In our house, for the past few years, we have been reading one chapter of a larger book as part of bedtime reading. One of the first books we started with was Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Of course, the girls wanted to know what happened next, so we went to Farmer Boy straight after. And it was a no brainer to stay in the series since the girls were still interested, so we then read Little House on the Prairie, On the Banks of Plumb Creek, and By the Shores of Silver Lake.

To be honest, this is where we have left off for now, since Laura is now in her early teens and our oldest is not even in double digits yet. I forget at the moment what we read next, but I am glad that we started chapter books with this series. And I’ll tell you why.

Having another book lined up to read next, in the same series, with kids of similar ages, pulled us along into the habit of the chapter books.

It also made late 1800’s American history come alive. We looked up what was going on in the United States the year Laura was born. We looked up where they traveled. We looked up weather oddities that she wrote about. We looked up illnesses mentioned. We looked up fashion at the time. We looked up the foods that are described. So much learning happened in that little time that it was an amazing time of discovery for the whole family. Now, I read this series while growing up. My mother has a copy of this boxed set in her living room.

But there is something so much more in depth when you have Mr. Googlepants on your bedside table and can look up what breed of dog Jack was (hint: he was Not a cute little scotty dog), show the kids what a panther looks like, and what the “cradle” looked like that Pa and Uncle Henry used to harvest oats.

That’s just stuff to do with Little House in the Big Woods! There are 7 more books.

The illustrations are delightful. Mr. Garth Williams did a beautiful job of bringing life and perspective to the stories. The print is a great size for tired eyes to read at the end of the day, or for an intermediate reader to try their hand at a longer book. Every book has a brief description of the story on the back cover, and a chronological order of the books, so you know what you’re going to read and where it sits in the series.

The only two things I would really caution about these books is first, the amount of time you may spend looking up locations, foods, old words not in use anymore, and any other stuff you come across that peaks your, or your child’s, curiosity. So make sure, if this is going to be used at bed time, that you leave at least another 10 minutes for looking up a couple of things. My husband and I did not (usually) mind the extra time that this impromptu research took up, but in our own ways we are both nerds, geeks, and history buffs.

Second, this is a series that was written a couple generations ago, so there are references to people of non-white races that are not the most positive. However, these sparked discussions about how some people were treated in history, and how they are now treated. That laws and culture have changed, and that a human is a human whatever skin tone they happen to have or culture they are from.

(Also something to note, this is Not the television series. They took a lot of poetic license with that show.)

If history, curiosity, or living life as an adventure are not your thing, I would not recommend this series.

These books would make a great intro to United States History for homeschooling (which is also how we used them, just being sneaky with them as “bedtime books”). It would be easy to go backwards or forwards in history depending on where your child’s curiosity leads. They would also be a great way to get an intermediate reader to read more.

In Little House in the Big Woods there’s food, family, music, fashion, homemaking, homesteading, teaching moments (including a Boy Who Cried Wolf type of incident), and a beautiful appreciation for the turning of the seasons. Learning to take each season for what it offers has certainly given me a new perspective on each portion of the year.

This series was something I enjoyed when I was younger, and I am enjoying it again as I read them to my children. Seeing the story from their current understanding of the world has certainly added an entirely new depth to my experience.

If you do end up reading The Little House on the Prairie series to your children I hope you let us know in the comments how it went.

Also, if your little ones get overly excited and can not sleep with even a hint of something interesting having happened recently (my oldest had this as a preschooler), I would recommend finding a different time of day for reading these books. Or, what we already had worked into the routine, we had another little book lined up for after they were snuggled under the covers. Books like A Book of Hugs, or Guess How Much I Love You.

Don’t mind the covers, they have been well read and loved over the years.

This helped to calm their minds after the more stimulating story from the chapter book. It’s still how we handle our bed time reading: Larger, more involved chapter of a book, then a sweet, little book that will help lull their minds into a sleepy mood.

Happy reading!

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