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Product Description
Ten years ago, Jack and Annie found a Magic Tree House in the woods and the world of reading was changed forever. Millions of letters later (from children, parents, and teachers around the world!)the exciting and inspiring four books are available together in a keepsake-worthy boxed set. The perfect gift to encourage a struggling new reader or remind old fans of the way they first discovered the magic of books…. More >>
Go & get it here - i can recommend it:
Magic Tree House Boxed Set, Books 1-4: Dinosaurs Before Dark, The Knight at Dawn, Mummies in the Morning, and Pirates Past Noon
I was accidently sent another book in my mailing package. I sent that one back with a note that it was the wrong product. i have not yet received the Magic Tree House book set.
My daughter is only 5 but she loves the magic tree house books and learns a lot from them too.
My child just loves this series, can’t get enough of it. Fun with history sprinkled in.
This was our first journey into chapter books for our 4 year old son. I never imagined he’d stay focused for so long. The plots are everything a 4 year old boy could dream of - Knights, Dinosaurs…etc. I even enjoy the books - I can’t believe I never read them as a child. We are both very excited to move on to the next set!
When I was a middle-schooler I read some books by a fellow called Willard Price. My mom told me recently that she found them very dry and couldn’t understand why I liked them. I reread one recently and was shocked. They are indeed very dry. They are just facts coated with the candy of a plot and some cardboard characters, the whole designed only to educate you without your realising it. Fortunately, I didn’t know that when I was thirteen, so I gobbled them up. I got vast amounts of knowledge of natural history from Willard Price’s stories.
The Magic Treehouse books are similar. From an adult’s viewpoints, these books are junk. There is very little of character development, even less of plot, and the grammar leaves much to be desired. But, my 3 year old and 5 year old love them. They eat them up. My five year old said, “Mummy, today is a good day because we get to read about Jack and Annie.” And they actually learn things from them. Certainly, the information presented is not complex. But, my kids are gaining general knowledge in a way that is highly palatable to them.
My main issue with the books is that it is difficult for the child to distinguish fact from fiction in them; in fact, some of the information in the books is inaccurate. (This is also the main difference from the Willard Price books. I’ve never been led wrong by a Willard Price fact). I would prefer if the Magic Treehouse author had designed the stories in such a way that the kids reading the stories could work out easily what was meant to be real and what was invented for the story. For example, Morgan Le Fay is presented as a Librarian in King Arthur’s library. Yes, the saga of Arthur is a myth, but let’s at least get the myth right!
I think these are good books for kids under the age of 7 or 8. Yes, there are other series that are written so much more skillfully, such as Enid Blyton’s Magic Faraway Tree. But, try reading The Magic Faraway Tree to your five year old. You have to explain every fourth word. Who knew Enid Blyton wrote such complex prose! The Magic Treehouse series is paced for beginning readers and there are lots of books so plenty of fodder for kids who read quickly. I think the best approach is to let your kid go through them as young as possible and then move on to better-written books when they are old enough to really be internalising the grammar and style.