Gabby drops her book and the letters fall out. Whatever she spells with those letters… comes to life!
I wrote the award-winning Gabby series when I was teaching my son to read. I’d done a ton of literacy research — in fact, I’m a certified tutor and past-president of Trent Valley Literacy Association — and I’d learned that “putting letters together” to make “things” can help many kids learn to read faster.
I got some old Scrabble tiles and we moved them around into words. He liked to touch the letters and manipulate them into as many different words as he could. And I thought, “What if there was a character in a book who did the same thing… except those words actually become things?”
This kind of text-to-concrete learning wasn’t the only literacy strategy I used, but for my son, it worked really well.
“There was a c on the carpet… an a on her armchair… and a t on the table. They made a word. “Cuh… ah… tuh… cat!” said Gabby. MEOW!”
One day I was doing a book signing at Playful Minds in Toronto (a wonderful independent toy store) and I read that page from Gabby to a little boy. I watched his eyes light up (I’m getting goosebumps just remembering this) as he sounded out cuh-ah-tuh… and then paused, thought a minute… and yelled, “CAT!”
In front of my eyes, this boy made the connection between those sounds and a cat. It was magical. Now, I’m not saying I taught someone to read with that one double-page spread. But it definitely was an a-ha! moment for that boy. And it shows how powerful phonics can be.
I’m a fan of the new curriculum that now includes, for many teachers, the use of phonics. If you’re familiar with this blog, you may also know that I believe in lots of different strategies, phonics being just one of them. In fact that’s the whole point of this blog–to give you lots of different kinds of activities, games and ideas to help you get your kid reading. But phonics has long been a cornerstone strategy and for lots of kids, it works tremendously well.
In Gabby, Gabby: Wonder Girl and Gabby: Drama Queen, once the letters become “things,” Gabby and her friends use those things to find solutions to little problems, like a cat and bird fighting or helping a neighbour down from a tree.
Each Gabby book focusses on a different literacy concept. Gabby is about simple words. Gabby: Drama Queen features consonant blends, and Gabby: Wonder Girl uses question words. The entire series was beautifully illustrated by the brilliant Jan Dolby and published by Fitzhenry & Whiteside.
You can get more information or purchase a signed copy of the Gabby books through my author website, JoyceGrantAuthor.com. Gabby also has a free teaching guide available to download here. Great for teachers and home-schoolers, it’s got activities and games you can play with Gabby and her friends.
Joyce Grant is an international award-winning author and speaker. In 2023 she was awarded the Press Freedom Teaching Award by Global Youth & News Media, based in France, for her work helping young people understand journalism and how to spot fake news. Gabby won the Rainforest of Reading Award in Montserrat, was named a Best Book for Kids and Teens by the Canadian Children’s Book Centre, an Ontario Library Association Best Bets for Kids and Teens, and was a Toy Testing Council Recommended Read.
Have Joyce Grant visit your class, in person or remotely. More information, or request a school visit, here.
