April is Poetry Month and here at Russ On Reading we continue our exploration of poetry read alouds for children with a few books that tell their stories in rhyme. Call it doggerel if you will, what children will tell you is that these stories are entertaining and that the rhymes add to the fun. What reading specialists will tell you is that the rhythm and rhyme in these stories support young readers developing fluency. There are many rhyming books out there, some are very familiar like Click, Clack Moo or the many Dr. Seuss books, but here are some of my favorites that may not be as well known.
My son's favorite book when he was growing up, Drummer Hoff,by Barbara Emberley with Caldecott Medal winning illlustrations by Ed Emberley, tells the cumulative story of soldiers of various ranks building a cannon. The ending of the story provides a kind of Where Have All the Flowers Gone? message to the militaristic affair. Get your kids walking around the room chanting, "Drummer Hoff fired it off!"
My wife, the literacy educator Cindy Mershon, introduced me to the works of Roy CONTINUE READING: Russ on Reading: Rhythm and Rhyme: Read Alouds that Support Reading Fluency