As a parent, how often have you made your baby sleep with the help of board books? How often have you read through those colorful, tiny, cute books to pamper your little one? How often have you used those board books while traveling so your munchkin keeps engaged and doesn’t get cranky? Well, the answer to all these questions would be “so many times”. Board books for babies are the very first books most parents prefer to buy..
So now let’s see the main differences between a regular book and a board book. Well, a regular book is just another with thin pages, non-glossy sheets and not so many pictographs. At the same time, a board book is just like a board with thick sheets, glossy papers and a lot of catchy pictures. A board book is the best way to make your baby aware of several things. For example, a baby learns faster by seeing pictures. A board book is the best for such uses. You can familiarize your baby with fruits and vegetables, stories, numbers and letters and much more.
In This Article
- What Are Board Books?
- Are Board Books Good For Babies?
- When Should You Introduce Board Books to Your Baby?
- Benefits of Board Books For Babies
- Top 10 Board Books For Babies
- FAQ’s
What Are Board Books?
A board book is a book with pictures on a hard paper surface and eye catchy for babies. In simple terms, board books are equipped with the same harder shell on the outside, and the inside pages are made from the same material. These factors make board books extremely durable, and the preferred types of books for parents with infants and babies.
Board books would be an apt form of learning material for your baby. It makes the learning process quite pleasing, and the material is so safe for small hands to hold and turn around the pages. These books don’t crinkle even though your baby may not hold them properly. Some board books are washable too making it easy for you to regularly sanitize them and remove any accidental stains.
Are Board Books Good For Babies?
Yes, absolutely. Board books are ultimately beneficial for babies as they are durable and are perfect for young readers who love to understand the concepts more by pictures than by reading. Moreover, board books endure a lot of wear and tear, and these books do not harm those tiny hands.
Parents usually use board books to introduce their babies to shapes, colors, designs, animals, numbers, letters, and other things. The colors of these books are bright, which is good for illustration depictions. Moreover, these books are not wordy, which means that most of the space in these books is acquired by pictures, making it quite convenient and exciting for babies. These grab their attention as the words are also mentioned in significant texts. Moreover, these books are suitable for age groups of 0-3 years.
[Read : The Power of Children’s Picture Books]
When Should You Introduce Board Books to Your Baby?
When your baby becomes capable of responding, this would be the apt age to introduce board books to them. A six-month-old baby would probably be able to respond to board books. You can teach them the colors first and see their reaction. If they enjoy it, you can move on by introducing other things like animals, the alphabet and more to them.
Benefits of Board Books For Babies
Board books have tremendous benefits for young readers. It helps your baby to develop pre-reading skills and, at the same time, introduce new things which will interest the readers. Let’s have a read at their other benefits below:
1. Language Development
It’s essential to help your baby with literacy skills, including vocabulary, pronunciation, sentence structure, and more. Board books help babies by teaching them language skills, which allows them to build their communication skills.
2. Motor Skills
Motor skills like hand-eye coordination are essential to be developed at an early stage. Nothing works better than a board book as it has texts and pictures, which would help the baby to make eye-hand coordination.
3. Social skills
Board books connect babies with the world outside by introducing various things. They get to connect with the characters mentioned in the books; hence, this one-to-one interaction with the book would help them develop their social skills.
[Read : Social Emotional Developmental Milestones in Infants]
Top 10 Board Books For Babies
Here are some of the best board books you can buy for your baby:
1. Mirror and Me Feelings by Rose Colombe
The book describes various traits of different animals in simple language paired with bright and interesting illustrations. Every time, you flip a page, on one side is the image of the animal and on the other page is the image of the animal with a mirror in place of its face. Babies can look into this mirror and see their face in the place of the animal’s face and try to mimic the feelings described.
Why This Book
This is a very interactive book for young babies. Babies love to look at themselves in a mirror. In fact, playing with a mirror is an important developmental milestone for babies and this book facilitates just that. Babies can learn about animals, and feelings and also learn to emote by looking in the mirror.
2. Count to Love by Andrea Pinkney
The book is about counting to love. It brings in the names of various body parts and counts from one to four every time. The book adds various parts of the baby and what parents do with the baby, that all add up to love.
Why This Book
Babies can learn to count from one to four and also learn the names of the body parts. When you count and touch the respective baby parts, along with the baby, they will learn fast and enjoy it too. It can also be a simple yet nice look for parents to bond with their children.
3. 8 Little Planets by Chris Ferrie
The book is about 8 planets of the solar system. It starts with telling the baby how the planets go around the sun. Then it goes on to describe each planet in simple terms that a baby can understand.
