Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge discussion

Yesterday as I was reading to my five and two year old inspiration struck! They don't know it but they are about to be drug (or some would say 'guided') through the challenge too! I think I'm going to try and read them children's books this year that fit as many of the prompts as possible.

Should be fun and I would love it if another mom or dad or someone who frequently reads to littles did it too! Some of the prompts may be hard/impossible but I just plan to do my best :)

It might be easier to create your own challenge specifically for children of that age and read to them the great classics that all children should know.

I would recommend designing a challenge for them with their input....Tell them about what you're doing for your challenge, show them your categories, and then have them pick their own categories. Making it a fun thing will encourage reading for them long term. Maybe categories like read a book for each color of the rainbow and a book with a made up word in the title?

My oldest is five and loves when I pick her stories (though I know her taste and she picks out books at the library) and the two year old and baby just love pictures and listening in. :)

Also I'm thinking if along with the books they pick normally if I just pick one to fit a prompt each library trip it helps us stick to our usual plan of visiting at least once a week to the library. They will still get all their normal books (we tend to read for at least 30 minutes each night) but now I'll have some things to look forward to as well as all the snuggles!

That's a really cute idea! I'll have to stick mostly to picture books but I'll do it with you :) my almost 3yo loves being read to!

What a fun idea! My son is nine and loves to read, so this may be something we could work on, too.

I have a 9 year old daughter and I filled out a bunch of my prompts with that in mind! She has given me suggestions of books she enjoyed and wants me to read as well as some book we will read together - i.e., Harry Potter certainly takes care of the 800 page prompt! I think this will be really fun to do together when we can.

I love children's books and use some for prompts. I even used a board book. I've thought about doing the challenge twice, once just with picture books.

I definitely count books I read to my boys to fill some of the prompts.

Jessica wrote: "Yesterday as I was reading to my five and two year old inspiration struck! They don't know it but they are about to be drug (or some would say 'guided') through the challenge too! I think I'm going..."


I teach third grade and I think it's completely do-able as is! There are some great international books for children, which knocks a few off the list. Let me know if I can help in any way! I'm excited for you and your children!

I was planning on doing this with my son too but I am finding that so many of the prompts would be really difficult. He's 7, he doesn't have a personal To Be Read list, espionage thriller not really in beginning kid lit (even Harriet the Spy doesn't really qualify).

Instead I am thinking of making him his own list, same number of prompts and some of them might be the same, some slightly modified, but others all new.

Kate wrote: "I was planning on doing this with my son too but I am finding that so many of the prompts would be really difficult. He's 7, he doesn't have a personal To Be Read list, espionage thriller not reall..."

Yes some of them will have to be loosely interpreted - but I've already read my kids several picture books with characters either being or pretending to be spies. Thrilling for me? Not so much but my 5 year old is a different story.

The main thing for me is that I'm going to be reading to my kids all year anyways and we read a LOT of books. Still it is going to be fun to be encouraged to add some variety and depth to our collection as well as something to keep me entertained along the way :)

I do think I will be changing the 800 pages prompt though! One suggestion I got was changing that to a children's book written by an author who normally writes for adults. I really like that idea!

I will be sticking mainly to books for Young Readers and getting my 5th grade students involved. No contests, no incentives. Reading for the love of reading and building stronger relationships with my students.

Chip wrote: "I will be sticking mainly to books for Young Readers and getting my 5th grade students involved. No contests, no incentives. Reading for the love of reading and building stronger relationships with..."

Definitely a good idea. As a kid if someone had made reading a contest I had to "compete" in I definitely would have shyed away. The possibility to "fail" would have scared me off. Thanks for being a teacher and for encouraging the love of reading!

Emily wrote: "Jessica wrote: "Yesterday as I was reading to my five and two year old inspiration struck! They don't know it but they are about to be drug (or some would say 'guided') through the challenge too! I..."

Thanks so much :) I'm sure I'll be in touch as we get going! Thanks for teaching and spreading a love of reading!

Nicole wrote: "What a fun idea! My son is nine and loves to read, so this may be something we could work on, too."

