Category: Books

Books by D. Passmore

X Pirate Letters: Handwriting Storybook for learning the slanted lowercase letters v, w, y, x, z & u.

Handwriting in a Storybook to Make Learning Letters a Fun Adventure.

This is the fourth and final book in the Pirate Handwriting series.

The pirates’ lowercase letter adventure is coming to a close with one of their favourite letters: X!

After all, X traditionally marks the spot where the treasure is hidden!

Get it on Amazon!

In this book, the pirates discover the slanted letters v, w, y, x and z, along with a surprise discovery: the final vowel, u!

Join the Pirates as they learn the slanted lines of a shark’s tooth

The lowercase letters are grouped by their shared starting positions and slanted line movements, helping children recognise familiar patterns as they learn new letters. Repeated practice of related movements helps build muscle memory and makes letter formation more manageable.

The illustrations bring the letters to life through the experience of tracing shapes in the sand. Children can see how familiar strokes and movements come together to form different lowercase letters.

Special attention is given to the vowel u, introduced by the colourful bird, in a fun and memorable story that engages young learners.

Vowels Are Another Kind of Treasure!

In this fourth adventure, the pirates discover the final vowel: u!

With this discovery, the pirates have found all five vowels and completed their journey through the four lowercase letter groups. Their search for treasure has led to two special discoveries: the patterns of letter formation and the five vowels!

X Pirate Letters, by D. Passmore

This is a perfect book to use with sand tray letters.

The whole pirate adventure is available in one storybook on Amazon. The Pirate Letters: Lowercase Handwriting Storybook.

Best Handwriting Picture Book Series

Need classroom supplies for handwriting? Find them here with links to TPT.

Handwriting worksheets and cards for this book are available HERE on Teachers Pay Teachers.

C Pirate Letters Sand Tray

Have Pure Joy Teaching!

I Pirate Letters Storybook – Learning Lowercase Letter Formation

Handwriting in a storybook to make learning visually memorable

Join the pirates on their third adventure as they follow turtle tracks in straight lines across the sand towards the ocean. Along the way, they discover six lowercase letters that share straight-line formation movements:

i, j, l, t, f, and k.

Available on Amazon.

Through the story and illustrations, children explore starting positions, downward pencil movements, letter height, and the pencil lifts needed to complete different letters. The turtle eggs and hatchlings provide a special visual clue for the dots above i and j.

These letters are the third handwriting group: i, j, l, t, f, k.

i Pirate Letters – by D. Passmore

Discover the Straight-Line Letters

These six lowercase letters share straight-line formation movements, but each has its own finishing steps. The pencil lifts for the second stroke.

Children explore where each letter begins, the direction of the pencil movement down, and when the pencil needs to lift and move to another position or make a dot.

  • i and j: Begin with a downward stroke, followed by a pencil lift to add the dot.
  • t, f and k: Require additional formation steps and pencil lifts.
  • l: Is the exception, formed with one continuous downward movement.

The lowercase letters are grouped to help build muscle memory skills and show a common starting point.

Letters are grouped by similar starting points and straight downstrokes; this can speed up the handwriting process and improve letter print recognition for reading.

The straight line letters are made alongside the little sea turtle tracks. Little hatchlings start at the top and head straight to the water. The visual theme in the story creates a reason why we start the letters at the top.

Discover the Different Letter Heights

Letter size is crucial but often overlooked when students are learning to write. Letters like i, j, f, l, t, and k provide great examples to highlight this concept.

The letters in this group also help children recognise differences in letter height and position.

  • Small letter: i
  • Falling letter: j
  • Tall letters: f, l, t, k

The illustrations help children see how these letters fit on the writing line and how their heights differ when they are all lined up together in the sand with the light blue wave under them.

This group of letters is more than just simple straight lines. Lowercase l is the only truly straight line. The other letters in this group have 2 or more steps that require the pencil to lift.

The sea turtle tracks explained

Sea turtle eggs are buried in the sand. When the hatchlings pop out, they head straight for the water. The visuals on the pages of this book use the natural activities of the baby turtle tracks in the sand and the egg as the dot on the letters i and j.

