Branches

There's a fantastic new series of books for kids who are still learning to read longer and longer books. I'd say these books are perfect for 1st through 3rd graders. They have lots of fantastic pictures, but they are longer than say, Henry and Mudge, and the vocabulary gets increasingly more difficult.

They are just short enough, however, for a child to read the whole thing in one block of time, something important for emerging readers who aren't yet ready to read books by chapter.

It's Scholastic's emerging reader series: Branches. The variety in this series is so tremendous, there is no way you won't find something your child will love.

Flannery loves all of them, and her reading is getting better and better every day thanks to these books.