An Egg-cellent Library
Springing into action with new books!
It’s time for longer days and brighter skies and hopefully those Spring showers don’t catch you while you’re out! Spring time can be a really exciting time for little ones; aside from egg hunts and eating chocolate, you can do and see all sorts of things during the springtime! Gardening, watching flowers bloom, seeing little baby animals… There are simply too many opportunities to explore the world outside, as well as the one in your books!
Contents
Note: if you’re interested in any of the books in this list, you can click/tap the titles to see them in the shop!
Chinese books about Easter
This is a super fun lift-the-flap book series and it’s so exciting to follow Spot in his day-to-day life to see what he discovers! This book about an Easter egg hunt uses lift-the-flap to help kids join in the fun with the hunt. It’s very cute and the big Chinese font accompanied with English make this great for a bilingual reader’s library!
Chinese Christian books about Easter
This tale doesn’t follow Jesus’ life directly but through the perspective of three trees who are cut down and used to craft various objects that are important in Jesus’ ministry. Each of them learns that their dreams and prayers are answered not through their own strivings, but through the vision of God. It’s a lovely story about trusting God - a wonderful message to remember during Easter!
Careful, though, the image of Jesus’ crucifixion is a little more bloody than the typical Bible illustration for kids.
Ready, Steady, Find - Easter Story 《大搜寻系列：夏活节》 (in Simplified / Traditional Chinese and English - link coming soon!)
Coming in a board book form, the books in this set are perfect for babies and toddlers. They’re also great fun! Encouraging young children to engage with the stories by giving them little things to find in the illustrations. This book follows a condensed version of the Easter story more closely.
Chinese books about Spring
These books are nice and large with wonderfully realistic illustrations. The text is very informative and they are a great set for slightly older children (ages 3+). The vocabulary is a little more complicated than most books for this age group because it is slightly more specialised and scientific than the ordinary book about everyday life.
Taking the difficulty a slight step further, you can observe all the secrets of the garden and the development of baby animals through some of the books in this set! We really love the way that the series uses the transparent pages to transform illustrations and show transitionary stages of the egg or reveal the garden.
Chirp’s Little Sister 《小鸡球球当哥哥了》 (From Chirp The Chick Grows Up Volume 2 in Simplified Chinese)
Here’s one of our personal favourites here at De Ziremi! This Chirp The Chick book is set during the season of new chick-arrivals! When Chirp becomes an older brother, he needs to learn to take good care of his little sister - which is harder than he thought! The bright colours and fun lift-the-flaps make discovering Spring fun!
Chirp The Chick’s Sunflower 《小鸡球球和向日葵》 （From Chirp The Chick And Friends series in Simplified Chinese)
This is a really heartwarming story about Chirp’s greatest efforts to grow a little seed into a big, strong sunflower! But no matter how hard he tries, the sunflower begins to wither and die… leaving behind just a few seeds. Chirp must wait to the next Spring to see his sunflower friends again. Sweet, right?
Eric Carle’s collage art brings to life another story about new life! The little tiny seed travels afar and dreams of being the most beautiful flower of all. It’s so interesting for kids to see how some seeds can survive while others cannot, and the journeys they can take before popping up in the warm Spring sunshine!
This is story is told with really bright and beautiful oil painting-style illustrations to help children learn the different colours of the Rainbow Flower. This is particularly apt for the Spring, because even when the Rainbow Flower gives away all its petals, it can still return in the Spring with the help of its friends!
The pull tabs on this series are so innovative! You can see each stage of growth for each of the fruits, vegetables and animals featured in the books! It’s one of our favourites because the illustrations are beautiful and realistic and children love observing the differences in each stage of growth!
The Very Hungry Caterpillar 《好饿的毛毛虫》 (in Simplified Chinese)
Probably the most classic of the classic Eric Carle books, this book hardly needs a summary. We love watching the caterpillar turning into a big fat caterpillar before hiding away into a cocoon and breaking out as a beautiful butterfly! (It certainly reminds us of Rui and Zhe; they eat so much sometimes - especially the bad stuff!)
Plant Cabbage With Me《第一次圆白菜》 (in Simplified Chinese - link coming soon!)
Another book about seeds and the Spring, except this one follows follows a little boy enjoying his garden. This book reminds me of Rui and Zhe and their garden antics with Ah Gong and it’s good to have stories like this so that children can relate their gardening experiences to words they find in books!
Here Comes The Express 《快递来了》 (From On A Trip Volume 2》 (in Simplified Chinese)
This book is so beautiful and sweet. I love the stretching landscapes and seaside towns and following the little express delivery through all the scenes! There’s a little girl at the end wondering why Spring comes so late to the mountainous regions but the Express seems to deliver a little taste of Spring to her.
Flower 《花》, Spring 《春天》 and Spring Is Here 《春天来了》 (From Greenfield I Can Read series available in Simplified / Traditional Chinese with Pinyin)
For those with the Greenfield I Can Learn graded reading system, you might want to dig out these books if you haven’t already! There’s even one where you can follow a girl with her little craft activity making a bunch of paper flowers. So there’s lots to do and learn in Spring with your graded learning systems, too!
Blooming Flower 《开花了》 and Flowers 《花》 (From Le Le Chinese Graded Learning System Intermediate available in Simplified / Traditional Chinese)
Le Le isn’t short of books about nature but this one about the blooming flower is particularly nice for springtime because you can follow the seed through its stages of growth and link it with spring gardening. It’s part of the beginner set so the vocabulary is very basic but it’s good for toddlers or new learners!
(UPDATE 14/07/2021 14:30: We are a Le Le Chinese Affiliate, which means that you get a 5% discount when you use ‘LELEDEZIREMI’ and a little bit of your purchase will support this blog and the day-to-day running of the bookshop!)
How was this booklist? We realise there’s a little shortage on books about actual Easter in both the Christian and non-Christian genre but there are so many books that fit the idea of new life and match perfectly with springtime activities! What Easter or Spring-related books do you like to read with your kids during this time? Let us know in the comments or on our social media! We’re always delighted to hear from you.
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