Lunar New Year Recommended Readings: Animals and the Zodiac (Elementary School: in ascending order of difficulty)

Ten Mice for Tet! By Pegi Deitz Chea and Cynthia Weill. 2003. Ten mice lead readers through the Tet with simple sentences. The book uses illustrations from beautifully embroidered pictures. PreK-1 Many Vietnamese customs are similar to Chinese customs; however, the zodiac replaces the rabbit with a cat. For an excellent explanation go to: http://vietnamesezodiac.com/vietnamese-year-of-the-cat/

Celebrating Chinese Festivals: A Collection of Holiday Tales, Poems and Activities by Sanmu Tang. 2012. This book contains several festivals including the New Year story of Nian, a monster who attacked the Chinese villages. Prek-1

Chinese Zodiac Animals by Sanmu Tang and Zhu Jingwen. 2011. This is a translated version from China of the zodiac animal story. Prek-1.

Why Cats Chase Mice: A Story of the Twelve Zodiac Signs (Japanese Fairy Tale Series) by Mina Harada Eimon. 1993. A mouse tricks the cat who loses his chance to be in the animal zodiac. The story differs from the Chinese version although the animals are the same. Japan changed to the Gregorian calendar, using January 1 as its New Year in 1873. Prek-1.

Cat and Rat: The Legend of the Chinese Zodiac by Ed Young. 1998. The illustrations are spare and dark. They capture the essence of each animal and their fierce competition to be the first in the zodiac. This is in contrast to the more colorful versions that are available. Older children might appreciate this as an art lesson, but the images might scare younger children. Grades 4-5.

The Chinese Book of Animal Powers by Chungliang Al Huang. 1999. Brush paintings of twelve animals of the zodiac that intermediate-middle school students would enjoy copying. The page for Year of the Dog is stunning. Grades 4-7.