Every day I discover more and more beautiful things. It’s enough to drive one mad. I have such a desire to do everything, my head is bursting with it.
- Claude Monet
Dad Suggests was created to share with others the many different things that we have loved sharing with our own children.
Our hope is that - by reading or visiting our children’s bookstore - you will find something special to enjoy with your own family.
- Ryan
All tagged books that teach
Lulu the Beaver is a wonderful new picture book to add to your toolbox of stories that teach kids to be themselves. Art matters, and pursuing your interests is vitally important.
Tell the Truth, Dragon! is a brand-new interactive picture book from Bianca Schulze and Samara Hardy. Learn a valuable lesson while, most importantly, having a lot of fun yelling at the Dragon to tell the truth!
The publication world had a little Operation Warp Speed of their own, because there are already a lot of kids books about the coronavirus pandemic. These are our favorites, and I hope this list of picture books helps you have a little heart to heart about quarantine with the kids in your lives.
Kevin the Unicorn: It’s Not All Rainbows is the perfect picture book to teach our children that it’s okay not to be perfect. It’s also completely normal to have bad days, and the pressure that society puts on us to be perfect is frankly unhealthy.
Cori Doerrfeld’s Goodbye, Friend! Hello, Friend! is a poignant lesson about the Yin and Yang in life. Every goodbye leads to a hello. It’s a beautiful book, and very useful for teaching your kids about how to deal with change and keep a positive mindset about adversity in life.
Teach your kids to love who they are. This book list contains the very best picture books for conveying this message to your kids - celebrate being yourself. Do what you love. Follow your passions. Be proud of who you are.
Immersion is one of the best ways to learn a foreign language. If the best advice for building your child’s vocabulary and setting them up for success is reading to them, why would it be any different with another language? Start exposing your kids to foreign languages through picture books.
Society is doing a very good job making children believe they’re worthless if they aren’t good at tests. I recently discovered the absolute perfect way to teach children otherwise - a picture book called All the Ways to Be Smart by Davina Bell. You simply must read this one with your kids.
As far as I’m concerned, books that tackle topics like empathy and friendship are tackling meaning of life stuff. They’re trying to give kids the tools to build meaningful relationships and spend their days on Earth in a worthwhile fashion. A Sick Day for Amos McGee provides these lessons better than any other picture book we have.
This is not your typical list of alphabet books. That’s because these books could easily be considered some of our favorite picture books ever made. They’re funny, they’re exciting, they’re beautiful, and, most importantly, they’re interesting. Who has time to waste reading A is for apple and B is for ball? Just because it’s the alphabet doesn’t mean it can’t be wildly entertaining and inspiring.
These are the best picture books that teach colors. Illustrating a picture book must always be a challenge. But I imagine that illustrating a picture book about colors is a very special challenge in-and-of itself. You’re tasked with capturing the very essence of illustrations themselves.
A Family is a Family is a Family by Sara O’Leary is a picture book that celebrates love - and how it’s love that makes a family. The message inside is extremely important for kids. If you’re looking to vaccinate your child for bigotry, just read them this story every night.
These are the very best picture books that teach kids empathy. Teach your children how to empathize with others. All of these kids books do a spectacular job of placing you in the shoes of someone else, and they show you that other creatures have lives and feelings too.
Quiet Please, Owen McPhee! is a picture book about listening. Trudy Ludwig has once again proven herself to be the queen of empathy. Ludwig and Patrice Barton have teamed up again to bring us another incredible story that will lead to our kids reflecting on how their actions might affect others.
These are our very favorite picture books with life lessons. The best picture books take incredibly important life lessons and isolate them down into a completely accessible, beautiful, compact work of art. They expose children to new thoughts and feelings and allow them to process it at their own level.
Pink is for Boys is a picture book by Robb Pearlman that throws absurd societal norms about colors out the window. It also teaches equality among boys and girls - the activities they're allowed to do and the things they're allowed to like. This is a picture book you simply must share with your kids.
The Invisible Boy by Trudy Ludwig and illustrated by Patrice Barton is a picture book about reaching out to someone who needs a friend. It is a masterclass example of empathy, and it should be in every home, library, and classroom in the world.
