Flashback Friday: 10 Best Childhood Book Series
When you were in grade school, chances are you had to participate in library time and were surrounded by book fairs put on by Scholastic Book Fairs. Think about it: in grade school, all you really wanted to do was play, watch TV, and have fun – and reading textbooks all day is in none of those categories. What’s an educator to do? The solution: get books that picque the interest of kids and get them to read AND have fun at the same time. Aside from the snoozeworthy textbooks and even the non-school (but boring) reading material, there were some gems that really got kids devouring books almost as much as TV… ALMOST!
Here are 10 of the best book series from back in the day:
Animorphs
A sci-fi book series about five humans and an alien who can morph into any animal they touch? AMAZING!
Anne of Green Gables
I must confess, I never did read these books as a kid. One Christmas, my mom bought me the entire Anne of Green Gables series and while I thought the cover artwork was really pretty, I wasn’t compelled to read them. I do know people who have, though, and thought they were the bees knees.
The Baby-Sitters Club
Say hello to your friends: Baby-Sitters Club! This series made every girl at one point or another want to start their OWN babysitting club. Being on a first-name basis with Kristy, Mary Anne, Claudia, Stacey, Dawn, Mallory, and Jessi made you feel like you were already in the BSC!
The Boxcar Children
As orphans who lived in an abandoned boxcar, this quartet of siblings always seemed to find their way into an adventure. By the way, don’t worry! If you never read it, they only live in an abandoned boxcar until they finally meet their legal guardian, their biological grandfather (who they feared would be a cruel man), who then has the boxcar moved to their backyard to use as a playhouse. Good thing they were wrong!
Choose Your Own Adventure
If anything, this series REALLY got kids to read. It was like a video game, in book form!
Fear Street
Designed for the older preteen crowd, Fear Street was legitimately scary! Thanks to author R.L. Stine (who also wrote Goosebumps), reading one of these books was like watching a horror movie with more description. A heed of advice: Read these in the daylight!
Goosebumps
Middle school (and older) kids LOVED this series sooo much! It was like a cross between the scary Fear Street (but slightly tamer) and Choose Your Own Adventure, which Goosebumps even had their own version of that got to be quite intense at times!
Harry Potter
When it first came out, Harry Potter was pegged as a children’s book of fantasy, with tales of wizards and sorcery and magic. But it was soon enjoyed by children of ALL ages!
Nancy Drew
This mystery solving preteen has been an inspiration to many characters and movies in recent times (remember the Emma Roberts’ movie?). Claudia from The Baby-Sitters Club ADORED Nancy Drew!
Sweet Valley Twins
These polar opposite blonde twin sisters made a splash for tween girls worldwide, first appearing as junior high girls adapting to adolescence and moving on to be the most talked about twins with their “more mature” series Sweet Valley High.
Which one of these books do you remember? What other books did you read as a kid?
