If any of you are looking for read-alouds for the 2nd to 6th grade level 
(about
ages 7-11), you might pick up a couple of books by Lois Lenski. Though she is 
not writing anymore (she died in the 70s), her books live on.
For this age level, she has a whole series of regional fiction. She picked an 
area of the country, chose something that the region is known for, and wrote 
a fictionalized story about it. For most of these books, she also did her own 
illustrations. I am reading _Strawberry Girl_ to my girls now, which is set 
in the Florida region. There are others, as well. (For the benefit of our 
non-USA friends, I should probably note that by "regions", I'm referring to 
regions of the USA rather than of the world.) My girls are really enjoying 
_Strawberry Girl_, as there is plenty of action.
Lois Lenski also wrote/illustrated plenty of picture books for the younger 
set. One series is about farms, country, city, etc - designed to teach 
smaller children about different places in the world.  These would be 
applicable to non-USA folks as well as USA children.
                                 -donna
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