Back to School Listens

The Yellow Bus

By: Loren Long
Narrated by: Soneela Nankani
Length: 12 minutes

The Yellow Bus features sound design and special effects to enhance your listening enjoyment. Listen out for the sound of children getting on the bus and bleating goats.

From #1 New York Times bestselling and beloved creator Loren Long, The Yellow Bus is a tender and heartfelt ode to educators.

There is a bright yellow bus who spends her days... Read more

Becoming Vanessa

By: Vanessa Brantley-Newton
Narrated by: Vanessa Brantley-Newton
Length: 6 minutes

Get ready to go back to school with this inclusive, empathetic story that will help kids new to the classroom transform from timid caterpillars into beautiful butterflies who love exactly who they are!

On Vanessa's first day of school, her parents tell her it will be easy to make friends. Vanessa isn't so sure. She wears her fanciest... Read more

All Are Welcome (An All Are Welcome Book)

All Are Welcome

By: Alexandra Penfold
Narrated by: Janina Edwards
Length: 5 minutes

Join the call for a better world with this New York Times bestselling picture book about a school where diversity and inclusion are celebrated. The perfect back-to-school read for every kid, family and classroom!

In our classroom safe and sound.
Fears are lost and hope is found.

Discover a school where all young children have a place, have a... Read more

The Name Jar

By: Yangsook Choi
Narrated by: Shannon Tyo
Length: 18 minutes

A heartwarming story about the new girl in school, and how she learns to appreciate her Korean name.

Being the new kid in school is hard enough, but what happens when nobody can pronounce your name? Having just moved from Korea, Unhei is anxious about fitting in. So instead of introducing herself on the first day of school, she decides to choose... Read more

The Day You Begin

By: Jacqueline Woodson
Narrated by: Jacqueline Woodson
Length: 5 minutes

Jacqueline Woodson is the 2018-2019 National Ambassador for Young People's Literature

A #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER!

National Book Award winner Jacqueline Woodson has created a poignant, yet heartening audiobook about finding courage to connect, even when you feel scared and alone.

There will be times when you walk into a room
and no one there is... Read more

Tomatoes in My Lunchbox

By: Costantia Manoli
Narrated by: Costantia Manoli
Length: 9 minutes

This audiobook is read by the author.

Tomatoes in My Lunchbox is a moving audiobook from a debut author about the first day of school, layered with themes about the immigrant experience and the universal experience of feeling out of place.

A child, newly arrived in another country, feels displaced, lonely, and a little scared on her first day of... Read more

Donut Worry

By: Christianne Jones
Narrated by: Jesús E. Martínez & Elizabeth Cottle
Length: 11 minutes

Poor Donut is feeling anxious. School is about to start again, and Donut can't stop all sorts of worries from filling her round donut head. She's tired of her friends and family saying Don't worry! As if it's that easy! Can her new friend, Cookie, help her find ways to manage her anxiety? Christianne Jones, author of Lacey Walker, Nonstop... Read more

The King of Kindergarten

By: Derrick Barnes
Narrated by: Sullivan Jones
Length: 5 minutes

A confident little boy takes pride in his first day of kindergarten, by the Newbery Honor-winning author of Crown.

The morning sun blares through your window like a million brass trumpets.It sits and shines behind your head--like a crown. Mommy says that today, you are going to be the King of Kindergarten!

Starting kindergarten is a big... Read more

I Love Vincent

By: Laura Ljungkvist
Narrated by: Travis Baldree
Length: 6 minutes

Scout is a very good boy. He is a seeing-eye dog who helps his human friend Vincent with all his daily activities because Vincent is blind. After graduating from a special training school where they learned how to be partners, Scout and Vincent became a perfect team! Vincent takes excellent care of Scout, giving him his favorite kind of food and... Read more

Fighting For YES! (Audio Descriptive)

The Story of Disability Rights Activist Judith Heumann

By: Maryann Cocca-Leffler & Judith Heumann
Narrated by: Ali Stroker & Judith Heumann
Length: 31 minutes

From a very young age, Judy Heumann heard the word NO. When she wanted to attend public school, the principal said NO. When she wanted her teaching license, the New York Board of Education said NO. Judy and people with disabilities everywhere were tired of hearing “NO.” In the 1970s, an important disability rights law, Section 504 of The... Read more

Calvin

By: JR Ford & Vanessa Ford
Narrated by: Vittorio Wyatt Gray
Length: 9 minutes

Calvin has always been a boy, even if the world sees him as a girl. He knows who he is in his heart and in his mind, but he hasn't yet told his family. Finally, he can wait no longer: I'm not a girl, he tells his family. I'm a boy?—a boy in my heart and in my brain. Quick to support him, his loving family takes Calvin shopping for the swim... Read more

