By Bill Martin Jr., John Archambault
The whole alphabet races up a coconut tree until it can't hold them all and they come tumbling down — a chant a toddler will have by heart in a week.
All twenty-six little letters decide to climb a coconut tree. A goes up, then B, then C, and the tree fills with the whole alphabet until there's no room left. Chicka chicka BOOM BOOM — down they all come in a heap, with skinned knees and stubbed toes and one letter with a loose tooth. Then the big capital letters come to help their little ones up, everyone gets patched up under the moon, and by the last page A is already sneaking back up the tree to start again.
This is one of the best first gifts you can hand a two- or three-year-old who is just starting to notice letters, because it makes the alphabet a rhythm you feel in your body before you ever call it learning. The chant is so catchy they'll memorize it, and once they've memorized it they start matching the sound to Ehlert's big colorful letters on their own. The board pages take drool and tossing and being read forty nights running.