Top 10 Rhyming Board Books for Baby

Parenting

Jun 23

Parenting is more than how you feed your child, and reading is a way to connect even if breastfeeding is difficult. Some of the best bonding you can have to calm your stress involves you, your baby, a rocking chair, and a children’s book. In fact, keeping a stack of them by your favorite breastfeeding chair can lower your cortisol, relax your body, and help the milk flow.

Reading to your baby is one of the most important things parents and caregivers can do to expose their little ones to new words, sounds, and expressions. After 10 years, we’ve amassed quite a set of board books - why board books? Because they are DURABLE! In fact, if a new book doesn’t have a board book edition, I don’t buy it. Babies eat books, tear the pages, bend them, and before long, your paper copy of Brown Bear Brown Bear is read by pure memory, followed by a perfectly amazing story getting tossed in the trash. Plus…board books are typically under $10 a piece - some as low as $3, so they are quite affordable and will grow in you and your children’s hearts together.

Rhyming books for kids are the ultimate in reading entertainment. I despise popping open a new board book at the store that doesn’t rhyme. Books that rhyme are also a much easier form of writing for people to enjoy that don’t always love reading.

I also love board books that come in a series - a series of good books makes for a wonderful, and incredibly thoughtful gift. So sit back, check out the list, and add parent-tested favorites to your next order.

Top 10 Rhyming Board Books for Baby

Dinosaurumpus by Tony Mitton (author of the famous rhyming book Giraffe’s Can’t Dance) is a newer addition to our nightly literary line-up. Now, this particular read is by no means an amateur rhyme reader’s first pick - it is definitely for our seasoned rhyming book readers. Besides, rhyming dinosaur names is no easy task. It is written in a way that stomping noises and body movements are really easy to incorporate for a more kinesthetic read (or just a really fidgety kid). Attempt some of the other books on our list to warm up the tongue first :)

The Pout Pout Fish by Deborah Diesen is my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE story and go-to baby shower gift. With around 20 titles to choose from, picking 5 can really help expand a new parent’s book collection. While not every Pout Pout Fish book is as timelessly good as the first, kids develop a special attachment to Mr. Fish and Ms. Shimmer and their adventures through the dark, going to school, and many holiday-themed classics. Asking your grumpy toddler if they are a “pout pout fish” will either elicit giggles or threenager indignation - it depends :)

Nancy Shaw’s Sheep in a Jeep is the start of a beautiful bedtime routine following the misadventures of directionally impaired, impolitely mannered,, and unprepared sheep friends. While I will always be partial to Sheep in a Jeep, my kids prefer Sheep on a Ship and Sheep Out to Eat. With around 7 titles to choose from, you will fly through these books as they are very short in content length but packed with humorous and original story lines.

“Help! Please help! Does anyone know how to make my stuck truck go?” Authors Kevin Lewis and Daniel Kirk of My Truck is Struck created a mystery for the dump truck driver to try and figure out why his truck is stuck and the passersby who work to together to pull the dump truck out. I wish wish wish this lineup included a whole series, but the only similar book by Lewis and Kirk is Tugga-Tugga Tugboat.

Alice Schertle’s Little Blue Truck captured my son’s heart from the first read. Combining helpful farm animals with a kind little blue truck and you already have childhood magic. The sounds of each farm animal repeated throughout the book help to reinforce learning and generate those early verbal sounds that are so important to speech development. There are 10 plus Little Blue Truck books in the series to choose from, and they are sure to make a great addition to your shelves.

The Going to Bed Book by Sandra Boynton is a chewed up treasure in our family library. The story of trying to get the animals ready for bed - on a SHIP! It is a sure delight for Navy family readers. While Boynton’s book are always centered around one character, the rest of the book she’s written are nothing short of brilliant. Hippos Go Berserk and Barnyard Dance are also popular stories.

Time for a Hug by Phillis Gershator is one of the sweetest stories I’ve read to my daughter. Told through the eyes of the family clock, it takes us through the daily activities a mom and child complete together. “11, 12 the raindrops fly! What shall we do? Let’s bake a pie!” Time for a Bath is another in Gershator’s published works and is also quite delightful. I hope you find this one as sweet as I do.

Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson and Alex Scheffler is our ultimate FAVORITE book every fall! If you haven’t had the pleasure of watching the Netflix animated reading of this story, you are missing out. This is by far the longest of the books on this list, but it is worth it. As the witch travels on her broom, she frequently drops items and has to hunt for them with a little help from the animals she meets along the way who all want a ride on the broom - but what will happen when the broom gets full and they are being chased by a dragon…only you can guess.

Bear Snores On by Karma Wilson and Jane Chapman was the first board book I read to my firstborn, and I am so thankful an entire series developed from it because the Bear books are phenomenal. I also like these books because the animals that are the main focus of each book are the more obscure ones - badgers, gophers, mice, etc. The Bear books (around 8 of them) lend themselves well to giving the animal characters different voices and kids just eat it up. Bear Wants More and Bear’s New Friend are some of our other favorites.

Snowmen at Night and the other 7 books in the Snowmen series by Caralyn Buehner are such a wonderfully written set of books that teach kids about the activities that snowmen do at night while the kids who built them are fast asleep. While these typically end up in our winter reading lineup, especially Snowmen at Christmas, they occasionally make a summer appearance. And yes, they do have snowball fights :)