A real list of from a real family!
I’ve spent more hours than I could count researching books and reading through them to curate a library of Montessori aligned books for our home.
We like to pick books that are based on reality, meaning there’s not talking animals and unicorns. Most of our books are based around real life. Babies are taking in everything and we want to give them a strong foundation to learn around the world around them. They are really most interested in real life things!
When I was searching for Montessori books for babies, none of the lists I found were someone’s real list of their baby’s absolute favorites! This is our list of Montessori books that were my son’s actual favorites when under the age of 1 (and some are still his favorites now that he’s 2).
We own dozens of Montessori based baby books, but here were my sons absolute favorites when he was a baby. These would be the perfect addition to your collection or a wonderful gift for any baby in your life.
You’ll notice a common theme, all of these books have real pictures of babies. He loved looking at the baby faces on every page more than any of his other books.
Luckily, a lot of these books are part of a series, so if you’re little one loves it you can add the others to your collection!
- The Babies and Kitties Book
- This one has real life pictures of babies and kitties. My son loved looking at all of the babies faces and cute kitties.
- They also have other versions, we have the babies and doggies book and the babies and bunnies book
- Eat
- This is a short and sweet little rhyming book about learning to eat. It has different babies eating different foods and getting messy.
- We also have the “Sleep” book that is very similar but about going to sleep.
- A Kiss Means I love You
- This is a cute rhyming book with real pictures of babies. It shows them going through every day and what things mean like “A wave means hello” and “A smile means I’m happy”
- There’s also a similar book called “Show Me Happy” by the same author.
- Hands Can
- This book has real pictures of kids doing all kinds of things with their hands. It Rhymes and is a fun one to read. This book helped teach my son how to wave to say hello and goodbye! The kids are doing things like tying shoes, planting seeds, and fixing things.
- My First Learn to Talk Book – Things that Go
- I highly recommend these books! They are written by a Speech Language Pathologist and promote early speech.
- We have all of her books and love all of them including, I Can Say Mama, I Can Say Dada, My First Learn to Talk Book, and I Can Say Goodnight Book.
- These books really grow with your child, we started reading them when my son was just a baby and now at the age of 2 he “reads” the books to us.
- Baby Up, Baby Down; A First Book of Opposites
- This is a simple book of opposites with only a couple of words on each page and pictures of real babies doing things.
- There are other books in the series and they’re all favorites including “Baby Loves; A First Book of Favorites” and “Making Faces; A First Book of Emotions”
- Let’s Find Momo: A Hide and Seek Board Book
- This is a great one with real pictures of a dog named Momo in different real life settings. It grows with your child too! It’s perfect for looking at the pictures for babies, then great for learning items, and as they get to toddler age, it’s great for finding the items in each setting.
- The other books in the series are Let’s Find Momo Outdoors, and Let’s Find YaYa and Boo at Home. Let’s find Momo Outdoors is another one of our favorites!
- Early Sign Language – First Signs by Stan Collins
- This sign language books has pictures of kids doing common everyday signs including baby, mom, dad, please, thank you, drink, eat, done, more, banana, apple, cookie, milk, help, hurt/pain, go, stop, ball, book, cat, dog, car, airplane, potty, bath, sleep, play, and I love you.
- This is an amazing series for teaching sign language! Other books in the series that we have and love include: Early Sign Language – Signs for Pets and Animals (This is a big hit because it has pictures of real animals) and First Signs at Home.
- I Love You All The Time
- This is a book by Lovevery and it was definitely our most read book. It goes through pictures of real babies doing different things and feeling different emotions on each page while saying I love you in each of these circumstances, I love you all the time. Including I love you when you sing along, I love you when you push up strong, I love you when you’ve had enough.
- National Geographic Kids First Board Book – Things that Go
- This book has real life pictures of different things that go doing things including a tractor trailer carrying a load of logs, a bus that takes people all around town, and a hot air balloon that goes up, up, up.
Bonus: Lovevery Books!
- I absolutely love the books from Lovevery. Every single one we’ve gotten has been a huge hit in our house.
- Besides I Love You All The time our other most read books from Lovevery were Hi, Baby (introduction to other languages), Peek-a-boo (with fabric flaps to lift) , How I Feel (book about emotions), My First Signs (introduction to sign language), Squish (a fun mini book about eating), My First Words (learning vocabulary), and Baby Math (math concepts).
- See my post about our favorite Lovevery books here.