The Going To Bed Book

Sandra Boynton's bedtime classic follows a cast of animals through the exact sequence a toddler already knows by heart — bath with soap all over, scrub scrub scrub, brushing teeth, and finally rocking off to sleep. This anniversary edition comes in an enlarged trim size, which matters more than it sounds for a board book aimed at ages 1 to 3: bigger pages mean a toddler can actually see the animals clearly during a lap-read. The text runs in simple, rhyming repetition — scrub scrub scrub, brush and brush and brush, rock and rock and rock — the kind of pattern a child starts anticipating and saying along with after a few reads.

What the repetition is doing structurally is mapping the bedtime routine itself onto the story, so reading it becomes a rehearsal for what's about to actually happen — bath, teeth, bed — rather than a separate activity before the routine starts. The animal cast keeps it playful instead of instructional, so it reads as a silly adventure that happens to end in sleep rather than a lecture about hygiene. For a family just establishing a bedtime routine with a toddler who resists the transition, having the sequence acted out by cheerful animals first can make the real version go over easier.