Eating the Alphabet » (BOARD)

LOIS EHLERT has created many celebrated picture books inspired by the world around her. She lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

While teaching upper- and lowercase letters to preschoolers, Ehlert introduces fruits and vegetables from around the world. A glossary at the end provides interesting facts about each food.

Children's Literature

All too frequently, teachers tell me that colleagues strike alphabet books from their upper-grade library's order list. That's sad, for the best alphabet books are for everyone. For example with Ehlert's book you can share it as 1) a simply beautiful alphabet book, 2) a sampling of edible plants elementary grade youngsters can categorize (i.e. leaf or root, crunchy or slurpy, yellow or green), whose origins can be pinpointed on a map, or whose preparations reflect cultural similarities or differences, 3) a collection of fine watercolor collages, anyone can try, 4) an information book with glossary entries that are models of tightly constructed, information laden, two-to-four sentence paragraphs. 1996 (orig.