Product Description

First real comprehensive alphabet book. Book and workbook in one. Every associative illustration looks like it's letter. Was tested in a National school of Excellence. Has received high marks from teachers, incl. Montessori school. Illustrations have been specifically designed to be a true memory aide. Pictures of the book correlate to the letters in new ways. The content helps the child to identify the names of the letters, the shapes and sounds, using auditory, visual and kinestethik processes.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1448196 in Books
• Published on: 1998-07
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 34 pages

Review
If there were a bestseller list for children's alphabet books, a local author's book would likely be at the top. In addition to thorough research on teaching and learning techniques, author Gisela Hausmann used in intelligent and sensitive approach to teaching the alphabet. Children of all races and ethnicity see a book illustrated with a gray-colored hedgehog that helps demonstrate the shapes of the letters. He's not white, yellow, brown or black, but gray. This was intentional, Hausmann said, and this attention to the smallest detail pervades the book. .... -- The Independent, December 24, 1998

From the Back Cover
Obvious Letters is the alphabet book that gets back to the basics of teaching: Make it simple and obvious! It associates each individual letter with one word that actually looks like that letter. Obvious Letters is no alphabet soup - it has a clear concept.

About the Author
born 1962 into a family with 4 generations of teachers. Graduated from the University of Vienna 1988 with a Bachelor of Arts, has worked as an illustrator for two scientific books, as a movie production manager(about 25 movies for TV), handled distribution of below mentioned books (Mailorder/in Austria/Europe), lives in the USA for about 10 years. 2 children age 6 and 7.

Customer Reviews

"Obvious Letters" are much more than obvious
"Obvious Letters" by Gisela Hausmann is a thorough and funny tool for children to learn the alphabet.The association with the images with every letter makes it easy for every child to retain the alphabet and have fun at the same time. I wish, I had a book like this when I grew up.

Kids keep coming back for more of this one!
Obvious Letters in a unique & creative approach to an age old preschool dilemma -- learning your ABCs. It draws children in by combining adorable illustrations & word associations (i.e. a b shaped backpack for the letter b). Although Obvious Letters uses some pretty novel words for preschool age kids (yield, razor, handbag), the children I observed reading the book picked them up easily with repeated readings. And that is the best part about Obvious Letters -- kids actually initiate wanting to read it again & again. What higher praise can any children's book receive!

Are ALL of the reviewers friends of the author?
I have been an early primary school teacher for fourteen years, and all of that time I have taught either kindergarten or first grade. I am always looking for excellent children's books to reinforce the alphabet letters and sounds -- an important part of the curriculum for all beginning readers.

One method which some teachers find useful in helping to teach letter names and sounds is to incorporate the shape of the letter into a "picture" whose name helps children associate the letter with the sound it usually makes. (For example, an "i" shaped into the form of an "inchworm.")

Needless to say, I was excited to see the description of this book and read the reviews.

Unfortunately, however, the book falls far short of its praises. The words used to associate the letter shape with its sound often seem poor choices: lower case "i" being the lock shape on a treasure chest for "inside," for example.

Also, the colors for the pictures are dark, so dark that the idea of the children coloring in the shape of the letter to help them remember it hardly seems possible. Don't buy this book thinking you will be able to use it for blackline masters.

I think the idea is sound, but the execution is poor. I do not recommend this book.