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This book is Eragon by Christopher Paolini. A farmboy finds a magical dragon egg, and begins an adventure to overthrow an evil empire alongside dwarves, elves and a secret order of dragon riders, which he is now a part of. I think I really liked this series of novels because it had a grand scope, Paolini builds a vast world with many unique characters, interesting places and an exciting magic system. Being surrounded by high fantasy material from a young age such as Lord of the Rings influenced me in loving this book, and still loving high fantasy today.

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My favorite book series when I was in grade 3 was Harry Potter. I loved the sense of wonder I got while reading and would wake up excited every Saturday morning to read in bed. This book always gave me a cozy feeling as well. My parents would read the series to myself and my brother while we were camping, I have very fond memories of this.

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My favourite books as a kid were the berenstain bear books. I parents bought a bunch of these for me as a kid and I always loved it. I can still remember the stories that I read. I think as a kid I felt like I related with the characters and I loved the colours. I liked anything colourful as a kid and now!

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Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

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Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

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My favourite book in grade 4 was Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone and it was the book that got me into reading. I think I really liked this book because it was about a kid going to school, but his school was magic (unlike mine). At the time, school was okay for me (not too bad and not too good), so reading about a magical school where there was adventure around every corner (and where you could use magic!) was really exciting.

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This book and all the others that followed always made me laugh while introducing life lessons I found helpful. For example when I was nervous going to school on the first day this book helped me realize that leaving home was not as scary as I had originally thought.

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I remember the Jungle Book being one of my favourite books as a child. I had often referred to it as Mowgli since I watched the movie before having read the book :)

As some of you may already know Mowgli grows up in the jungle, surrounded by all kinds of wild animals. During his formative years he is trained to hunt, work in a team with his wolf brothers, until one day when rivalries come up and Sher Khan who wants to abduct him since his childhood makes a comeback in his life.

I think it is a timeless read, focusing on concepts of community and its importance in our lives, in addition to cooperation and love and respect for other beings.

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Title = L'œil du loup
Author = Daniel Pennac
Illustrator = Jacques Ferrandez
Summary:
In grade 3, we had to read this short novel, about a wolf in a zoo and a boy standing outside the wolf's cage staring for days and days. The story happens in the eye of the wolf (he's got only one functionning eye) and in the eye of the boy (he's closed one of his eyes). They discover each other's stories and universes. They are surprised and fascinated because the wolf comes from Alaska and the boy comes from Africa so their environment growing up were very different. They also both discover the violence that they suffered and understand that they are way more similar than they originnaly thought.

The illustrations are light in this book but really helped me pictures the story in my heead while also giving me the liberty of making most of it up. The fact that they saw each other's stories through the eye fascinated me and the violence present really shocked me (not in a bad way but in a awakening way). That's why I choose to talk about this book here.
The amount of text was good for me because I was an avid reader but I don't know how appropriate it was for the others. The fact that one of the protagonist was our age probably helped. And the zoo was a place we'd all gone to during a field trip so it wasn't completly outside of our world.
Finally, I think we had to read it all at the same pace: the teacher would give us a number of chapter to read for that day and then we'd study in class what had happened. I think it's a good way to motivate slow readers or those who don't like to read to do it step by step everyone together instead of showcasing it as a daunting task. Also, I remember feeling a lot of suspense in the story about whether someone was going to get captured or hurt etc. This atmosphere could help reluctant reader: you want to know how it ends!

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Author: Jean-Luc Bizien, Illustrator: Emmanuel Chaunu

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Emma R. - 50 surprises chez les pharaons 

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Emma R. - 50 surprises chez les pharaons 

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One of my favourite memories of grade 5 was when my class discovered the "50 surprises chez les..." series. I went to elementary school in French, so most of the books I read are in that language, but I do believe there is an English version of the book as well.
This book is a choose-your-own-adventure idea where there are decisions or puzzles on each page and you need to decide which page to turn to. The only way to "win" and get to the Pharaoh is to solve the puzzles and choose the correct path. My class would beg our teacher to read these books (I remember doing at least 4 of them) and often times it would be our reward at the end of the day once we had finished all our work.
I loved these books because they weren't like a typical book that you read through. The puzzles and pictures kept you engaged the entire time. The fact that my whole class was so invested in getting to the end of the adventure also added to the excitement. I'm not sure if it would have had the same effect if I was reading it alone.
Highly recommend this book series if you're looking for a fun class engagement activity!

