What Are Kids Reading These Days?

The Renaissance Learning report, What Kids Are Reading, “calculated the books most read by more than 3 million schoolchildren last year.” The report lists the top 20 books read in each grade from 1-12 and breaks them down by gender and by geographic area as well. The report also includes essays by Mary Pope Osborne, S.E. Hinton, Daniel Handler and Christopher Paul Curtis on the benefits of reading. And, finally, the report breaks down the top books read by the top students–those who score in the top 10% of their class for reading achievement. Here are the books read most overall:

• Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss (first grade)
• If You Give a Mouse a Cookie by Laura Numeroff (second grade)
• Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White (third grade)
• Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing by Judy Blume (fourth grade)
• Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson (fifth grade)
• Hatchet by Gary Paulsen (sixth grade)
• The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton (seventh and eighth grades)
• To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (ninth through twelfth grade)