The Animal Clock House - My First Written & Illustrated Book

Writing and illustrating this book was an assignment I received when I was taking my Advanced Diploma in Special Needs Education last year. Looking back, I thought it would be nice to share with more parents so that maybe their children will find it beneficial and an interesting read.

I spent about 3 weeks conceptualizing "The Animal Clock House". The story revolves around a clock house which magically comes alive at midnight when the children are sound asleep. The little animals living within are awakening to play.

The initial concept was to incorporate rhyming words to raise phonological awareness and improve reading and spelling skills. It helps a child to recognize sound patterns that form a basis for learning word families. (E.g. met, wet, get etc). Apart from rhyming words, I also input numbers, some high frequency words and names of animals to make the story fun as they learn. To be honest, making every sentence rhyme was hard, and keeping in mind the flow of the story makes it even harder.

Illustrating for the book was another big challenge. I drew and coloured on every page. It took a lot of time thinking what images to input as I hope the book will be colourful, filled with cartoons to provide opportunities where parents can engage the child as they read aloud.

Reading time is FUN and I hope you enjoyed my story!