Michael FolsomQ Is for Duck: An Alphabet Guessing Game

This book bills itself as an "alphabet guessing game". It's true that there's some guessing involved, but all too often the answer is "This wrong letter is for this animal because this animal says something that starts with that letter", with little variation from these theme. My nieces (4 and 6) grasped the pattern within a few letters, which takes all the guessing out of this guessing game. However, other people might prefer it because of the transparency of so many of the letter-animal pairs.The artwork is great. Very silly. F is for bird (because birds Fly) and we see a shot of a bird aviator. R is for Lion and we see the two parent lions scared witless because their cub has let out a huge ROAR. When M is for Cow, we see the poor milkmaid covering her ears because her herd is mooing so loudly.I do have a slight concern about diversity. There are 42 people in this book, I just counted. Of these 42, 1 is black. 3 might generously be described as being dark enough to have a tan. And the remaining 38 are "peach", the so-called "flesh" color from the crayon box. Given that when this book was published, in 1980, blacks made up slightly more than 10% of the US population, I would expect to see about 4 black people (and a few Hispanics and Asians as well). Barring that, seeing no black people would at least not smack so blatantly of tokenism!

This is the beat book for young kids—even babies. I give copies to people when they have a new baby even though it is best for toddlers. I always made noises and bouncing motions for each animal and my children loved it from a very young age. The sentences have a wonderful cadence that even babies love. And older kids just love the silliness of a letter standing for something besides the name of the animal. Just the best little book.

This has been a favorite book since childhood. I bought several for nieces and nephews recently and it is just as I remember. Fun and unique. They came in perfect condition. I will buy again as gifts as the need arises.

Great book to help children see things from a different viewpoint.

exactly what I needed!

Wonderful book for the classroom or for home. This is a fun book to read and then have the child(ren) guess why "Q is for Duck". After reading, you can ask the child(ren) to make their own page about themselves and what letter could they use for their name: (eg. A is for Mrs. ________ because she likes Art). My class created a class book of their own based on the concept of this book.

My grandson, almost 3, loves this book! He quickly caught on to the idea of how a letter could be related to something that doesn't even start with that letter. The text is repetitive and organized on the page in the same fashion for each letter which encourages an early reader to quickly become successful in adding this book to those he/she can read alone. The alphabet is out of order which can help a child who is not yet recognizing the letters out of order. It is a fun book and just the right size for little hands to hold.

This book arrived with the back cover being damaged. The corner is partially missing and is also ripped.

Delightful pictures. Thought provoking.

This is such a great fun book ... my daycare kids LOVE it

My grand daughter loves her book!