Evaluation

Just a couple of years ago my family and I traveled to Charleston, NC for our vacation and we spotted a man selling photographs of letters that he had taken all over the city. Some of the letters could be found in the photographs of churches, old houses, gates, etc. Many tourists were buying these small pictures to spell out their last names. Although these letters were photographs, it reminded me of the individual paintings within this book. Not only are these paintings interesting to look at, but it also encourages the younger children to become super sleuths hunting for the letters that are not so obvious within this picture book. A wonderful family project for younger students would be to have the student search outside and take a picture of either the first letter of their last name or the first letter of their first name. If the teacher is extremely adventurous she may assign a specific letter to each family and then compile a classroom alphabet book that students can read during their independent reading time.