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I loved this book from when I was four months old until well into grade 2. The story originates from a piece of music, written by an American composer in 1907. The lyrics (or story, in this situation) were written by an Irish songwriter in 1932. Here is my favourite version of the song, performed by Anne Murray: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxFIGWm9M6w

My godmother gave me a copy of this when I was an infant, along with a teddy, a mobile for above my bed, and a wind up ceramic teddy bear that played the song. I wore out the paperback copy of the book so Mum gave me a hardcover copy when I was in kindergarten.

I loved singing the song with my mum and looking at the softly painted illustrations. For some reason, the end of the story made me cry every time. I think it was because I could relate to the teddy bears feeling tired after playing all day. Or maybe because I didn't want the story to end because I knew it meant I had to go to bed...

"They love to play and shout
They never have any cares
At six o'clock their mummies and daddies will take them back home to bed
Because they're tired little teddy bears"

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Stand Tall, Molly Lou Melon - Patty Lovell

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Stand Tall, Molly Lou Melon - Patty Lovell

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I loved this book in my early grades of school. It is about a really small girl that moves schools and tries to find her voice. When I was a young girl, I just thought the message was so beautiful and it encouraged me to feel confident and be myself. The illustrations were also as beautiful as they were bizarre, so I think that appealed to me at age 6 because I felt transported when I read it. I think this is one of the books that helped ignite my love for literature early on! I was a sensitive kid and this book made me feel seen. :)

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I Love You Like Crazy Cakes - Kaylee Merrick 

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I Love You Like Crazy Cakes - Kaylee Merrick 

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I Love You Like Crazy Cakes by Rose Lewis was my favourite book in grade 2 and 3. It is a story about a family adopting a baby from China. I used to take turns reading it before bed with my mom, she would read a page and then I would read a page. This book was a tool my parents used to explain my adoption story. The content of this book reiterates the importance of representation in children's literature. It is a special moment for children to see themselves in literature other forms of media.

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Sleep Book by Dr. Seuss was one of my favourite books when I was younger. This story is talking about all aspects of sleep in an engaging way as Dr. Seuss would rhyme and use fun illustrations in his books.

The context where I read the book mattered as I would read it before bed at my grandparents house when I would sleep over, which makes it special to me.
What attracted me to this book when I was younger was probably the illustrations as I am a visual learner and growing up I would learn best when there was a picture to support the text of a book.

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Shane : Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day By: Judith Viorst and Illustrated by: Ray Cruz

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Shane : Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day By: Judith Viorst and Illustrated by: Ray Cruz

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Alexander wakes up and is not having a good time, everything that can go wrong from the eyes of this poor soul does. What’s especially sad is that it seems that all of Alexander’s friends and family are having great days and no one can see where he is coming from. He feels unheard and lost, but every one feels like that sometimes.

My elementary librarian read books to all the classes and this one stuck out because it felt real. I recall feeling like Alexander more than a few times when having to deal with heavy emotions. The ending of the book isn’t exactly happy but it doesn’t need to be, Alexander’s day comes to an end and he gets to try again tomorrow.

The context matters in this book because Alexander could be seen as selfish just trying to get through his day and making sure everyone knows what his problems are but I feel like most kids can see that they’re not alone in dealing with there bad days.

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Nitter Pitter was one of my favourite books as a child mainly for the illustrations! It was a book that actually showed horses as I recognized them as I grew up with them, so some of the other horse illustrations I never found showed horses as I knew they looked! I re-visted the book over the years and actually paid attention to the story, which is that value placed in vanity can have negative impact on relationships and that inner beauty, and other more meaningful aspects of life, are more important than outer appearance. Fun fact: it was based on a real-life horse who actually loved his own reflection!

