People often don’t believe me when I say this, but when we drove from NYC to Prince Edward Island and back my kids were angels in the car.

Why? All of the Ramona Quimby books on audiobook. They spent almost 40 hours listening to Stockard Channing and laughing their heads off.

A year and a half later when we moved across country and drove from NYC to California we again had no issues.

Why? Audiobooks!

All four of us happily listened to Neil Patrick Harris lend his voice to Henry Huggins and were spellbound by the adventure in How to Train Your Dragon.

Not only were my twins (ages 5 and later 6) completely happy to sit in the car – which let’s face it was a huge parenting win – but they were also building important reading skills.

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Raising Readers on the Go

It’s no secret that I love children’s books and think raising my twins to be readers is one of my most important mom jobs. We’re also a family that likes to get outside and go on adventures.

Adventures and reading may not seem to go hand in hand – but there are a lot of ways to raise your kids to be readers even while you are on the go.

Find all Raising Readers Resources Here

Whether you’re planning a cross country road trip or just spend a lot of time in the car, these tips will help you continue to raise readers even while you’re on the go.

Awesome Audiobooks for Kids

We are relatively new to the audiobook for kids world. A friend (don’t you love those helpful bookish friends!?) told me at the park one day that you can borrow audiobooks for kids from the library a couple of years ago and I was like “WHAT?!” We had a trip coming up so I went on the library site and found a couple of Magic Treehouse audiobooks and we were hooked.

Now any time I know we’re going to be spending more than an hour in the car I hop onto the library site and borrow a book or two.

Slowly this has turned into us often listening to an audiobook as we drive around town and owning a slowly growing audiobook collection. I love the way this infuses some extra reading into our lives with basically no effort.

Our 10 Favorite Audiobooks for Kids

1.Ramona Quimby series (find online)

These are amazing. They are hands down our absolute favorites – so much so that I feel like I need to own them because the re-listen-ability is incredible. All four of us – ages 5 to 35 – laugh out loud constantly while we listen to these. Stockard Channing does an incredible job reading them.

2. Henry Huggins series (find online)

These were also written by Beverly Cleary, so if you like the Ramona Quimby books they’re likely to also be a hit. These books are narrated by Neil Patrick Harris who of course does an awesome job as well.

3. Matilda (find online)

This book by Roald Dahl is one of my favorite chapter books for kids period and I was thrilled to find it well narrated by Kate Winslet. I found it just delightful. If you are Roald Dahl fans, you can also listen to James and the Giant Peach, the BFG, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and several others.

4. Magic Treehouse series (find online)

My kids loved the Magic Treehouse books starting around age 3 so these were actually the first audiobooks I tried with them and they were a huge hit. They are all read by the author who has the sweetest grandma like voice. If you get into this there are a ton of them on audiobook.

5. How to Train Your Dragon (find online)

This is such a fun adventure story. Someone recommended it to me before our big cross country road trip and I was so grateful. This one literally had my kids racing to get back in the car after pit stops because they HAD to know what would happen next. There are more in this series as well if you get hooked!

6. The Babysitter’s Club (find online) 

These are new to audible this year (2019) and I was SO excited to share them with my twins. But also nervous. You know that feeling right? When you’re sharing something that you loved as a kid and you’re worried they’ll think it’s boring. No worries here though – my twins both loved it. We listened to the first one on our road trip and then they wanted to immediately start the next one. They were hooked – just like I was decades ago.

7. The Penderwicks (find online)

This is our latest audiobook find. We love these sweet stories about a family of girls. The subtitle of the first book is “A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits, and a Very Interesting Boy”. It is full of adventure and interesting characters and lots of heart. We just finished the first one recently so we haven’t listened to more yet – but there is a whole series of these as well.

8. The Vanderbeekers of 141st Street (find online)

This is on my audiobook wishlist. I LOVE this middle grade chapter book. I think it’s one of those books that everyone should read like Harry Potter or Anne of Green Gables. It is about a delightful family of kids who try to hatch a plan to change their landlord’s mind when he tells them they have to move out of their Harlem home. Words really can’t express the warmth and character this book holds. It also lends itself well to reading aloud and the sample on Amazon is good. One way or another promise me you’ll read or listen to this one!

