2009 Recommended Holiday Reading

Commissioner Smith announces the K-12 Recommended Holiday Reading List which parents and educators can use to encourage students to continue reading during the holiday season. There are a variety of interesting books available to spark the interest, imagination and most of all the love of reading for children of all ages.

Elementary (Pre K – Grade 2)

• A New Coat for Anna - Harriet Ziefert
• The Best Christmas Pageant Ever - Barbara Robinson
• Inside Out Grandma ~ A Hanukkah Story - Joan Rothenberg
• The Polar Express - Chris Van Allsburg
• Feliz Navidad: Two Stories Celebrating Christmas - Jose Feliciano
• Biscuit Celebrates Hanukkah - Ayssa Satin Capucilli
• Las Posadas: An Hispanic Christmas Celebration - Diane Hoyt-Goldsmith
• A Kwanzaa Celebration Pop-up Book - Nancy Williams
• D Is for Dreidel: A Hanukkah Alphabet Book - Tanya Lee Stone
• Christmas Alphabet 10th Anniversary Edition [pop-up book] - Robert Sabuda
• Feliz Navidad: Two Stories Celebrating Christmas - Jose Feliciano, David Diaz (illus.)
• Festival of Lights: The Story of Hanukkah - Maida Silverman, Carolyn Ewing (illus.)
• Lanterns and Firecrackers: A Chinese New Year Story - Jonny Zucker, Jan Barger Cohen
• The Legend of the Poinsettia - Tomie dePaola
• Carlos, Light the Farolito - Jean Carlos Ciavonne
• A Hanukkah Treasury - Eric A. Kimmel
• Feliz Nochebuena, Feliz Navidad
• New Year's Day - Dana Meachen Rau
• Olive, the Other Reindeer - J. Otto Seibold
• Who's That Knocking on Christmas Eve? - Jan Brett (illus.)
• A Wish to Be a Christmas Tree - Colleen Monroe
• Mooseltoe - Margie Palatini
• Farolitos of Christmas – Rudolfo Anaya
• Mr. Willowby’s Christmas Tree - Robert Barry
• Anna's Wish - Friederike Rave
• Baby Polar Bears' Snow-Day - Michael Teitelbaum
• Houndsley and Catina and the Quiet Time - James Howe
• Jan Brett's Snowy Treasury - Jan Brett
• The Mitten - Retold by Jim Aylesworth
• Snowflakes - Martha E.H. Rustad
• Menorah Under the Sea - Esther Susan Heller
• Bella's Tree - Janet Russell
• The Biggest Christmas Tree Ever - Steven Kroll
• Christmas in Many Cultures - Martha E.H. Rustad
• Curious George Christmas Countdown - Tish Rabe
• A Piñata in a Pine Tree: A Latino Twelve Days of Christmas - Pat Mora

Elementary (Grades 3 – 5)

• Hurray For Three Kings’ Day! - Lori Marie Carlson
• Reindeer Crunch and other Christmas Recipes - Kristi Johnson
• Blizzards - Jenny Vaughan
• Carl's Snowy Afternoon - Alexandra Day
• Hershel and the Hanukkah Goblins - Eric A. Kimmel
• Light the Lights! A Story about Celebrating Hanukkah and Christmas - Margaret Moorman
• The Velveteen Rabbit - Margery Williams
• Gift of the Magi - O. Henry
• Ramadan - Suhaib Hamaid Ghazi
• The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree: An Appalachian Story - Gloria Houston
• Seven Spools of Thread: A Kwanzaa Story - Angela Shelf Medearis
• Christmas Around the World - Mary Lankford
• Seven Candles for Kwanzaa - Andrea Davis Pinkney
• By the Hanukkah Light - Sheldon Oberman
• Latkes, Latkes, Good to Eat - Naomi Howland
• Seven Days of Kwanzaa - Angela Shelf Medearis
• Christmas House - Ann Turner
• Children of Christmas - Cynthia Rylant
• Prairie Winter - Bonnie Geisert

