This summer The Five-Year-Old with characteristic enthusiasm has enrolled in not one, but two reading programs. The first is the Dream Big, Read! Massachusetts-wide reading program through our local library. The other is the Imagination’s Destination Summer Reading program at our local Barnes & Noble.

Fortunately, the two programs work really well together. Dream Big, Read! asks The Five-Year-Old to set a goal for the total number of books that she’ll read this summer, and if she manages to read all of them, her school will give her a prize this fall. Meanwhile, the Barnes & Noble program gives The Five-Year-Old a free book for every eight books she reads, giving her the short-term positive feedback so helpful to achieving a longer-term goal. We’ve already claimed The Five-Year-Old’s first free book through the Barnes & Noble program (Melissa Stewart’s Titanic from the National Geographic Readers Series), and The Five-Year-Old is eager to claim a new free book “every week!”, so we’re both pretty pleased with how this summer reading plan is turning out.

The library’s program asks The Five-Year-Old to review the books she reads. Here are a few of her favorites.

The Frogs Wore Red Suspenders
By Jack Prelusky
Illustrated by Petra Mathers
Harper Collins Publishers, 2005

What The Five-Year-Old Thought:
“Perfect. The penguins were the funniest. Actually, the bears were the coolest, where they ate too many pies. You can tell because one has a green face.”

Dinosaurs Before Dark (Magic Tree House Series #1)
By Mary Pope Osborne
Illustrated by Salvatore Murdocca
Random House Children’s Books, 1992

What The Five-Year-Old Thought:
“There was a T. Rex and Jack got away by flying on a pteranodon and it was fantastic.”

The Borrowers Afloat
By Mary Norton
Illustrated by Beth and Joe Krush
Houghton Miflin Harcourt, 2003

What The Five-Year-Old Thought:
“I liked that they were floating in a kettle for a little bit, and that the gypsy got caught.”

Related articles

• Barnes & Noble FREE Book with Summer Reading (urbanmoocher.com)