Use this book with Pre-K and Kindergarten when children are first learning the letters of the alphabet. Each page in this book has a letter of the alphabet and a picture of a famous piece of artwork from the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. In addition, the picture is labeled with one word that describes it starting with the corresponding letter. For example, the page with the letter N has a picture of VanGogh's "Starry Night" painting. The picture is labeled with the word "night." Addresses learning letters, art, real life locations/museums. Can be used in the classroom to teach young children the letters of the alphabet. After reading this book, children could cut pictures out of magazines for each letter of the alphabet. In Kindergarten, I had to keep an alphabet journal, in which we did this exact activity. If possible, a class trip to the MoMA would be excellent!

ABC: The Museum of Modern Art New York is an alphabet learning tool to be read with young children, which uses works of modern art from the MOMA collection, to illustrate each letter. I love this book because it is equally enjoyable for young children and adult readers who may tire of pointing out an apple for A or Zebra for Z. Here the reader gets to appreciate important works of modern art while a child learns to think outside the box for what a word might look like.

Night, for example, is the word chosen for N, and here the author has chosen Van Gogh’s Starry Night for the image. I enjoy that not only is night a different type of word than the typical alphabet reader, but that the image is teaching a child visual literacy and familiarizing them with an important work of art. Some other letters, such as a Léger cubist painting with an abstracted umbrella chosen for U, act as fun guessing games one could play with a child by discussing what else you see in the image. I think this book might seem advanced or not age appropriate to those unfamiliar with looking at modern art. However, children are naturally skilled at telling you what they see and this book provides a much deeper range of opportunities for this kind of meaning making, all while introducing the abc’s.