Radio 4 Children's Summer Book Club: Nature

The Today programme’s Children’s Summer Book Club has returned for the holidays!

The Book Club recommends children’s books on different themes and for different age groups every Monday until the end of August. Recommendations include old favourites, classics, new releases, books you can borrow from the library and books to delight the whole family.

This year is even more special because they've enlisted the help of Frank Cottrell-Boyce, SLA Patron, award-winning author and screenwriter and the current Waterstones Children’s Laureate, as well as Cressida Cowell, author and illustrator of the bestselling the How to Train Your Dragon.

As Frank is a Patron of the SLA, this year we thought we'd get involved and support the Book Club by suggesting our own reading recommendations on each weekly theme!

The Book Club this week recommends children’s books on the theme of Nature. 

Frank Cottrell-Boyce, SLA Patron, award-winning author and screenwriter and the current Waterstones Children’s Laureate, as well as Cressida Cowell, author and illustrator of the bestselling the How to Train Your Dragon have made some great suggestions. 

Frank recommends:

• Diary of a Young Naturalist by Dara McAnulty
• Toby Alone by Timothee de Fombelle
• Catfish Rolling by Clara Kumagai
• My side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George

Cressida recommends: 

• Clean Up! By Nathan Bryon and Dapo Adeola
• The Lorax by Dr Seuss
• The Lost Words by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris
• The Last Wild by Piers Torday

At the SLA, we have added ours 

Theme: Nature

KS1

• Life on the Thames by Emma Shoard 

- A journey along the Thames highlighting the nature seen along the way.

• Grandpa and the Kingfisher by Anna Alison and Sarah Massini 
  - Beautiful intergenerational bond between Grandfather and grandchild and the circle of life.
  
  

KS2

• Beautiful by William Spring 
  A new book, but one which will become a favourite to pour over the detail.
  
  

• The Wilding by Isabelle Tree and Angela Harding  

- Angela Harding's distinctive prints showing us how to conserve our environment.

KS3

• Bone Music by David Almond 

- David Almond is a firm favourite of mine as his atmospheric writing of the Northumberland Fells means the reader is there on the moors.

• Wonder: the Natural History Museum poetry book 

        - Poems inspired by the collection in London's Natural History Museum

Do check back next week to see what the theme for next week will be.