I just love the idea of kids and parents reading together! What a great hobby to share!

I hope you all read your children Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Jessica wrote: "Yesterday as I was reading to my five and two year old inspiration struck! They don't know it but they are about to be drug (or some would say 'guided') through the challenge too! I think I'm going..."

This is a super fun idea!!! My kids are tween/teens reading on their own (and not interested in the challenge for themselves, but they seem to enjoy giving me suggestions for my own list). But I will happily follow your adventure :-)

Oh and by the way, the very first book I read for this Challenge was a picture book!! "A book you've read before that never fails to make you smile" (or words to that effect), I read a xmas picture book that always made me laugh out loud when I read it to my kids: How Murray Saved Christmas. I don't know if you could fit it into any of the prompts, but I highly recommend this if you like to read xmas books.

I officially checked off a book about an immigrant or refugee! I read From Far Away by Robert Munsch :)

I think this is a fantastic idea. I wish I lived closer to my niece and nephew I'd do this with them.

I had this same idea. I read my seven year old daughter a story out of a 5 minute bedtime storybook. It was a Monsters Inc story called "My Summer Vacation". I'm going to try and fill in as many prompts as I can to fulfill this challenge for/with her.

I'll be interested to see what people use for steampunk lol

Tara wrote: "I'll be interested to see what people use for steampunk lol"

There's a bunch of steampunk for kids! There are even picture books.

These two tween books get lots of praise (I'm pretty sure my younger daughter owns one of them, but she hasn't read it):
The Invention of Hugo Cabret
The Lost Kingdom

I'll look into it! Tonight we read Zoom! By Robert Munsch for a book about someone with a disability.

Tara wrote: "I'll look into it! Tonight we read Zoom! By Robert Munsch for a book about someone with a disability."

If you're reading Munsch, you probably want picture books? The Hugo Cabret book (which I have not read yet) is billed as "part graphic novel" so it may work. Here are some actual picture books (to be honest, none of these really pique my interest - I've never been a fan of alphabet books, they are boring to read aloud)
Steampunk Alphabet
A Cats Steampunk Alphabet
Her Majesty's Explorer: A Steampunk Bedtime Story
Steamduck Learns to Fly!: A Steampunk Picture Book

We are heading to the library today or tomorrow. I'm starting with "Book with a red spine" and hoping to get my hands on Corduroy! How have I not read that to my kids yet?!

My now 12 and 14 year olds have done the challenge with me the last 2 years. The then 10 year old read more than her sister and me the first year! I do give an incentive--£5 toward books if they finish 20, £10 if they finish 25, £15 for 30, £20 for 35 and £25 for completion. I haven't decided how much I'll give for the *bonus.* I see it as a win-win, they read and I'll be buying books anyway so might as well use it as an incentive.

For my 5 year old, I do try to find a few books that broaden horizons such as other cultures, but really I just read whatever he brings to me off his shelves or from the library. I will read Brer Rabbit to him this year for my "book from childhood." It also happens to be one of his Sonlight school books this year.

For those of you who have kids participating: have you / they found any good kid-oriented Goodreads groups? I want my kids to love and enjoy Goodreads as much as I do, and I think a big part of that will be finding a great social group. My thirteen year old joined Emma Watson's group, but it's been a little too "grown up" for her. We're still looking.

Nadine that steamduck one looks cute! Thanks for the suggestions :) you're correct in your assumption about picture books, my kid is under 3 so I'm doing bedtime picture books! He loves new stories so I'm excited to expand our usual repertoire.

Last year I read a bunch of YA books with my kids and counted them toward the challenge. I already know the Cat in the Hat has a picture of a cat on the cover. :-)

Done a third! Book about food The Pigeon Finds a Hotdog

Tara wrote: "Done a third! Book about food The Pigeon Finds a Hotdog"

and will the book involving travel be "Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!" ? ;-)

Jessica wrote: "Yesterday as I was reading to my five and two year old inspiration struck! They don't know it but they are about to be drug (or some would say 'guided') through the challenge too! I think I'm going..."