Middle School (Grades 6 – 8)

• 1621:  A New Look at Thanksgiving – Catherine O’Neill Grace; Sissee Brimberg
• William Bradford:  Plymouth’s Faithful Pilgrim – Gary D. Schmidt
• The Best Christmas Pageant Ever - Barbara Robinson
• Amazing Peace – Maya Angelou
• Feast of Lights – Ellen S. Jaffe
• Timothy Cratchitt’s Christmas Carol – Dale Powell, Charles Dickens
• The Christmas Box – Richard Paul Evans
• A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens, Dean Morrissey (illus.)
• Christmas Treasury: Heirloom Edition - Christian Birmingham
• Circle of Wonder: A Native American Christmas Story - N. Scott Momaday
• Hallelujah Handel - Douglas Cowling, Jason Walker (illus.)
• The Power of Light: Eight Stories for Hanukkah - Isaac Bashevis Singer, Irene Lieblich (illus.)
• Ramadan - Susan L. Douglass, Jeni Reeves (illus.)
• Seven Days of Kwanzaa - Angela Shelf Medearis
• A Kwanzaa Story: Or How One Gentleman Found His Way - Nancy Guthorn Harrington
• Hanukkah Lights: Stories of the Season - Harlan Ellison, Anne Roiphe, Elie Wiesel
• The Gift of the Magi and Other Stories - O. Henry
• Amazing Peace: A Christmas Poem - Maya Angelou
• Truce: The Day the Soldiers Stopped Fighting – Jim Murphy
• Christmas With Ida Early – Robert Burch
• Papa’s Angles: A Christmas Story – Collin Wilcox Paxton and Gary Carden
• Dream Soul – Laurence Yep

High School (Grades 9 – 12)

• The Special Guest - Lee Allen
• The Angel Doll - Jerry Bledsoe
• All Through the Night - Mary Higgins Clark
• Miracle on 34th Street - Valentine Davies
• A Different Kind of Christmas - Alex Haley
• A Cup of Christmas Tea - Tom Hegg
• The Christmas Cross - Max Lucado
• The Modern Magi - Carol Lynn Pearson
• The Christmas Tree - Julie Salamon
• The Christmas Wish - Richard Siddoway
• The Christmas Store - Ray Sipherd
• The Christmas Letters - Lee Smith
• Certain Poor Shepherds - Elizabeth Marshall Thomas
• A Stranger for Christmas - Carol Lynn Pearson
• The Complete Kwanzaa: Celebrating Our Cultural Harvest - D. Winbush Riley
• Hanukkah Lights: Stories of the Season - Harlan Ellison, Anne Roiphe, Elie Wiesel
• Recipes for Ramadan - Indrani Ibrahim
• Celebrating Ramadan - Diane Hoyt-Goldsmith, Lawrence Migdale
• The Story of the Trapp Family Singers - Maria Augusta Trapp, Maria Augusta Von Trapp
• A Christmas Memory, One Christmas and the Thanksgiving Visitor - Truman Capote
• It's a Wonderful Life - Stephen Cox
• Stories Behind the Great Traditions of Christmas - Ace Collins
• Kwanzaa: From Holiday to Every Day - Maitefa Angaza
• Angels and Other Strangers: Family Christmas Stories - Katherine Paterson
• Hanukkah Trivia: 150 Fun & Fascinating Facts About Hanukkah - Jennie Miller Helderman, Mary Caulkins
• A Charlie Brown Christmas: The Making of a Tradition - Lee Mendelson, Bill Melendez
• A Christmas Treasury: Twelve Unforgettable Holiday Stories – L. Frank Baum
• Holidays Around the World: Celebrate Ramadan and Eid al-Fitr – Deborah Heiligman
• A Different Light: The Hanukkah Book of Celebration – Noam Zion