Why This Book
The illustrations are very bright, colorful, and interesting enough to grasp a baby’s attention. Simple terms make it easy for babies to understand. The book can also help your baby learn colors and counting or ordinal numbers. The smiling images of the planets are easy for a baby to recollect when you ask about the planet’s features or color. Overall, it is a simple straightforward book that can teach your baby many important concepts.
4. Peek-A-Boo House by Camilla Reid
This is a peek-a-boo book that encourages babies to interact with the book. Babies can slide the flaps, put their tiny fingers in and have fun finding simple common household items. The book describes and encourages babies to find simple items they are bound to see around them at home.
Why This Book
The simple words in bold font along with bright illustrations will attract a baby’s attention and encourage them to interact more with the book, The finger hole is small enough for a baby to put their finger in and slide the flap. The baby gets to slide, roll and find hidden images. It will help improve cognitive development, language, and fine motor skills.
5. All the World by Liz Garton Scanlon
The book describes different scenarios and brings it back to how everything is part of the big world. it uses simple words without any sentence formation or story narration. The illustrations are self-explanatory with simple words for babies to understand what the author is explaining.
Why This Book
There are no lengthy sentences or grammar to worry about, It is just a collection of relatable words used in a rhyming format, which helps babies pick up the sounds of the words quite easily. Babies can’t speak in sentences and say just the important words. The book is in a similar format, thus making it very relatable for a baby who is just about to say their first words.
6. Once Upon A World by Chloe Perkins
This is a box set of four fairy tales for you to read aloud to your baby. These are well-illustrated board books for babies to explore on their own, to see the pictures of good and bad people, and understand them in their own way.
Why This Book
Fairy tales are a part of almost all babies’ lives and they can captivate the interest of any child. Fairy tales though may not hold much relevance to today’s world, gives babies a boost of creativity and imagination.
7. Where Is Little Fish by Lucy Cousins
The book is about finding a colorful fish that has fun swimming around under the sea. The author encourages babies to search for the little fish behind various bright illustrations on the pages.
Why This Book
This is a very interactive book with bright illustrations that encourages babies to open the flap and search for the fish. The bold words and bright images of other sea creatures along with the names are a very interesting way to teach young babies about the underwater world. The book helps in developing fine motor skills, language, and overall brain development.
8. Bath! Bath! Bath! by Douglas Florian
This is a simple story with bright illustrations about a day in young children’s lives. They have a full fun-filled day and now it’s time for a bath. It goes on to describe how they bathe and clean themselves up.
Why This Book
The book uses rhyming words in a repetitive manner, which makes it easy for babies to learn the words. Babies always want to mimic older kids or what they read and see. Seeing illustrations of scrubbing oneself clean after a long day is a great way to encourage your baby to have a bath as a part of their routine.
[Read : Top 9 Best Black and White Books For Newborn Babies]
9. Tummy Time: Happy Baby by Duopress Labs
A fun book with black and white images and a mirror to help the baby interact with the book and develop multiple essential skills. Instead of individual pages to flip, the board book can be opened up fully and made to stand for a baby to lie down during tummy time and observe the images.
Why This Book
The colored images on one side and black and white images on the other helps stimulate a baby’s vision. The board book can stand on its own, making it a perfect toy for tummy time. When babies spend more time on their tummies, it strengthens their back, neck, and upper body, which is essential for movement.
10. One, Two, Three Dim Sum by Rich Lo
This Mandarin and English Counting book feature Chinese food items that babies can see and count. The numbers are given in both Chinese and English and illustrate common food items many babies might see from time to time.
Why This Book
This is a bilingual book that can help babies learn numbers in both English and Chinese. Babies pick up language fast when they are young and exposing them to other languages through such books can be a good start to get them interested.
Board books for babies can be a good investment that can serve more than just language development. Getting your baby into the habit of reading from a young age, can be very beneficial for their development in various stages of life. With a diversified set of board books for babies, your baby can benefit a lot.
[Read : Top 6 Best Counting Books For Babies in First Year]
FAQ’s
1. Are Board Books Good For 1 Year Olds?
Undoubtedly, reading is an excellent habit for young children. It hones their social skills and, at the same time, builds their verbal communication and reading skills.
2. Which is Better, Board Books or Paper Covers?
A board book is undoubtedly better than a paper cover because babies can handle them easily.
3. What Makes a Good Board Book?
A good board book is something which contains good stories and good representative pictures at the same time.
