Children's Books About Gratitude & Thankfulness (Ages 3–7)

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One thing worth knowing before you choose. Researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, led by Andrea Hussong, describe gratitude as four separate moves rather than one: a child has to notice they have been given something, think about why the other person gave it, feel something about it, and then do something to show it. When they surveyed around a hundred parents of six- to nine-year-olds, about 85% expected their child to say thank you. Far fewer ever asked the child why they thought the other person had given it. That is the gap these books are good at closing, because a story can put a child inside somebody else's head for ten minutes in a way that "say thank you to Granny" never will.

1. Sharing Silver — best for the child whose thank you sounds automatic

Bandit is a dog who takes from everyone in Friendship Forest and gives nothing back, and the thing Sharing Silver does that the rest of this list does not is refuse to scold him. Silver the Super Pup simply walks him round and shows him the machinery: Olivia's music, Benny's waterwheel, a forest that looks after whoever looks after it. Bandit works out for himself that everything he has been helping himself to arrived because somebody made it.

That is the noticing-and-wondering half of gratitude, dramatised, and it is the half our own children needed most. A four-year-old who has been told a hundred times to say thank you has learned a sound, not a thought. Watching a character trace a good thing back to the person who put it there is a different exercise entirely, and it stuck with ours in a way the reminders had not. Written for ages three to seven, and short enough to read twice in a sitting, which you will want to do.

“The world is like a mirror. It reflects back what you give.”

Sharing Silver is a superhero training story about sharing, kindness and giving, written for ages 3 to 7. The book on this list that treats thanks and giving as the same loop rather than two separate manners lessons.

View Sharing Silver on Amazon

You can read a sample of Sharing Silver first to see whether the voice suits your child, and our kindness activities cover the week after you close it.

2. Last Stop on Market Street — by Matt de la Peña

CJ and his nana ride the bus across town every Sunday and CJ spends most of it complaining. Why don't we have a car. Why do we always have to come here. His nana never argues with him, she just keeps pointing at what is already there, until the shabby end of town looks different. This is the best book on the list for the noticing part, and it never once uses the word grateful, which is exactly why it works. Christian Robinson's collage art is worth the price on its own. Best from about four upwards, and the child who grumbles in the car is the child to read it to. View Last Stop on Market Street on Amazon →

3. Have You Filled a Bucket Today? — by Carol McCloud

Everyone carries an invisible bucket, you fill other people's with kind words and helpful acts, and when you dip into someone's bucket you empty your own too. It is less a story than a very good idea, and it gives a young child something gratitude usually lacks at this age: a physical picture to hang the feeling on. Ours started announcing whose bucket had been filled at dinner, unprompted, which is the whole point. Four and up, though the metaphor lands earliest with children who like a rule they can apply. Pair it with our kindness story books list if the wider problem is unkindness rather than thanks. View Have You Filled a Bucket Today? on Amazon →

4. Thank You, Mr. Falker — by Patricia Polacco

Polacco's own story. Trisha loves books but cannot read a word of them, hides it for years, gets picked on for it, and then a fifth-grade teacher notices and quietly teaches her. The thank you at the centre of this one is the real article, aimed at a specific person who took real trouble, which is the version of gratitude the research says we teach least. Be honest about the age though. It is longer and sadder than everything else here, the bullying is not softened, and it suits six and seven at the very top of our range rather than a three-year-old. For an older sibling, or a child who has a teacher worth thanking, it is the one. View Thank You, Mr. Falker on Amazon →

5. The Giving Tree — by Shel Silverstein

A tree gives a boy her apples, then her branches, then her trunk, and ends as a stump for him to sit on. People have argued since 1964 about whether it is a story about generous love or about being taken for granted, and on a gratitude list that argument is the feature rather than the bug. It is the only book here that shows the cost side, what it takes out of the person doing the giving, and with a six- or seven-year-old it produces a properly interesting conversation about whether the boy ever says thank you. Not a starting point, and not one to read to a three-year-old expecting a tidy ending. View The Giving Tree on Amazon →

6. Little Blue Truck — by Alice Schertle

Blue says hello to every animal on the road. A big dump truck is far too important for any of that, roars past, and buries himself in the mud, and it is the animals Blue greeted who eventually push him out. The rhyme and the beeps carry it for the two- and three-year-olds who are too young for everything else on this page, and the lesson underneath is one they can actually hold: the people who help you are the ones you were nice to. Jill McElmurry's illustrations are lovely. This is the toddler rung of the list. View Little Blue Truck on Amazon →

How to choose one, and how to read it

Pick by the part your child is missing rather than by the word on the cover. A child who has plenty and sees none of it needs Last Stop on Market Street. A child whose thank you is a reflex needs Sharing Silver. A child who cannot connect a feeling to an action needs the bucket. A two-year-old needs Little Blue Truck and nothing more complicated than that. Buying the one that matches this month beats buying four that do not.

Then do the small thing afterwards, because it is the bit almost everyone skips. Instead of asking for a thank you, ask the question the Chapel Hill research found parents ask least: why do you think she gave you that? It is an odd question the first few times and a child will often shrug at it. Ask it anyway. You are not fishing for manners, you are getting them to look at the person behind the gift, and a picture book read the night before gives them somewhere to start.

It also helps to keep your expectations honest. Feeling grateful, as opposed to performing it, leans on perspective-taking, and that builds slowly across these years. A three-year-old rattling off a thank you is not being insincere. They are doing the only part of it that is currently available to them, and the ritual is what the real feeling will later attach to.

If you want more, see our guide to raising a kind, sharing friend, the best books about giving and generosity for the other half of this loop, and children's story books about sharing if the argument at your house is over a toy rather than over thanks.