Alphablock is the best book to teach the alphabet we’ve seen

Uh oh, that title has a lot to live up to.  We have about 8 books upstairs that are solely dedicated to teaching small children the alphabet.  Is Alphablock really the best book to teach the alphabet that we have seen?  Yes, its size, simplicity, vivid graphics and more make it great for kids and enjoyable for the adults.

When you open Alphablock you’ll see that each letter is cut out on the opposing page.  For example, it’ll say “A is for” and then you turn the “A” cut out and it reveals a picnic scene where the word apple is shown in a picnic setting.  Pretty simple, isn’t it?

The problem that we’ve had with this type of book previously is that, because all of the pages are cut to different sizes the spine of the book would bend quite easily.  Once the spine of the book was bent it was only a matter of time before the entire book was torn and ultimately ruined.

What’s different about Alphablock is that its spine is very thick, about the diameter of four book pages thick.  It would take more force than a child could muster to snap the spine of this book.

The book is very compact.  It’s about the size of a CD case and is very simple for little hands to pick it up and thumb through the pages.

The individual pages are thicker than normal, it feels like cardboard stock.   The cut out pages with the letters are thick and take effort to bend.  Granted, it’s not impossible to bend or rip, but it’s stronger than what you’re used to when it comes to a book to teach the alphabet.

The graphics are bright, playful and invite conversations in addition to the word and letter that the pages is trying to teach.  How many birds are in the nest?  What colors are the birds?  What does a bird say?  You can create any number of questions around each of the pages in Alphablock.

The illustrations are done by a husband/wife team called Peskimo.  The pictures have a vivid, retro feel that is at home with any age.  Christopher Franceschelli is the author of Alphablock  and other children’s books.

Alphablock is great for any child 1-4 and is festive enough for adults to enjoy reading it to them.