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My favourite childhood book was the Lorax because it delivered a strong message about saving trees. It raises awareness of environmental issues and the importance of maintaining a green earth. I also enjoy the funny rhymes that Dr. Seuss uses and the funky characters and made up words. I think the book resonated with me in particular as a child because I really liked animals and nature and I knew that if the trees were cut down it would destroy the animals natural habitats.

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This book follows a little girl named Madeline who lives with 11 other girls at a school in Paris. She's brave and eccentric, causing trouble at times. We see what happens when she ends up having to get her appendix removed...dun dun dun.

I remember always coming back to this book as a child, though I don't recall why. I do think the illustrations had this quality to them that was other-worldly. I also think I was intrigued that there was a nun in this book as I didn't know much about them at the time.

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"Love You Forever" by Robert Munsch (Illustrator: Sheila McGraw) was one of my favourite books as a child (still makes me cry when I read it).

Love You Forever is about a mother's experience watching her son grow up and continuing to sing the same lullaby to him of how much she loves him and how he'll always be her baby despite his growing independence. During the mother's old age, the son visits her and sings the lullaby to her and continues the lullaby to his own child.

I liked that book at that age because the meaning had such a big impact on me and really put loving your parents into perspective and how one day you can be taking care of them. The first time, it was read to me by my mom and I cried and cried and then the book just stuck with me ever since.

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Stephanie's ponytail by Robert Munsch was one of my favourite books when I was in elementary school. I loved this book for so many reasons, one because of the illustrations by Michael Martchenke, two because the story made me feel like it was okay to be myself and like what I liked.

The story is about a girl named Stephanie who liked to do her hair in different ponytails. Everyday when she got to school her classmates would tell her that it was ugly, but would then copy her hairstyle the next day. When made fun of, Stephanie says "it's MY ponytail and I like it!".

My mom always read Robert Munsch books with me growing up, so the context in which I read most of these books was at home. It was time that I got to spend with my parents, reading and laughing, which I loved.

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Renée - Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you see?

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Renée - Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you see?

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Summary: With simple and repetitive text for young readers to follow along, this book helps to teach colour association (with objects in our world).

This book was always read to my sister and I at bedtime. It was a nice, simple book to read to wind down at the end of the night. As well, the illustrations (although simple) were captivating. Because my sister is 3 years younger than me, this book was still being read even when I was passed the age of its reading level. However, because it was considered a "classic" in my house and I liked to look at the pictures, I enjoyed it all the same!

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The illustrations are comical, people fall a lot in this book, there are lots of depictions of them with big red lumps on them. It made me laugh

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Author: Robert Munsch
Illustrator: Michael Martchenko
Summary: Anna keeps climbing on things and falling down. Moral of the story is to not give up and that there are safe ways of doing things.

My mom would read to us a lot as kids and she would always exaggerate the dialogue and make it extra funny. So I think I associated it with fun family time. Plus what kid doesn't find people falling down hilarious.

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Casey’s favourite book – Where the Wild Things Are  

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Casey’s favourite book – Where the Wild Things Are  

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“Where the Wild Things Are” is a story about a boy named Max, who was a little too wild for his mother’s liking, from time to time. He had a vivid imagination and one night, he became King of an island full of beasts.

I loved the idea of adventure from a young age, but just like Max, I had a very strong connection to my home.

To this day, I’m moved by this book! The illustrations are fantastic and love is the central theme that resonated with me. I was first read this book by the librarian at my elementary school.

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The Very Hungry Caterpillar- Ayrton's submission

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The Very Hungry Caterpillar- Ayrton's submission

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This was my favourite picture book growing up because I enjoyed how the book extended beyond the text. The author chose to put physical holes into the pages where the caterpillar had taken bites of all the different fruit it ate throughout the story. This made the story more interesting as you could physically interact along with the story. I had this book first read to me by my teacher at school, and also enjoyed reading it alone.

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This book holds a special place in my heart as my parents would often read it to me before bed. The poems are great for all ages. Even as an adult, I feel like I learn something each time I pick it up as there are countless hidden lessons / meanings.