, rather than put in their conventional position as footnotes. That could be helpful, but isn’t because which words are glossed is random and odd. For example, the word ‘ere’ is glossed in three different pieces, while such words as ‘anxiously’, ‘belligerent’, ‘ignominiously’ and ‘miniatures’ from the same pieces are not glossed.
More worryingly, foreign names, of which there are many in the book, are often pronounced in hilariously incorrect ways. For example, Greek ‘cyclopes’ is given as ‘SYE-clopps’, French ‘tête-à-tête’ as ‘tay-tah-TAY’, and Dutch ‘Mynheer’ as ‘mine-HAIR’. There is, for the record, no pronunciation guide: we are left to guess, for example, the difference between ‘A’, ‘AA’, ‘AH, ‘AIR’, and ‘AY’.
The two stories I had concerns about were a Robin Hood adventure, and a chapter extracted from Anna Sewell’s Black Beauty. I can understand others skipping Stephen Crane’s Red Badge of Courage and two retellings of bible stories by William Canton. The Robin Hood story was the oddest telling about that character I’ve ever read. Maybe it was because this version had an American author, but it completely missed the whole point of these stories, that are good-natured romps starring a folk hero who was a hero to the poor who lived under the heel of an evil sheriff. In this telling, Robin Hood hides from the sheriff (literally) behind the skirts of a crazy old woman, who is left to deal with him the evil sheriff by herself. Some hero. There is also an entirely gratuitous telling of an incident (pp. 32-33) in which a man sees an old woman one dark night carrying a bundle that turns out to contain a human head. This is recommended for five-year-olds!
I’ve yet to meet a small child who liked Black Beauty, not surprisingly since this book was written to shock adults into understanding the extreme degree of cruelty horses in the 19th century often endured. This book only contains the first chapter, in which Black Beauty, after four wonderful years in a pasture, is broken to crupper, bit, and blinkers. Another book placed in the 5+ section.
I also skipped two retellings of Exodus and the Gospels by the Victorian religious writer William Canton. For the first of these two pieces, the editor earnestly recommends that historical accuracy is less important than exploring your children’s feelings about enslavement and liberation. Apparently, children are never to be allowed to just enjoy stories.
Generally, I was confused about who the editor thought the adult readers were, at least their reading level. There are a fair number of glosses of words and proper names, annoyingly often interspersed in the text, rather than put in their conventional position as footnotes. That could be helpful, but isn’t because which words are glossed is random and odd. For example, the word ‘ere’ is glossed in three different pieces, while such words as ‘anxiously’, ‘belligerent’, ‘ignominiously’ and ‘miniatures’ from the same pieces are not glossed.
More worryingly, foreign names, of which there are many in the book, are often pronounced in hilariously incorrect ways. For example, Greek ‘cyclopes’ is given as ‘SYE-clopps’, French ‘tête-à-tête’ as ‘tay-tah-TAY’, and Dutch ‘Mynheer’ as ‘mine-HAIR’. There is, for the record, no pronunciation guide: we are left to guess, for example, the difference between ‘A’, ‘AA’, ‘AH, ‘AIR’, and ‘AY’.
August 9, 2022
Wonderful book to read to children or b yourself
December 30, 2012
Throughout our lives we hear many analogies and idioms that refer to classic literature. It is so interesting to read the stories behind the constant references that are such a part of our culture! In addition, my daughter loves these well-written stories and the vocabulary help at the beginning of each story. There are poems and well as stories that are short enough to keep your kids awake, but long enough to make an impact and tell a great story! We try to read this book and its companion "More Classics to Read Aloud to Your Children" every night!
March 22, 2010
I ordered this one based on amazon reviews and am not disappointed. I have only read a couple of the stories so far but think it will be a great way (I'm hoping) to get my kids interested in reading something besides the newest popular book. Maybe I need that a little myself as well :)
Excellent collection of stories/excerpts. Stories are sorted by reading age and each selection is prefaced by a general statement about the story, reading time required, and vocabulary.
Excellent collection of stories/excerpts. Stories are sorted by reading age and each selection is prefaced by a general statement about the story, reading time required, and vocabulary.
April 14, 2009
We just read the first section of this book to our older boys. The next sections are for even older children. It was fun to share some classic stories with our kids and explain some "old-fashioned" words, like "whitewashing a fence." Each story is short and can be easily read in one sitting.
September 22, 2013
This was interlibrary loan, and so I didn't have a chance to read very many of the selections to my son before I had to return it... but I rather liked it and wished that my library had a copy of it...
April 8, 2017
An age appropriate collection of classic short stories, poems, legends, and myths to read aloud to your kids. Highly recommend this book to any educator, parent, or anyone wishing to share the love of the "classics".
Want to read
November 20, 2011I can't wait to get Ellie started on the classics...
October 20, 2014
A book of classic stories that children should know. And it's nice to have them in a format you can read them out loud when your kids are young and enjoy that.
October 8, 2009
My girls and I have had a great time reading this book together. I'm definitely going to look for this one at our used book store. A great reference to have on the shelf.
July 24, 2014
We're also reading Classic Myths to Read Aloud to Your Children.
October 31, 2009
My mom read this to me.
December 17, 2011
I enjoyed reading the stories to my kids and the kids enjoyed most of them. There wre a few that they didn't like very much but I expected that when I picked up the book.
October 1, 2014
I was so glad to be able to give my son a taste of some wonderful classics. A great read aloud for children. He lived a Christmas carol and sleepy hollow especially. :)
April 14, 2016
Everything you need to get your 5-yr old hooked on classic literature!
August 18, 2017
I've only read the section for my children's ages but I loved every minute! Highly recommend!
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews