I am a super lucky dad. My daughter has loved reading from practically day one. She's three and a half now, and reading is a big part of our days together. As a stay-at-home dad, one of my big privileges is getting to shape her amazingly inquisitive mind through what we read together. So I thought I'd take a moment to share briefly a little about some of my our favorite books to read together.
On a Beam of Light.
Okay, with a sci-fi writer and filmmaker as a dad, there's little chance my daughter won't be a little nerdy. Even quite early on, my daughter and I really enjoyed reading this book together. It's an engaging story and we have engaged in fun conversations about how curiosity and imagination can bring about great scientific insight. And as a relativity theory loving dad, I can't help but talking to my daughter about concepts that come up in this book, like time dilation. Okay, she probably doesn't get that into dime dilation discussions, but she has loved reading this book again and again.
The Book With No Pictures
I have to admit that I knew nothing about this book when I ran across it in Barnes and Noble. Well, almost nothing. The one thing I did know is that B. J. Novak was an actor and writer in one of my favorite TV shows of recent years, The Office (American version). So when I saw this book and his name, I was intrigued. I picked it up, leafed through it, and started chuckling. That was an easy buy. We now have two copies of the book, and they have been beat up and read over and over. It's hilarious and interactive.
Journey
For something completely different than The Book with No Pictures, I highly recommend Aaron Becker's Journey. You could call it "the book with no words," but that doesn't do Journey justice. Its beautiful artwork takes us through an adventure of imagination and the discovery of friendship. My daughter has really taken to this book to the point that she found a small tube at home and declared it her piece of magic chalk and talks of how she can travel to the "ever tree forest"--what she calls the woods the girl discovers in the book. Need a closer look? Check out the beautiful book trailer below.
