Real Picture Books for Babies and Toddlers [Montessori-Aligned]
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I love real picture books. In general, babies tend to connect to them better than illustrated books. However, there are not a ton of real picture books available. Lovevery makes a gorgeous set but they are only available with a subscription. This blog post features our favorite real picture books that are not Lovevery. I have found more companies are producing real picture books recently, including some with more storylines. This is absolutely wonderful to see! These books I share below are, for the most part, not just books with real pictures and labels. They mostly have some sort of story, at least a very short poem throughout. I intentionally skipped the “first-word” type books that have real pictures and just labels. There are a lot more of that option, but we don’t prefer them in our home.
Our bookshelf is Sprout Kids (code OnTheWay10 gives a discount).
Carry Me: This is from the Babies Everywhere series and is a must-have if you are a babywearing family! I love that it shows babywearing throughout the world with both men and women. Babywearing is a big part of our familiy so this book is one of our favorite Montessori-aligned real picture books for babies.
Baby Up, Baby Down: This is a cute opposites book with real photos of babies. My children loved it as babies. It shows various everyday opposites and is a great choice for a real photo book for babies.
Edible Colors: This is an absolute favorite of mine and without question my favorite book about colors. One thing I love is how it introduces babies and toddlers to the idea that food can come in a variety of colors, encouraging exploration. We have tried some fun colored food inspired by this book! If you don’t have this book yet, I would absolutely get it!
Edible Numbers: This one is by the same people as Edible Colors above and is similar but focused on numbers and counting rather than colors. It is another great book featuring real and diverse foods!
The Babies and Kitties Book: Or The Babies and Doggies Book if you’re more of a dog person or The Babies and Bunnies Book for a lovely springtime book (or all of them like we have because they are ALL amazing). These are some of the cutest real picture books. They make comparisons between kitties (or doggies or bunnies) and babies. Whether you choose to get one favorite animal or all of them, I highly recommend this series. The photos are so cute and it is just the sweetest little premise.
A Kiss Means I Love You: I adore this book and how it gives feelings to nonverbal actions. It just feels like such a special thing to tell our babies “I understand” about all of the ways they communicate without words. It has the absolute sweetest bookend of a kiss meaning I love you but includes other actions throughout the book as well.
Hands Can: This book goes through the different things hands do. It has a gentle rhyme and real pictures. Like most of the real picture books I have shared I like that it has a real rhythm versus just labels of the pictures!
All Kinds of People: This is a wonderful book for introducing diversity of skin tone and the fact that children of all races, etc. play together. I love that it shows diversity in skin tone and introduces children to diversity in a very simple way.
Chloe Goes to the Doctor: This series has a lot of different fantastic options for real picture books. There is one about going to the dentist, two about potty training, one about getting a new sibling. These books do a wonderful job of helping children through challenging transitions. They also have great story lines with real pictures that children will enjoy even if they are not preparing for one of these events. I love that options like this are now available outside of a subscription!
My Turn, Your Turn: This series is all about books with real pictures and has several in the series. This is a great one for all children, focusing on something all children will come across: turn-taking. Many of their real picture books are focused more on specific events which is also very helpful (such as surgery, getting a new sibling, etc.). I love that these have more of a story to them than many of the other real picture books and are wonderful for toddlers.
Global Babies: Babies love looking at photos of other babies. This book features babies all around the world. I love how it introduces global diversity to children. Each picture is labeled with the location and a few words weave throughout the book to make a very short “story.”
Celebrations (We are Little Feminists): This set has several books but I am particularly fond of the celebrations ones. It features real pictures of people celebrating key events in different cultures. For minority children, like mine, it can be so special to see our culture represented, but it also gives an opportunity to learn about other cultures and their celebrations. All of them though feature wonderful diversity. I also love the On the Go one for showing all sorts of ways to move including wheelchairs, hand bikes, and other supports.
My Face Book: I am not a huge fan of books that don’t have any sort of prose or poetry to them, but this is a good book showing different emotions in babies. The best part of this particular book is that it is available in different languages. We have the Hebrew one, but it is available in a whole bunch of languages, including ones that are more challenging to find books in.