9. Spy School series (find online)

These are geared towards kids a little older than mine, but I started listening to one while they were playing games on their kindles and they both ended up listening. It is a good adventure story and while geared towards older kids (the main character has a crush on another character and my kids so aren’t there yet) they definitely understood the plot, were engaged in the story and rooting for the characters. This is a fun and often funny book – also part of a series – don’t you love when that happens?

10. Anastasia Krupnik (Find Online)

Anything Lois Lowry is amazing in my opinion, but this is our absolute favorite audiobook by Lowry. This whole series is fun but unfortunately only the first book is available on audio. It is hilarious though. My kids both love this one. We’ve listened to it at least a dozen times.

11. Harry Potter (Find Online)

If you haven’t already, listen to Harry Potter on audio. They are amazingly well narrated. We’ve read the books and watched the movies, but the audiobooks are a whole new experience. Jim Dale does a far better job of reading them than I ever could.

I’ll add more favorites as we discover them!

Beyond Audiobooks: 5 Tips for Raising Readers on the Go

1. Pack a Stack of Paperbacks. Unlike normal picture books, paperback picture books are super thin and light. I like to pack 5-10 paperbacks in my carry on to read aloud as we go or have time when we need to wait. Now that my kids are reading, I also usually buy them one or two new easy paperback chapter books and slip them in their backpacks for the hotel, car or airplane as well.
2. Road Trip Book Box. When my kids were about 2, I took recycled a diaper box into a box to hold books in between their car seats. All it took was some colorful duct tape and a stack of books. It did take some time when they were toddlers to train them to take one book and then put it back before taking another (otherwise we’d get ten minutes into our drive and all the books were on the floor – but patience and natural consequences prevailed!) This makes reading the go-to activity in the car for my kids.
3. Bring a Story Collection. My kids love the giant story collections of books about their favorite Disney characters or when a whole bunch of favorite picture books are folded into one – like this Madeline collection. I know this is the opposite of the paperback suggestion, but if you have space – bringing a new story collection for a week long trip may be the only bedtime story you need. I put one in their suitcase and pull it out every night.
4. E-Books. Along with being able to borrow audiobooks from your library, did you know you can often borrow ebooks? Of picture books? Download a few before your trip and save even more space in your suitcase! If you have an Amazon Kindle or other tablet for your kids, there are also books that you can download for them – much like you probably do for yourself.
5. Online Read Alouds. My kids both have Amazon Kindles for kids and among the apps you will find books that read to your kiddo. You have to look in the apps area – not in the books area, but especially for preschoolers you can find some great picture book options to add to your child’s queue.
   Another free and easy to pack option is to watch YouTube read alouds. These vary greatly so this does take a little prep work. I have a READ ALOUD PLAYLIST on my YouTube account and will take some time to go through and watch at least the beginning of read alouds of some of our favorite stories to find good ones. I save those to my playlist and then we can snuggle up and watch a few of those before bed or when we’re waiting somewhere on my phone or tablet.
6. Read Environmental Print. We of course want our kids to fall in love with the magic of reading because of the amazing stories and worlds books can offer them – but we also learn to read for practical reasons. You read all day every day and that doesn’t change when you’re traveling. Include your kids in this reading by pointing out signs, having them look for street names with you or navigate maps. Read the airplane safety pamphlet together or help them sound out words on the kid menu when you stop for food. Words are all around you. Showing your kids how reading can help them, even when you’re traveling, will just encourage them to want to read even more! Click here to read more about using environmental print with kids.

You May Also Like: 10+ Picture Books about Airplanes to Read Before You Take Flight

Raising readers is not something that just happens on library days or curled up on the couch at bedtime. It definitely happens then too – but reading is something that is everywhere in your life. Bring it on the road with you. To the hotel with you or to grandma’s house.

I never leave the house without a book. It’s in my bag right next to my other must haves – like bandaids, the keys, and a bottle of water. Not every situation is ideal for pulling out a book and reading though. For those moments, I hope that these tips will give you some ideas for how to raise readers anywhere.

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