Brown, Alison. A Bible Alphabet. Edinburgh: The Banner of Truth Trust, 2007. 31 pp. $8.00 (Buy from Westminster Books and save 40%)
I knew coming from Banner of Truth, this book would be a solid resource for young children learning their alphabet. I was pleasantly surprised to see just how much of a resource this book can become. Beginning with “a is for ark” and ending with “z is for Zion,” Ms. Brown takes a quick tour of the entire Bible in twenty-six letters.
The sub-title of the book is “introducing little children to well-known Bible stories.” This is accomplished and then some. For example, I would have thought that “w is wall” would have been about Jericho but it was not. Rather, she chose the story of Nehemiah’s rebuilding Jerusalem. Throughout the alphabet, you are introduced to Jezebel, Dorcas, jail, the epistles of Paul and Balaam. These are stories that most children are not as familiar with; that is, in the children’s bible story books I have read to my boys, these have never been mentioned to our detriment.
My oldest son, who is four, knows his alphabet but enjoyed the illustrations and even told me more about the stories than what was shared in the book. As I was reading the book with my boys, I was wishing they had scripture references for the stories so we could turn immediately to the Bible for more information. When I got to the letter Z, I noticed that the opposite page had a list of Bible references for all of the letters of the alphabet. I was excited that they did include this. Perhaps the only change I would make is to add them in a smaller font size on each page, but that is just me.
This book has so much potential for use in Sunday School, in home schooling, and parents who want to teach their children their alphabet and introduce stories from the Bible as well. There is a 64p. activity book that can be purchased in addition to this book. This is a great resource at many levels because it not only teaches the alphabet but it also begins to build a solid foundation of Scripture knowledge for the children as well as perhaps the new believing parent.