12 Middle Grade Series About Friendship for Girls

 

Friendships become more complex as girls enter late elementary school and middle school. The following twelve fictional series explore the many changes, joys, frustrations, and complications that occur in relationships between tween girls.

• The Snob Squad
  by Julie Anne Peters
  (Book 1: Revenge of the Snob Squad)
  Jenny, Maxine, and Prairie - all outsiders - form an unlikely bond when they take up against the principal's daughter and her friends. 
• Nerd Girls
  by Alan Lawrence Sitomer
  (Book 1: The Rise of the Dorkosaurus)
  Maureen, Allergy Alice and Beanpole Barbara make a pact to beat the popular girls, known as the ThreePees, in the school talent show.  
• Dork Diaries
  by Rachel Renee Russell
  (Book 1: Tales from a Not-So-Fabulous Life)
  In her daily diary, Nikki Maxwell shares the dorky moments of her life, and comments on her friendship with best friends Chloe and Zoey.

• Camp Club Girls
  by Renae Brumbaugh, et. al.
  (Book 1: Camp Club Girls & the Mystery at Discovery Lake)
  A group of Christian girls who meet at camp solve mysteries at various American landmarks.  
• Pink Locker Society
  by Debra Moffitt
  (Book 1:  Only Girls Allowed)
  Jemma, Piper, Kate, and Bet are tapped for a secret organization designed to provide information about puberty to girls in their school.  
• The Baby-sitters Club
  by Ann M. Martin
  (Book 1: Kristy's Great Idea)
  Kristy, Claudia, Mary Anne, and Stacey form a babysitting club to help their neighbors find reliable babysitters.

• The Winnie Years
  by Lauren Myracle
  (Book 1: Eleven)
  Winnie's adolescence is marked by ups and downs, including the loss of her childhood best friend, Amanda, to the popular girls, and the discovery of new friends in outspoken Cinnamon and awkward Dinah.  
• Alice McKinley
  by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
  (Book 1: The Agony of Alice)
  *Note: Later books in this series are classified as Young Adult.
  Alice and her best friends Pamela and Elizabeth navigate adolescence in this series, where Alice grows up alongside the reader. 
• Annabelle Unleashed
  by Leslie Margolis
  (Book 1: Boys Are Dogs)
  Annabelle and her new middle school friends discover lots of truths about life and boys.

• The Secret Language of Girls
  by Frances O'Roark Dowell
  (Book 1: The Secret Language of Girls)
  Everything changes for childhood friends Marylin and Kate when middle school begins and they begin to drift apart. 
• Allie Finkle's Rules for Girls
  by Meg Cabot
  (Book 1: Moving Day)
  Allie Finkle collects rules for every situation, including saying goodbye to old friends and making new friends at a new school. 
• Summer Camp Secrets
  by Katy Grant
  (Book 1: Pranked)
  Different characters relate their experiences during the same summer at camp in this six-volume series.

Browse all my middle grade reviews here.

LibraryAdventure.com: 20 Songs to Develop Literacy Skills in Kids Ages 0 to 5

Today, I'm over at The Library Adventure sharing a set of songs for families to sing together in the morning, at mealtime, on the go, at bathtime, and at night.

Best of Baby Story Time: Puppets

After reviewing my baby story time plans, and attending a number of baby story times as a mom, I’ve pulled together my list of the best materials and activities I have found for this age group. Today, I'm sharing my list of the best way to use puppets in baby story time.

While puppets are by no means a requirement for a successful baby story time, they can be an opportunity to introduce a little variety and to capture the attention of little ones whose minds have begun to wander.

For one thing, puppets are a great way to introduce animal names and sounds.

• Did You Ever See...? is a great song to use when you have a random hodgepodge of animal puppets. I have used this song to sing about just about any animal going this way and that. Caregivers and older siblings are usually great about calling out the names of the animals, and babies happily track the moving creatures with their eyes. 
• All the Cows Say... (sung to the tune of "Mary Had a Little Lamb") introduces the names of the animals and the sounds they make. It works best with one-syllable animals (cow, dog, duck, pig, cat). Words larger than that mess up the natural rhythm of the song. I also omit the word "little" from the original lyrics to help maintain the proper rhythm. I have used actual cloth puppets as well as homemade stick puppets to share this song.

Puppets also lend themselves well to songs and rhymes involving anything that flies.

• I’m a Little Bumblebee (originally written by Mel of Mel's Desk) works well with insect puppets. I usually use a bee, a ladybug, and a butterfly. At the end of each verse, I invite the caregivers to lift their babies up into the air to "fly away" along with each bug. I used to regularly rotate this rhyme in and out of story time and often got requests for it when it didn't happen to be on my list for a particular session.
• Flutter Flutter Butterfly (sung to the tune of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star", originally found at Preschool Education) is a great song to use with a butterfly hand puppet, a homemade paper puppet, or even just two hands held together to form a butterfly. Babies are intrigued by the flapping of butterfly wings, and they will watch intently as the butterfly sails over their heads. It's best not to get too close to babies with the butterfly puppet, as they might get scared, but from a safe distance, it is usually well-received.
• Two Little Blackbirds has been adapted many times over, and each adaptation works great with finger puppets and/or stick puppets. It's especially fun if you can provide each caregiver/baby pairing with a set of puppets either to borrow for story time, or to take home and make.

Finally, if you have no other puppet in your possession, I recommend a sunshine puppet.

• You Are My Sunshine is always a hit at story time, but it becomes even more fun when there is a sunshine puppet to show the babies. 
• Mr. Sun is another wonderful song to sing with a puppet. It has become sort of my signature song, and at my last library, it became a tradition that after story time, kids were allowed to come up and high-five Mr. Sun. Even babies liked to take their turn giving the puppet a tentative pat!

A full archive of my baby story times is available here. Next week, watch for the conclusion of this series: my list of the best bounces for baby story time. If you missed them, also take a look at my lists of best books and best action songs and rhymes.

Mommy Librarian's Story Time Secret #2: Hold Back on the Hand Motions

First I was a children’s librarian. Then I became a mom. As I attend story times with my daughter, I have started to make a list of hints that might be helpful to story time performers and/or story time attendees. Today’s hint is for librarians who perform baby story times: Hold back on the hand motions!

I have always made sure to use songs and rhymes in all my story times that can be acted out with hand motions. I was worried that if there were no hand motions, everyone would just sit and look at me blankly. It turns out, though, that most hand motions are totally lost on babies. While older babies can mimic some simple movements, most of them can’t do any of the gestures suggested by story time songs and rhymes. Often we suggest that adults do the hand motions themselves to show their babies, but anybody with a little one in their lap has their hands full already. My child has tried to take a header more than once while I’ve dutifully made an itsy bitsy spider with my fingers.

Here are some basic movements that work well for both baby and caregiver:

• Bouncing
• Pointing to body parts
• Tickling
• Counting off fingers and toes
• Clapping/rolling hands
• Raising arms
• Shaking shakers

Otherwise, it’s totally fine to just chant or sing without any prescribed choreography at all.