Free Online Books & Read Alouds
- Literacy: Reading aloud can help children develop literacy skills in reading, writing, speaking, and listening.
- Vocabulary: Reading aloud can help children build their vocabulary and word mastery.
- Comprehension: Children’s comprehension abilities can be enhanced by reading aloud.
- Cognitive benefits: Reading aloud can strengthen the parts of the brain associated with visual imagery, story comprehension, and word meaning.
- Social and emotional development: Reading aloud can help children learn to use words to describe feelings and can decrease aggression, hyperactivity, and attention difficulties.
- Bonding: Reading aloud can help build relationships.
- Enjoyment: Reading aloud can be an enjoyable experience for both children and adults.
- Learning to love reading: Reading aloud can help children develop a love for reading.
- Understanding the world: Reading aloud can help children understand the world around them and the global society in which they live.
Free Online Books & Read Alouds
The following books may be leveled by Lexile level, grade level, Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level, guided reading level, generic level, topic, or age. Some books are not leveled at all. If your child is learning to read, please choose decodable books.
Multilingual stories—books are written in a variety of languages. You can filter books by emergent readers and Levels 1, 2, 3, and 4.
- Emergent—word repetition, less than 50 words, familiar words
- Level 1—easy words, repetition, less than 250 words
- Level 2—simple concepts, up to 250 words
- Level 3—longer sentences, up to 1500 words
- Level 4—longer, more nuanced stories, more than 1500 words
Choose from various genres, including fairy tales, folk tales, fables, adventure, science fiction, and more! Readability levels for passages on Lit2Go use the Flesch-Kincaid grade levels, which are roughly equivalent to U.S. grade levels. Students can also listen to stories.
Unite Books are short, colorful, and easy to understand with a picture/text format and narration in home languages. New books and languages are added every month. Texts are written in English and Spanish.
These are leveled by guided reading levels A through K.
Create a free account. This site is based in the UK, and books appear to be leveled by age group.
Here are free books by guided reading levels A-M. Once you select a book, use the 4 red arrows to enlarge the book and eliminate ads.
These books are organized by guided reading levels A-Z. You can also choose the Lexile level. Create a free teacher account. You don’t need to import your students’ names. Select “Go to Library,” “Guided Reading,” and “I Can Read.” Books can be read aloud, too! Have your child listen first, then reread the book aloud fluently and accurately.
Create an educator/parent account. Go to Content, pick your grade level, and then choose from nonfiction and fiction passages with curriculum and supports designed to improve comprehension. Each selection within each grade level has a Lexile level.
Choose a story and follow along as it is read aloud. The books aren’t leveled. This site is suitable for developing listening comprehension skills.
There are lots of books to choose from at various age levels, and there are also Highlight Magazine issues to read!
These are first-grade stories, but they appear to be very challenging. There are four units: 1, 2, 4, and 5.
READ-ALOUDS
Turn on closed captioning OR
get the actual text from the library and follow along!
American Literature Short Stories for Children
This site features classics intended for adults to read aloud to children. This is excellent for practicing listening comprehension.
Select your child’s age group and view the recorded narration of the story. The idea is to borrow the book(s) from the library and follow the text!
Day by Day, New York has a charming, festive day-by-day calendar of read-alouds.
Listen to stories being read aloud by celebrated actors and actresses.
You can select books by level, author, title, length, and even language: English, French, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, and German.
Free online books for kids. Free decodable texts. The best reading specialist website. Science of reading.
Edited on 06/29/25
