Recomendations for Dialogue Tags for children's books

For young kids, I personally prefer your third option. It is grammatically correct, clear for a young reader to understand, and flows nicely.

I wouldn't used "squealed" very often, except to show really strong emotion. "Said" is better for most conversations, with other words used sparingly.

"Said Molly" or "Molly said" are both correct, just a matter of style and personal preference.

I would split the first two options into two sentences, if I didn't put the dialogue tag in the middle:

"Come on, Mazy. Let's go play in my room," said Molly. But I still like option three the best. It's what I do all the time. Maybe somebody will tell me I do it too much...

Trish said:

I've had different opinions on "dialogue tags" used in children's books, for ages, five years up to ten years. Should we keep them to a minimum? or is it better to use them more so that young readers understand, which character is speaking?

Some people say I use too many, and others tell me to put them in. Also which is the correct was to write it? Out of these:

"Come on, Mazy, let's go play in my room,” squealed Molly.

"Come on, Mazy, let's go play in my room," Molly squealed.

"Come on, Mazy," said Molly. "Let's go play in my room."

Thank you.

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Well, this is just my opinion...but as a fellow writer and someone who has been reading childrens books all her life (I started reading about 2 years old [God's truth], I worked child care from the time I was 12 - including as a nursery worker, and I have 6 kids...using squealed depends on if you want to show great excitement or not.


If the child is very excited, then sure, use squealed - but perhaps include the emotion that goes with the term -

I have found that if you think like a child it works very well. If you were about 6 -8 years old and you heard that someone squealed, you might imagine them making sounds like a baby pig or something, but if you include the emotion you are trying to convey, they are more likely to understand the usage.

"Come on, Mazy, let's go play in my room," Molly squealed with excitement.

Trish said:

Thank you, KrishanJewel. The reason I used "squealed" was because the character, Molly, is a very excitable child (age seven) in this story. She is so excited because her new best friend has come for a sleep over. She want's to impress this girl because she loves her to death.

She,Molly, has just been banned from playing with her old best friend, Marie, in the last chapter book.


Thank you, for explaing that to me.

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Then squealed with excitement makes perfect sense!

Trish said:

Thanks, KrishnaJewel. I thought so, but JudScotKev, has a point too. I am inclined to use that word a lot in my stories. I'll have to watch that.

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Ah yes, you do have to avoid the trap of over use....thank god for the thesaurus..lol!

Trish said:

I'm trying to learn the dialogue of little children, Also, to learn how they read. Sometimes my words are not suitable for little children. And my sentences are too long.

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The best ways to do this is spend time with kids, and read popular kids books.

Trish said:

Thanks, KrishnaJewel. I thought so, but JudScotKev, has a point too. I am inclined to use that word a lot in my stories. I'll have to watch that.

I'm trying to learn the dialogue of little children, Also, to learn how they read. Sometimes my words are not suitable for little children. And my sentences are too long. Hopefully I will get there in the end, especially with all the wonderful teachers on this forum. LOL.

Thanks, again, Krishna and JSK.

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I know how you feel Trish. This is why writing chapter books, especially Easy Reader Chapter Books terrify me. On the one hand, I know some of my story ideas would work better for the chapter book set. On the other hand, keeping the vocabular simple and still interesting is the trick.

You don't want talk down to your readers, but you also don't want them to throw your book out the window because you use too many "big" words and complex situations.

I agree with JSK about the dialogue tags. I will say that I get confused about whether to use "said" or some other word. I've had some people read my work and say I use "said" far too much and is boring.

Or I get some that say "Said" is always best. My writing books also say using anything other than "Said" shows your're an amateur. What I do is try to vary up my tags, but keep them to a minimum.

But then I write mainly MG and YA, and you want the dialogue to help identify the character that's speaking without using a ton of dialogue tags. I'm still learning about what works best in chapter books.

KrishnaJewel said:

The best ways to do this is spend time with kids, and read popular kids books.

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T.V. is good, too. Current cartoons and sitcoms capture not just how modern kids talk, but also what modern kids think is funny. I mean, if you write like most 6-year-olds, your stories will be TOO random and rambling! T.V. writers are good models for capturing the essence of a kid's speech without losing the momentum of the story.

Hang out with the Disney channel and Nickelodeon for a while, if you don't have kids of your own at the right age to listen to.

Use what most aptly describes the action...but only if said doesn't quite cover it. Said is almost invisible, so you want to use that one the most frequently. Don't forget too that you don't always have to use dialogue tags--small beats of action will enrichen the story as long as they are relevant (shows characterization or emotion or gives description).

"Come on, Mazy." Molly darted up the stairs. "Let's go play in my room."

If you can't use action to depict who is talking, I believe it is best to stick to he said, she said. When you are reading those tags become almost invisible to the reader. Whe you start adding squealed, giggled, growled etc. The tags intrude on the story. The reader should be able to work out the emotion by the action of the character. The odd tag here and there is fine but I treat them like adverbs, and adjectives keeping them to a minimum.