Discovery Girls  – A Magazine for Girls 8 and up
Where to buy: www.amazon.com
Recommendation by: KellyAPL

At a certain age, kids love receiving monthly magazines to browse and read through. Discovery Girls is a magazine for girls aged 8 – 12. It covers lots of articles on topics that this age range of girls are interested in. From sports, fashion, real-life stories to quizzes and lots of other fun stuff to read up on.

The articles in the magazine are age-appropriate and designed for girls of this pre-teen stage. For example, it talks about natural hair and skin care and other “beauty” tips. Girls that feature in the magazine are normal girls that your daughter can relate to. What I like about this magazine is the fact each of the magazines is, in part, written by youngsters like your daughter/niece/granddaughter. The magazine crew travels each month to a different State and finds girls in that age group who have inspired others or have something interesting to say and write.

Overall, this is a magazine that a lot of girls would be keen to read. Obviously, every child is different in terms of interest and maturity. It does give 8 – 12 years as an appropriate age group, but from my point of view, I would wait until your daughter hits the pre-teen stage, i.e. 11/12 before subscribing to Discovery Girls to get the most out of it.

For this age group, we also like:

American Girl Magazine
Created especially for girls age 8 and up, American Girl is an appealing, age-appropriate alternative to teen magazines. Features advice, crafts, contests, puzzles, games and more.

Here’s a fun find just for ‘tween girls (ages 8-12):

Random House has just launched the “Collectopia™” series, a fun new collection of books for creative and crafty girls. Each Collectopia™ title celebrates the magic of friendship, creativity, and dreams with a 128-page keepsake spiral bound book that has room inside for special photos, doodles, and memorabilia, plus questions to help girls record their ideas, fun facts, memories, favorite things, and more. Each title also comes with 3 sheets of stickers and 4 different pom pom characters called (c’lectomanics), plus sturdy little cubbies to collect all 12 of these critters. The tone is sassy (without being rude), and the activities are just right for girls 8 and up.

Two titles are currently available in this series.

Collectopia™ Wacktivity: a collection of games, interesting facts, puzzles, surveys and how-tos (including scavenger hunts, palm readings, and special pages for girls to creatively express their dreams.)
Collectopia™ A Friendship Scraptacular: helps kids document their favorite (and not so favorite) things. This collectopia box is filled with fun fill-ins and spots for photos and doodles.

Stay tuned for two more titles in the series: All-Year Yearbook and Quazy Quest (to be published in Summer 2008 and Spring 2009, respectively).