Mo Willems
Recognized in the Creative Minds Montessori 2026 Teacher’s Choice list.
Mo Willems is one of roughly one hundred authors whose work was selected by the Montessori-certified teachers at Creative Minds Montessori for the 2026 Teacher’s Choice list — 120 books chosen across four reading stages, from first lap-reads to first chapter books. Their 2 selected books were chosen for how precisely they meet children at a real developmental moment. This recognition cannot be bought: no author or publisher paid to appear on our lists, and we take no commission on any book sale.
About Mo Willems
Mo Willems began as a writer and animator on Sesame Street, where he won the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Children's Series six times between 1995 and 2001. Three of his picture books have been named Caldecott Honor Books, and his Elephant & Piggie early readers have won multiple Theodor Seuss Geisel Medals and Honors.
By his own account the Pigeon simply turned up in one of his notebooks and objected to the books he was writing. He drafted the story in sketchbook form during a sabbatical in Oxford, and his wife, a school librarian, read it to children and persuaded him to try to sell it.
Also by this author: Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! · Knuffle Bunny · We Are in a Book!
Official website: hiddenpigeoncompany.com
Selected for the 2026 Teacher’s Choice list
Should I Share My Ice Cream?
The Why-Askers · Big Feelings, First Friendships
There Is a Bird on Your Head!
Read-to-Me, Read-by-Me · I Can Read This Myself
Part of The Best Children’s Books by Age, chosen by the teachers at Creative Minds Montessori in Frisco, TX.