Time Travel Books For Kids

Fun Chapter Books Send Kids to the Middle Ages and Prehistoric Times

Mar 7, 2009

From battling medieval knights to coming face to face with dinosaurs, time travel books can take kids on the adventure of a lifetime.

Whether they dream of fighting in jousting tournaments, meeting a real dinosaur, or finding a way to sleep an extra hour in class, time travel is a favorite fantasy of many kids. Here are three fun chapter books that can send kids on trips to medieval England and back to the age of the dinosaurs.

When Steve shows his friend Max the time machine he bought at a garage sale for $2.50, Max figures Steve’s lost it. But they assemble the time machine, set it for the year 1250, and suddenly they’re back in the Middle Ages – with Steve in the body of medieval knight Sir Robert Marshall and Max in the body of Sir Robert’s horse! Cool, right?

Well, maybe not. Turns out Sir Robert’s rival the Hampshire Mauler is just itching to challenge Sir Robert to a duel. Too bad Steve’s swordsman skills aren’t anywhere near as good as Sir Robert’s. As time runs out for Steve, the boys frantically try to find a way to return home and escape the long lance of the Hampshire Mauler.

This hilarious medieval book for kids will keep readers laughing as Max and Steve race through a number of misadventures in the Middle Ages. Readers should also check out the sequel, Max and Me and the Wild West.

Jake, Tobias, Marco, Cassie, and Rachel are the Animorphs –five teenagers given the power by a dying alien to morph into any animal they can touch. Together with their alien friend Ax, the Animorphs battle the Yeerks, parasitic space aliens set on conquering the Earth. But when one of their battles accidentally opens a time rift, the Animorphs are sent back in time to the age of the dinosaurs.

Now the Animorphs must use their powers to morph into dinosaurs and stay alive in a time more hostile than they can imagine. Can they survive? More importantly, can they return to their own time?

This volume in the popular Animorphs book series not only lets kids walk with dinosaurs but also lets them experience what it’s like to be a T-Rex or Velociraptor through the Animorphs’ first-person narration. A great dinosaur book for kids!

For most campers, Camp Haunted Hills is a fun movie camp where kids learn to be filmmakers. But Stuart Glassman knows the camp is really haunted by a ghost named Robert who loves to play tricks on people – including arranging for a time vortex to send Stuart and several other campers back to the age of the dinosaurs.

Fortunately, Robert manages to get the kids back to the future safely. Unfortunately, he brings three dinosaurs with them. Can Stuart get the dinosaurs back to the past before the campers discover they’re not a new special effect?

This fun dinosaur book for kids by the author of The Monster's Ring also introduces readers to scientific concepts like chaos theory in a bizarre and memorable final sequence that has to be read to be believed. Also read other Camp Haunted Hills books, How I Survived My Summer Vacation and Some of My Best Friends are Monsters.

Applegate, K.A. Animorphs: In the Time of Dinosaurs. New York: Scholastic, Inc., 1998. ISBN: 0-590-95615-9

Coville, Bruce. Camp Haunted Hills: The Dinosaur that Followed Me Home. New York: A Minstrel Book, 1990. ISBN: 0-671-64750

Greer, Gery and Bob Ruddick. Max and Me and the Time Machine. New York: Harper & Row Publishers, Inc., 1983. ISBN: 0-06-440222-3

The copyright of the article Time Travel Books For Kids in Children’s Books is owned by Michael Jung. Permission to republish Time Travel Books For Kids in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.