It Begins with an A

by Stephanie Calmenson

Rhyming riddles challenge the reader to guess objects beginning with letters A to Z

Genres: Picture Books, Childrens

32 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1993

About the author

Stephanie Calmenson's many popular titles include concept books, funny school stories, poetry collections, books about dogs and, with Magic School Bus author Joanna Cole, anthologies and beginning reader chapter books.

Stephanie's books have been called "marvelous" (PW), "lyrical" (SLJ), "hilarious" (SLJ), "sweet, funny, and right on the mark" (Booklist).

Before turning to writing, Stephanie was a teacher, a children's book editor, and Editorial Director of Parents Magazine's Read-Aloud Book Club.

Website: my link text

Reviews

[Ammie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love the premise of this, but it is too challenging for V still. I think it will go over better when she is a little older.

[Pinky · Rating 3 out of 5]

An alphabet primer that starts with A and ends with Z.

[Kelsey · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is very outdated (particularly with its illustrations), but it does have good information.

[Linda Branich · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a cute book filled with clues about things that begin with different letters of the alphabet. Each page has an upper case letter on it with 3 progressive clues and illustrations about an object.

This is a good book for parents, older reading siblings, or teachers to use with children who are learning the alphabet and elemental phonics.

My only criticisms are as follows:

1. The lower case letters are not presented with the upper case letters. We do not write, nor are books printed, solely in upper case letters.

2. There is inconsistency in the presentation of vowels: A is represented by what some would say is long A, others would say diphthong ---the word is airplane, while E is short (egg) and I is long ( icing), O is a digraph ( owl), and U is short ( umbrella)

The illustrations are captivating and the objects chosen are ones children would be familiar with

3. Only hard C is presented ( camera)

4. Only soft G is presented ( giraffe)

5. X ( ks) sound is presented, but not the (z) sound
, as in Xylophone

[Caroline Petty · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great book to emphasize the alphabet. It is beneficial in the way that it combines both pictures and letters together and is presented so that it enables children to guess a letter by looking at a picture. It's simplicity and interesting pictures make it helpful for beginning a phonics routine at the beginning of the school year and for increasing a students' basic reading skills as time progresses.

[Hope Johnson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a wonderful way to get kids thinking about the alphabet and relating it to examples. The book is a rhyming book that gives clues on each page to a thing that begin with the letter on that page. Wonderful book to use when children are comfortable with alphabet and need and warm-up or a sponge for the day.

[Mckenzie Quade · Rating 4 out of 5]

This alphabet book was extremely interactive and clever. On each page was a rhyme that described an everyday object that started with each letter of the alphabet. At the end of the page there was the question 'what is it?' so students could participate and feel a sense of accomplishment at the end of reading this book.

[Quinn · Rating 3 out of 5]

this was really great for my esl kids. the pictures made it obvious what the riddle wanted as an answer, but they had to wrack their brains for the vocab word. we then took the time to think of all words we could that start with that letter and they came up with 111 words and im so proud of them.

[Jami · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great fun for the wee ones.