This is a sweet story about one imaginative boy’s special bond with his father, whom he images as a loveable grizzly bear. It’s full of humour, from the exaggerated facial expressions and bear-like attributes captured in Dapo Adeola’s vibrant illustrations, to the humorous asides in the text about Dad’s wild habits.

This is a playful and heartwarming picture book that perfectly captures the way in which young children observe familiar adults with curiosity, wonder and imagination – but also with pure adoration. Filled with giggles and with the theme of family bonds at its heart, this is a bear-illiant choice for storytime.

Many of us can relate to the frustration of a sleepness night – especially after this past week of too hot, too stormy or too rainy bedtimes! Arlo the lion is no exception; he is struggling to sleep and feeling helpless at being all out of ideas for what to try next. Arlo meets Owl, who offers a different perspective. He learns that Owl can sleep through the day – even through the sights and sounds of all the other animals being awake. Fortunately for Arlo, Owl has some sleep-inducing tricks of her own that might just help Arlo too. Owl teaches Arlo a bedtime song, which focuses on thoughts of happy places, a relaxation of the body, a slowing down of breathing patterns and meditation about sinking into the soft ground. The song works a treat, but in his excitement over his new found success, Arlo accidentally wakes other animals up! Happily though, they can use the song too to settle back to sleep.

This excellent picture book has enough depth to captivate pupils and is an entertaining storytime choice for Year 1 and 2. It follows the story of Bob, an ordinary man with the extra-ordinary job of keeping the moon clean and entertaining moon tourists. Readers will delight in spotting all of the aliens that Bob misses noticing as he goes about his work as the man on the moon. Highly recommended!

A longer illustrated story from Michael Morpurgo and illustrated by Michael Foreman, all about a boy from a cornish fishing village who helps a beached dolphin find its way back into the sea. This heartwarming story tells of the special bond between children and animals, which is characterised by unconditional love and loyalty. Poignant at times and magical at others, we love this beautifully rich story of a friendship between a boy and a dolphin, which never fails to captivate KS1 audiences at storytime.

This is a highly recommendable award-winning picture book that tells the story of a little girl whose favourite toy rabbit is kidnapped by order of the Queen, who likes the look of the toy for herself. Emily Brown is not willing to let her beloved rabbit go without a fight and goes on to teach the Queen an important lesson about the value of treasured toys.

We absolutely love this story from storytelling maestro Cressida Cowell, and grown-ups who love to read dramatically and ‘do the voices’ will have just as much fun as children listening.

Both of these author-illustrators have separately created some joyous picture books for children and in this collaboration it sees the two create a humorous rhyming picture book with a canine theme. The premise requires the reader to enjoy the notion that dogs really like dressing up in clothes and do this so they can ‘blend in’ with everyday human life. The idea of dogs in high heels “to make them look big” certainly can’t help but raise a smile! Dogs can sneak into all sorts of places when disguised, whether it’s a fancy café, a gym or a swimming pool. The rhyming is masterful and it would be great to see if dog-loving children can spot which dog must be dressed in the disguise based on the rhyme. It could, after all, only be a Shih-tzu that does jujitsu, and schnauzers that wear trousers!

Funnybones follows the adventures of a well-loved family of skeletons. These classic stories are full of humour and provide a great curriculum link into finding out about what lies inside the human body. There is also an accompanying Read & Respond guide available from Amazon.

Hip hip hooray! It’s Splash Day today and everyone is ready for a water fight! They’ve got their trunks and wetsuits, wellies and rubber rings. Even the teachers are going to join in. Let’s see what happens when Mrs Thistle blows her whistle!

A new collection of illustrated verses from a range of contemporary children’s poets, performers and hip-hop artists. This is the poetry collection that EYFS and KS1 classrooms have been waiting for! The poems have been selected for their suitability to read aloud and cover topics like minibeasts, pirates, animals and night time. Highly recommended.

Anita loves the small, beautiful village in the Dominican Republic where she lives. She spends her days exploring the island, imagining herself as a valiant, brave princessa as she watches the ‘dragons’ (aeroplanes) fly overhead. One day she finds that she must say goodbye to her beloved Abuela and her treasured island and travel with her family to a new home far away. As she walks into the unknown and to new adventures, she needs all the courage she can muster to come face to face with, and ride inside the dragon herself.

 This is a story of leaving the place you call home, facing your fears and embarking on new adventures.

A classic picture book featuring the story of the lighthouse keeper Mr. Grinling and his attempts to receive his lunch before it is eaten by the pesky seagulls. First published forty years ago, The Lighthouse Keeper series is a popular choice to go alongside a seaside topic. This text is rich in vocabulary and a good option for Talk for Writing.

These books are real gems for children who are ready for a short chapter book but may still feel overwhelmed by too much text on a page. Centred around an unlikely friendship between two animals, the stories are laugh-out-loud adventures with appealing illustrations that perfectly break up the text to suit the reading stamina of this age range. This latest adventure continues to focus on small-scale conflict resolution with the perfect dose of silliness (and toilet humour) to keep young readers entertained throughout.

Paula’s early reader series features a girl called Kitty and her crew of felines as they embark upon brave rooftop adventures in the moonlight. Illustrated in cool blacks and oranges, these fun-filled mystery adventures with talking cats are likely to be a purrrfectly popular independent reading choice among ages 6-8.

This is part of a series responsible for turning many young children into independent readers. Isadora Moon is half fairy, half-vampire and each book in the series follows her adventures with friends and family. In this book, Isadora has reached school age and has an important decision to make. Her mum wants her to attend fairy school and her dad wants to send her to vampire school. Isadora tries out each school, with their very different priorities and curriculums, and in the process answers some important questions about her own heritage and identity. This is a humorous chapter book, with attractive black-and-pink illustrations and a high appeal to modern young readers.

We are huge fans of this series at BooksForTopics HQ. Take a dive through the different layers of the ocean to the deepest trenches below with our favourite feline scientist, Professer Astro Cat. Each double-page spread offers a highly visual array of facts themed around a different stage of the sea voyage. Starting with fun on the seashore (did you know that most of the white sand in Hawaii is actually parrotfish poop?), we then join Professor Astro Cat as he boards a sea vessel and takes a crash course in navigation and ocean weather. The animals don their diving gear and explore the kelp forests and continental shelf of the shallow zone (find out how the torpedo ray can kill small fish with a 200-volt electric shock) before progressing deeper to discover a host of creatures including sharks and cephalopods. Going deeper still, Professor Astro Cat explores how the bigger and smaller creatures are connected via the food web before heading into the very darkest zones and deepest trenches (where you’ll find out how zombie worms got their name). Every page is highly visual down to the tiniest detail and the selected information is at once interesting and informative, allowing readers to delight in their newfound knowledge and quickly feel like an expert. The book is well suited to children in terms of reading level, design style and interest range.