Children’s Collections

The Bullitt County Public Library strives to create a warm, inviting, and fun environment for children and their caregivers. Our children’s collections and spaces are intended primarily for children from birth through age 8, although older kids and adults may also enjoy the children’s materials we provide. We are committed to providing ongoing support to parents, teachers, caregivers, homeschooling families, and community organizations.

Our book collections are designed so that kids and parents can more easily locate the books that best fit each child’s reading and interest levels. In addition to books, each BCPL location also offers educational multimedia for checkout. A variety of early learning toys, such as blocks and activity stations, are available for use in the children’s spaces to encourage play and exploration.

Children’s Books

Board Books

This collection consists of books with sturdy, laminated cardboard pages. Selected especially for babies and toddlers, this format is important in introducing books to the youngest child. These books generally have bright, uncluttered drawings or photographs and are wordless or accompanied by very brief text.

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Picture Books

Along with board books, picture books are often the child’s first introduction to books. They are usually written for pre-readers and beginning readers and are typically shared with the child by an adult. However, some picture books in our collection are intended for older, primary-school-aged children and feature more involved stories and higher reading levels.

Illustrations play an essential role in picture books; their purpose is to extend and interpret the story, supplying what paragraphs of words in a novel do for older readers. Our collection includes both wordless picture books and standard picture books where the words and pictures are meant to work in tandem to tell the story.

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Beginning Readers

As the name indicates, these books are written for beginning readers. Children learn to read at different ages, but usually between five and eight, they begin to decode words and start to read by themselves without adult help. Beginning reader books use a controlled vocabulary to help children practice the new skill of reading while limiting their frustration level. These books often have large print, generous white space and margins, color illustrations, and fairly simple stories. We purchase beginning reader books at a variety of reading levels so that children can continue to develop their skills and vocabulary as they work their way up from short sentences with only a few words on a page to longer paragraphs and slightly more involved stories.

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Chapter Books

Chapter books are targeted to more advanced early readers who have the attention span and skills to transition from heavily-illustrated beginning readers to longer, more detailed stories. Chapter books usually feature one or more illustrations per chapter, but pictures are of minor importance to the story. Popular early chapter book series found in this collection include Amber Brown, Cam Jansen, Geronimo Stilton, Judy Moody, June B. Jones, Magic Treehouse, and Rainbow Magic. Chapter book readers are usually in the early primary grades; around 3rd grade, many children will be ready to begin exploring the more detailed stories included in our juvenile fiction collection, but they may still enjoy titles from both collections.

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Children’s Nonfiction

Our children’s nonfiction collection includes real-life stories and informational books for children up to early or middle primary grades. Both nonfiction picture books and beginning reader books have been included to meet the needs of children at a variety of reading levels and attention spans.

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Children’s Media

 

Children’s Audiobooks

We offer a growing collection of audiobooks for children, including books on CD and portable devices called Playaways. The majority of our children’s audiobook collection consists of Read Alongs, which include popular children’s books packaged with a CD recording of the book (located in a pocket inside the front cover). Read Alongs allow children to follow the narrator and build confidence until they are ready to read on their own.

Playaway Launchpads

launchpad Launchpad are learning tablets created just for children. These devices feature high-quality learning apps grouped by subject area, theme, grade level, and age. Launchpads offer a safe and secure learning environment for kids, and parents can easily track their child’s usage with the parent’s console. BCPL offers tablets targeted for two separate age groups: Ages 3–5 (Pre-K–Kindergarten) and Ages 5–7 (Kindergarten–Grade 2).

Playaway Views

sesame group_VSPlayaway Views are all-in-one video players for kids of all ages. The devices are portable and pre-loaded with multiple videos that are both entertaining and educational; you just have to press play!

Movies & Music

A number of movies and music CDs for children and families are available in the general Blu-ray, DVD, and Music CD collections. Hoopla and OverDrive also each offer a fantastic selection of streaming movies and music for kids!