Top 10 Books for 1 Year Olds

We love books based in reality so that kids can learn about the world around them when they’re reading.

These are all books we own and love that are Montessori aligned, meaning they are based in reality and don’t have any fantasy aspects (all either non-fiction or fiction that could happen in real life).

I browse, research, and read every single book before we add it to our home library. Finding Montessori based books is something I spend a lot of time doing for fun! Here’s our huge list of our favorite reality based books for 1 year olds starting with our top 10 choices and others we love below.

First 100 Trucks and Things that Go
- This book has 100 pictures of things like dump trucks, excavators, race cars, police cars, boats, and more! We started with the giant sized book and ended up buying the small one to take with us when we’re traveling.
- The other “first 100” books in the series are great too! We have First 100 Animals and it’s just as loved as the Trucks and Things that Go.
Montessori Letter Work
- We love this book introducing letters! The Montessori way of introducing letters is to teach the sound the letter makes, not the name of the letter.
- This book has a sandpaper letter that you can trace with your finger, and teaches the sound the letter makes with a picture of something that starts with that sound.
- The pictures that go with the sounds actually make sense unlike a lot of the alphabet books out there. (For example they wouldn’t use “Chicken” for a C where the “K” sound doesn’t match up)
- We also have 3 other books from the series: Montessori Number Work, Montessori Shape Work, and Montessori Seed Work.
It’s You I Like – A Mister Rogers Poetry Book
- This book has illustrations (not real life photos) but is a beautiful book about liking someone for who they are as a person and not “your toys, they’re just beside you”.
- The words are the lyrics to the Mister Rogers song “It’s You I Like” which we’ve listened to on the Yoto since A was a baby.
- We also have another book in the series “Won’t You Be My Neighbor” which is based on the song of the same name.
Tool Book by Gail Gibbons
- A lot of tool books are geared toward older kids, but this one is perfect for 1 year olds!
- It has illustrations of all different tools and categorizes them such as “tools measure” with a tape measure and a ruler, and “tools cut” with a saw and shears.
- My son knows so many tool names just from owning this book! It’s definitely a favorite.
Roadwork
- This is a fun rhyming book that goes through all the steps of building a road. It has fun illustrations and sound effects that you read through.
- Construction is a very similar book by the same author and another favorite in our house.
I Went Walking
- Very similar to “Brown Bear, Brown Bear” but with real farm animals that are colors that make sense like a black cat, a pink pig, and a brown horse.
- It stars with “I went walking, what did you see?” “I saw a black cat looking at me” and continues through all different animals.
Edible Colors – Jennifer Vogel Bass
- A book filled with beautiful photos of real and unique fruits & veggies. It starts with “Carrots are orange, they are also purple. Look what else can be purple” and then shows all different varieties of fruits and vegetables that can be purple like purple grapes, purple asparagus, and purple cauliflower.
- It introduces little ones to all different kinds of foods and show them that there’s different varieties that come in all different colors.
- We also have Edible Numbers which counts different fruits and vegetables!
Let’s Make Music – A National Geographic Little Kids First Board Book
- We love this whole series of books! This one each page shows kids playing a different instrument and tells what sound it makes like drums, ukeleles, or maracas.
- Other books we love in this series are Bears and Bugs.
Go Go Grapes – A Fruit Chant by April Pulley Sayre
- This is a fun rhyming book full of different types of fruits! It has all real photos from a farmer’s market.
- We also own Rah Rah Radishes which is similar but full of vegetables!
Play, Play, Play – by Douglas Florian
- An illustrated rhyming book about playing! Each page shows kids playing with different things inside and outside. We love the rhyming and we like to point out the different toys we see like a train and a ball.
- Brush, Brush, Brush is another book in the series that we have and love. It’s all about brushing your teeth.