Okay guys, so I am a writer, and I have been on a bit of a block, but after talking to my friend about this, and what he is writing, he suggested writing a book for children. So, I am also a teacher, so I currently work with infants- prek age, and for those that don’t know those ages it’s baby to 5 years old. So I am looking for information on what books your kids like. [name_f]Do[/name_f] they like books about princess’s and prince’s more, or about animals more? What makes them laugh in the book? What makes them think? Let me know how they feel about some different books, and give me some feed back. I haven’t wrote anything in about 3 years, and I have never wrote a child book. I do know what some children that age like, but I would like some feed back that’s a little wider than just my work kids. Thank you!
My daughter is 17 months. She loves books about animals (particularly cats) and books featuring characters with her name. I would say her favorite books right now are “If You Give a [name_f]Cat[/name_f] a Cupcake,” “[name_f]Rosie[/name_f]'s [name_f]Hat[/name_f],” and “[name_m]Little[/name_m] [name_u]Elliot[/name_u], Big City.”
For her, it’s not so much about the words as it is about the pictures. “If You Give a [name_f]Cat[/name_f] a Cupcake” is stuffed full of random hidden things in the pictures. One page in particular is a mess of various items, like balls, sunglasses, shoes, buckets, a boat, airplane, hat, etc. She will spend 10 minutes on that page finding things she recognizes and enquiring about things she doesn’t recognize. It’s a great vocabulary booster for her too, sort of like a simplified “I Spy.”
As a parent, I like reading books that rhyme or have a story where everything isn’t dumbed down. Makes it more fun to read and not one of those books I toss in the cupboard and hope she forgets about it!
My daughter recently turned 2 and she prefers books about animals, vehicles and everyday life. At the moment her most-requested bedtime story is If You Give a Mouse a Cookie but she goes through phases - other favourites include The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Hairy Maclary, Peepo, Each [name_f]Peach[/name_f], Pear, [name_f]Plum[/name_f], Where the [name_m]Wild[/name_m] Things Are. She’s also obsessed with a big picture book called [name_u]Teddy[/name_u] [name_m]Bear[/name_m]'s Fun to Learn First 1000 Words (except she has it in Icelandic) which I find pretty boring but she can look at it for like an hour solid.
She likes it when she can recognise some element of the story/pictures from her own life/experiences, she likes rhyming, she likes finding things (especially lift the flap) and she likes ‘surprise’ pages like the cat in Hairy Maclary or the butterfly page in the The Very Hungry Caterpillar.
I have never read a book for her about princes and princesses but I’m not sure she’d find them more interesting than any other person since she has no understanding of monarchy at this age. It’ll probably be a different story when she’s 3 or 4.
My nieces and nephews are big on a I al books, or magical creatures (dragons, unicorns, mermaids). They love anything with bright colours.
For very small babies, black and white is great because they can see it easier.
My little brother adores fantasy storybooks that have lots of different stories and quirky characters, usually not human. He also likes when an author takes a well known fairy tale and changed something to make it funny (his favorite being The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig - Wikipedia )
If youre writing stories for younger children, I know the kids I babysit love books with weird textures that are fun to touch
Thank you for the insight everyone! @jackal i find that around 3 or 4 they like princess’s and prince stuff more than 2 years old.
My son is almost 13 months and LOVES anything to do with animals, including books. His favourite book for the last month or two has been Good [name_m]Night[/name_m], [name_m]Little[/name_m] [name_m]Bear[/name_m]. Good luck on your writers block and just writing your book in general 
My daughter is 2.5. She loves a book called “This Book [name_m]Just[/name_m] Ate my Dog”. At one point in the book you flip it around and shake it. Whenever she sees an animal in a book upside down (like a bat) she turns the book around.
She also loves a book called “Chicken Soup, Chicken Soup” and one called “Sh, We have a plan”
Whenever we read a book with a family in it she points to the mom and says, “Mommy” and points to me and says “Same!”. We have a cat too and she likes pointing out the cats in her books.
My kids are 11 (boy) and 5 (girl).
I don’t read to my son nearly as much unless he joins in on his sister’s bedtime routine but when he was little he loved books about superheroes and animals. We always read Goodnight [name_f]Moon[/name_f], The Very Hungry Caterpillar, [name_m]Brown[/name_m] [name_m]Bear[/name_m] [name_m]Brown[/name_m] [name_m]Bear[/name_m], Are You My Mother?, and tons of various books about superheroes like Spiderman and Batman. He was really into the [name_f]Cat[/name_f] and the [name_f]Hat[/name_f] Knows A Lot About That series for a few years which were awesome because they were educational and fun. He learned to read by memorizing books first, then when he learned about letters and sounds it all clicked. Now he’s 11 and thinks [name_m]Captain[/name_m] Underpants is the world’s best literature. What makes him laugh? Potty humor!!
My 5 year old really loves all things Frozen, [name_f]Moana[/name_f], [name_f]Sofia[/name_f] the First, all around [name_f]Princess[/name_f] themed so I usually snag the $1 books from Target with like 5 pages and we do really quick reads through those at night. We read a lot of “girl power” themed books…Odd [name_f]Velvet[/name_f], [name_f]Chrysanthemum[/name_f], [name_f]Olivia[/name_f], [name_f]Lilly[/name_f]'s Purple Plastic Purse…she also loves [name_f]Rainbow[/name_f] [name_m]Fish[/name_m]. She’s very sensitive and will often get very involved with the characters in books and loves when it’s a happy ending.
My kids like books that are silly. There’s a book called ‘The Three [name_m]Little[/name_m] Wolves and the Big Bad pig’ that they absolutely love, or B j [name_m]Novak[/name_m]'s book ‘The Book With no Pictures’. Or Seuss. When they were littler, they would usually pick books that rhyme (although those were usually my suggestions to them, so not sure if those would be their first picks without my influence). My fave board books when they were babies are ‘Jesse Bear’ and Mem Fox’s ‘Time for Bed’ because of their lovely writing and gorgeous illustrations.
Azula is almost 5 (what?!) and loves princess books - I usually try to pick ones about tough princesses like ‘The Paper Bag [name_f]Princess[/name_f]’ to give her some of that influence, buy she will pick a crappy Disney type one every time. There’s a book about rocks & minerals she likes to pick often too, but I have a rock collection she likes, so im sure thats why shes intetested in that.
[name_f]Indira[/name_f] is 3, and pretty much likes everything. She’ll usually go with something about animals or dinosaurs, but sometimes her picks make no sense and I’m pretty sure she grabs one at random without even looking.
My god daughter (almost two) loves colour in photos, bland colour schemes bore her, the words are important to her as well, subtle rhyming does especially well with her. Also, including some bigger words is great to extend their vocab, she always asks when she doesn’t understand. This isn’t necessarily relevant but she also asks for me to read when she sees me reading any book and she loves poetry, of any form and any level.