I love this idea. They All Saw a Cat is a fantastic picture book with a cat on the cover. I may become obsessed with finding kids' books to fit the challenge.

Lol Nadine no since he doesn't actually get to to anywhere

I'm sorry I'm so slow to post and respond - I only have my mobile app most of the time for access to goodreads/the internet in general but I do try to hot spot occasionally to my computer. Living in the middle of nowhere has both perks and down falls.

Love the books people have read and suggested so far! We are off to a slow start as I wanted to check out Corduroy today but the library did not have any copies in! Still we checked out a few for some of the prompts:

A picture book about Laura Ingalls Wilder as a book on an interesting woman. Though I'm sure we will read others and I have 3 girls and try to read them lots of books about all kinds of women.

And the Book Monday Is Wash Day for a book with a day of the week in the title.

I'm using Chicka Chicka Boom Boom in both this challenge and my adult version for book I loved as a child.

Shortly I do think I will post a list of the prompts here for me to keep track of what I've read. I was going to keep track on the list I made for the giant thread of everyone's list but that was getting complicated. Just easier to have one here I can update :)

Hope you all are having a fantastic evening (or whatever part of the day suits your time zone)!

That's a great idea, maybe we can start a separate thread to keep track of our lists for this and leave this one more for discussion? Just a thought :)

Tara wrote: "That's a great idea, maybe we can start a separate thread to keep track of our lists for this and leave this one more for discussion? Just a thought :)"

Do you think the moderators would mind? This is the first GR group I've been in so not sure how etiquette goes for that?

I don't know, I suppose we could pm one of them. It's on topic.

I'm so excited about this idea and I wish I had kids I could still read picture books to. (I know, I could just do it anyway, but it wouldn't be the same.)

For food, I recommend Jon Muth's Stone Soup
For day of week, I recommend What Happens on Wednesdays (my kids are 10 & 13 and still like to talk about this book!)
There was a great picture book biography we read about a singer from Harlem which would be good for "interesting woman" ... I think it was Skit-Scat Raggedy Cat: Ella Fitzgerald

I don't think the moderators will mind, but I can't actually speak for them.

I just sent a pm to Juanita

Yay she created a thread for it for us :) she said to let her know if we want a folder because moderators have to create those :)

Thanks Jaunita and Tara!! I'll add my list at some point today :)

Did an audiobook download from my library tonight. It wasn't much of a hit with the kid because it's hard to listen to a kid story at that age but I ticked off another prompt :)

Tara wrote: "Did an audiobook download from my library tonight. It wasn't much of a hit with the kid because it's hard to listen to a kid story at that age but I ticked off another prompt :)"

We like audio books on long car rides!

I haven't had a chance to get to my actual computer today to put my list up in the list post but I am planning on it ASAP! We read a couple of the books I mentioned previously tonight and I also picked up one, The Snow Leopard, that features a character from a different ethnicity. I'll be sure to link up to it as soon as I'm on Internet on an actual computer!

Jack is too young for them, he needs the tactile and visual experience of sitting with me while I read to him. The ebooks are fun though especially ones he can manipulate.

Tara wrote: "Jack is too young for them, he needs the tactile and visual experience of sitting with me while I read to him. The ebooks are fun though especially ones he can manipulate."

You should totally get some of the free down loads of Pete the Cat books especially Pete the Cat: I Love My White Shoes

He can read through the book and the recording reads it and sings the song in the book. I've yet to find a kid who doesn't love it and it's fun as an adult too:)

I love that idea!! My 10 year old reads so much and likes to say that she reads more than me so I'm sure she'll be up for the challenge. :) Maybe I'll just go with the same reading list as mine and see what books she comes up with. I'll see how that goes and maybe change it if it doesn't work...
Or do you create a whole new reading challenge for children? Because that would be amazing!
As our first language is not English she can not really follow your suggestions for books though they all sound really good.
I'm excited to see how this plays out for you and your kids

It was a Pete the cat actually. I only did it to fulfill the prompt, I'm not going to be doing any more for now :)