A is for Amp · Four on the Floor, volume one
Twenty-six real things from a working studio.
No cartoon animals and no invented words. A crossfader is called a crossfader, explained in seven words a one-year-old can hear, and then again, properly, for the adult reading it for the three hundredth time. One book, four registers, so it is not outgrown at three.
Free, and staying free
The alphabet, on screen
Free
No account. Works offline.
- All twenty-six, with a synthesised sound for each
- Optional narration in the register that matches her age
- Put her name on it: /play?name=
- Nothing is sent anywhere, ever
Instant · the one to start with
The Home Pack
RM 79
About USD 18. One payment, yours to keep.
- A is for Amp, the complete 32-page fixed-layout ebook, on any tablet or e-reader
- The Parents' Guide, the method as a printed thing: the four registers, what to say, and when to stop talking
- Print-at-home pages, laid out four across, for a paper version tonight
- Arrives by email the same day
Pre-order · funds the print run
Founding copies
RM 145
One copy, or RM 240 for two. The board book, plus the Home Pack, plus their names on it.
- The printed board book: 178 mm square, 32 pages, 1.5 mm board
- The dedication page is printed with your children's names, which is the whole reason to buy this one rather than a copy off a shelf
- The Home Pack, delivered today, while the book is at the printer
- Refunded in full if the run does not happen. You are funding a print run, and you should be told that plainly
The interior and the cover wrap are print-ready and out for quotation with board-book printers. The ISBN is being issued by Perpustakaan Negara Malaysia. Nobody has printed a copy yet, and until somebody has, this page will keep saying so. A founding copy is a pre-order that pays for the run, not a book sitting in a warehouse.
The object
Why this rather than another alphabet book
Three reasons, and none of them is that it is cute.
- The words are real. A child who learns oscillator at four has learned a thing that exists, and the word will still be true at twenty.
- It carries four registers at once. A single word for the smallest ears; a name and one fact at two; letters and their sounds at four; and at the back, what each thing actually does. Most alphabet books are outgrown in a year. The ladder is here →
- The adult can bear it. You will read this several hundred times. The design brief was that the reader should still find something in it on the hundredth pass, because a book the adult avoids produces no turns at all, and the turns are the entire mechanism1.
Why paper, when the screen version is free
Because they are not the same tool. Given the same story, print produces more back-and-forth talk between a parent and a toddler than a device does2. The screen version exists for the times you are not in the same room, and it is built to wait for her rather than to hold her3. We tell you where the guidance puts screens, in the guidance's own words, on the evidence page.
Every button above goes straight to card checkout. On the founding copies, put the children's names in the note field so the dedication page is set correctly. Anything else, write to hello@syncprimitive.com.
We sell a book. You do not need it to use any of the method on this site, the method is the part that works, and the screen alphabet is free and stays free. If you read the method, use it tonight, and never buy anything, the job is done.
Sources on this page
- 1Beyond the 30-Million-Word Gap: Children's Conversational Exposure Is Associated With Language-Related Brain FunctionRomeo et al., Psychological Science, 2018
doi.org/10.1177/0956797617742725 - 2Differences in Parent-Toddler Interactions With Electronic Versus Print BooksMunzer et al., Pediatrics, 2019
doi.org/10.1542/peds.2018-2012 - 3Skype Me! Socially Contingent Interactions Help Toddlers Learn LanguageRoseberry, Hirsh-Pasek & Golinkoff, Child Development, 2014
doi.org/10.1111/cdev.12166