Best Friends

Real Friends: Book #2

By: Shannon Hale
Narrated by: Carlotta Brentan, Dean Hale, Dinah Hale, Helen Laser, Jeremy Carlisle Parker, Mark Sanderlin, Marni Penning, Mia Jenness, Michael Crouch, Rob Brinkmann, Shannon Hale & Wren Hale
Length: 3 hours 11 minutes

"Author Shannon Hale narrates as a full cast enacts the drama of her sixth-grade year in this adaptation of the middle volume of her graphic memoir trilogy. Portraying young Shannon, Mia Jenness evokes excitement, uncertainty, and hurt--painfully and exquisitely--as she picks her way through a friendship minefield."- AudioFile (Earphones Award... Read more

First Grade, Here I Come!

Here I Come!

By: David J Steinberg
Narrated by: Nily Dar Steinberg
Length: 10 minutes

The funny follow-up to Kindergarten, Here I Come!

First grade—it's the big time! After all, it's a real honest to goodness grade. In verses that are both funny and full of heart, D.J. Steinberg celebrates big and small moments, ones that all young "scholars" will relate to—baby teeth that won't fall out, choosing the perfect library book,... Read more

Second Grade, Here I Come!

Here I Come!

By: David J Steinberg
Narrated by: D.J. Steinberg
Length: 13 minutes

Go back to school for second grade—and get ready to go with these fun and silly poems!

D. J. Steinberg's heartfelt, relatable, and silly poems bring to life the highlights of second grade—reading those big-kid books, trying out for the school play, and even dance breaks to wiggle "arms and legs and kaboodles. . . like a big bunch of second-grade... Read more

Preschool, Here I Come!

Here I Come!

By: D.J. Steinberg
Narrated by: Nily Dar Steinberg
Length: 11 minutes

A book for all preschoolers-to-be from the author of Kindergarten, Here I Come!

From saying goodbye to parents on the very first day of school to watching butterflies hatch in spring, D. J. Steinberg celebrates all the landmark moments of preschool. Because the year is full of so many firsts, this collection of funny, joyful poems is a must-have... Read more

Kindergarten, Here I Come!

Here I Come!

By: D.J. Steinberg
Narrated by: D.J. Steinberg
Length: 13 minutes

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • MORE THAN A MILLION COPIES SOLD • Get ready for kindergarten with this audiobook of rhyming poems that shows kids what to expect from their first year in school!

“Kindergarten, here I come…
I’m checking off the list
Of everything I need for school.
Let’s see… what have I missed?”

Celebrate all the familiar moments of... Read more

The Great Banned-Books Bake Sale

By: Aya Khalil
Narrated by: Dalia Ramahi
Length: 18 minutes

Upon learning that the books with kids who look like her have been banned by her school district, Kanzi descends into fear and helplessness. But her classmates support her, and together—with their teacher’s help—they hatch a plan to hold a bake sale and use the proceeds to buy diverse books to donate to libraries. The event is a big success: the... Read more

Classified

The Secret Career of Mary Golda Ross, Cherokee Aerospace Engineer

By: Traci Sorell
Narrated by: DeLanna Studi, Traci Sorell & John Ross
Length: 20 minutes

Mary Golda Ross designed classified airplanes and spacecraft as Lockheed Aircraft Corporation's first female engineer. This story traces her journey from being the only girl in a high-school math class to becoming a teacher to pursuing an engineering degree, joining the top-secret Skunk Works division of Lockheed, and being a mentor for Native... Read more

Battle of the Bands

By: Lauren Gibaldi & Eric Smith
Narrated by: Zoe Cross-Nelms, Sara Young, Jackie Meloche, Hope Newhouse, Nick Mondelli, Imani Jade Powers, Dez Walker, Gail Shalan, Monica Rachelle & Subhadra Newton
Length: 9 hours 43 minutes

A daughter of rock ’n’ roll royalty has a secret crush. A lonely ticket taker worries about his sister. An almost-famous songwriter nurses old wounds. A stage manager tires of being behind the scenes. A singer-songwriter struggles to untangle her feelings for her best friend and his girlfriend. In this live-out-loud anthology, the disparate... Read more

What Ollie Saw

By: Joukje Akveld
Narrated by: Carrington MacDuffie
Length: 11 minutes

Ollie doesn't see things the same way everybody else does (and he certainly doesn't see things the same way his older sister does). Instead of cars in traffic, Ollie sees a circus parade. Instead of cows grazing in a field, Ollie sees deadly bison with sharp horns and hooves. And at school, instead of letters on the board, Ollie sees birds with... Read more