A Book Month That Quietly Came to Its Close

Book Month quietly came to its close—
and yet our Facebook page never did put up a single picture-book introduction 🫣
That's because the very first step of preparing to introduce them—
counting and sorting the books—was where we got completely stuck 😅
The sharing on Facebook may not have been written, but in the lounge itself
we were glad of every chance to properly recommend so many books to those who visited 😊

The books here were gathered across these dozen-odd years, alongside my children's growing—bit by bit, one book at a time.
Besides the 0-to-6 collection now kept in the lounge,
there are many others put away, for ages seven to twelve, twelve-and-up, even reference volumes.

When my child was very small, I began reading together with them.
Back then, reading together wasn't for understanding any content—
it was for *companionship*, for leaving behind a lovely feeling.
Singing a lullaby, reading a picture book aloud, listening to music—
letting a mother's melody, her warmth, the rhythm and cadence of reading,
carry a child gently into sleep.

When they grew a little older, curious about the pictures, brimming with the drive to explore the world around them,
watching their faces light up at each new discovery, I began to wonder:
"How do I bring this wide world before their eyes?"
—to let them feel, from small, the colour of all things, the abundance of the world,
and so light up their hopes for life, their imaginings of growing.
Walking into picture books, into books, into libraries, was the way I thought of 💖.
Later, as we stepped into homeschooling life, this knowing of the world and of life
moved from the pages into exploring and testing it out in real life.

Having owned these books for so many years, this was the first time I'd properly sorted and recorded them.
I'd thought it a simple task—but by the end, I could only kneel in awe of librarians… Orz
Right. Anyway (ahem)—
the final count came in a little larger than expected: the lounge collection alone held 1,349 books…
across eleven themes:

💞 Home, family and emotional connection, hugs and love, and the little bedtime stories
🐰 The lovable animals children adore, all kinds of humour, imagination and everyday adventure
🖼️ Art, music and visual creativity—the doodled, the classical, and wordless books that leave room for a child to fill in their own imagining
🌳 Nature and conservation—meeting animals, living things, forests, oceans, and this planet
🔭 Encyclopaedias, science and STEM
🔦 Interactive books: flaps, light-through, pop-ups, seek-and-find—so a child feels that a book's joy isn't only in reading words; interaction makes knowledge more approachable
💪 Biographies of world figures and stories of encouragement and growth—so children see a life full of possibility, and dare to believe "I can too!"
🌈 Multiculturalism, civic awareness and social issues—so children can see different people, cultures, faiths, viewpoints and values in the world
💗 Character, emotion and social growth (SEL)—stories of inner awareness, to help them know their own feelings and learn to be with others
🏡 Taiwanese and local culture—from Taiwanese and Hakka songs and Little Black Pi, to the stories of this island, coming to know the larger "home" we share
And last, for parents and children who'd like to build English step by step and read on their own—English graded readers and bridging chapter books—accompanying a child from phonics all the way to reading a whole book alone 📖.

Beyond the themes already in place, this time we carefully added ESL-level notes to the English picture books,
so visitors can more easily find books that fit their child's level, or a theme they'd enjoy 🙂
And though our Chinese picture books are fewer, they too are a collection chosen with care—do come and leaf through 😊

In future we'll keep introducing the lounge's picture books, little by little,
and try, through video too, to see how we might bring everyone closer to them.
For now, let's look together at a few interesting books, each with its own character—
and look forward to the next share 😊