Available on Amazon.

Follow the Little Sea Turtles!

The pirates discover that the turtle eggs are beginning to hatch! The little turtles emerge from their eggs and make their way across the sand towards the light blue ocean.

The turtle tracks follow the direction of the pencil movements, providing a visual reminder of the downward strokes used to form the letters.

The Bird Has Another Vowel to Reveal!

“I see the vowel i” said the bird

The colourful bird returns with another important discovery! This time, the bird introduces the vowel i.

As the pirates continue their search for treasure, they discover that vowels are another kind of treasure. Each adventure brings them closer to discovering all five vowels!

A playful story that brings handwriting and early letter awareness together.

Handwriting letter strips can be found on my TPT page. These are great for students to use daily. Practicing writing the letters and making the letter sounds together is very important for reading and spelling.

This is a perfect book to use with sand tray letters.

2026 in Hardcover ISBN 978-0-473-60250-5

The next book in the series is “X Pirate Letters.“

The 4-book series can be purchased on AMAZON

Enjoy! Have Pure Joy Teaching

You may also like the c letters for sand trays.

C Pirate Letters Sand Tray

C Pirate Letters Handwriting Storybook

The second book in the series, Pirate Handwriting letter formation

Find it on Amazon

C Pirate Letters: Handwriting Storybook Lowercase Letter Formation

This is the second book in the series Pirate Handwriting.

Discover the Hidden C Shape: A Visual Approach to Lowercase Handwriting

What do a pirate’s hook and a coconut have in common? They both reveal the secret shape behind a group of lowercase letters!

In this second Pirate Handwriting adventure, the pirates discover that a familiar C shape is hidden within eight lowercase letters:

c · a · g · d · q · o · s · e

The Coconut Discovery

The pirates find a coconut on their island. When they cut it in half, they discover a shape that looks just like a pirate’s hook!

This becomes the visual foundation for exploring the C-shaped letter group.

Follow the C Shape!

Through the story and illustrations, children discover how the familiar C shape provides a foundation for forming different lowercase letters.

A curious monkey helps bring these discoveries to life.

As the monkey jumps down to grab a coconut, children discover how the shape develops into the hook of the letter g.

When the monkey drops whole coconuts from the tree, the pirates notice the round impressions left in the sand. They trace around the circular shape, beginning with the familiar C-shaped movement, to discover the letter o.

Two coconut halves provide another visual clue for exploring the letter s.

And there’s a special little surprise with the letter e! The monkey rolls a round coconut and pushes it, creating the C shape that completes the letter.

Visual Clues for Letter Formation

The pirate coins mark the starting positions, while the coconut shapes and playful illustrations help children recognise the familiar formation pattern.

By seeing the C shape repeated throughout the group, children build familiarity with the handwriting movement, develop muscle memory and gain a visual reference to help guard against letter reversals.

One familiar shape. Eight lowercase letters. A whole new pirate discovery!

Letter e has the c-shape with an extra step first.

And the pirates discover the first set of vowels. Now they are really on the path to reading.

Get handwriting letter strips, worksheets and posters on TPT.

C Pirate Letters Sand Tray

The Bird Knows Something the Pirates Don’t!

Remember the colourful bird from the first Pirate Handwriting adventure?

When the pirates tried to read words using their newly discovered consonants, they couldn’t make sense of them. Something was missing!

The clever bird knew exactly what they needed.

“Aw, something is missing!”

“Aw, vowels!”

The bird repeats the sounds, drawing attention to the vowel sounds hidden in everyday speech.

As the adventure unfolds, the bird introduces the vowel letters a and o.

The pirates are beginning to discover that there’s more to their letter treasure than they first imagined!

Then the story continues in book 3: i Pirate letters, straight line letters and one more vowel to be found.

By D. Passmore

The next book in the series is: I Pirate Letters

Best Handwriting Picture Book Series

The Vowels: A Second Kind of Treasure

The vowel discovery continues throughout the four-book Pirate Handwriting series.

Book 2 introduces a and o, Book 3 adds i, and Book 4 reveals u.

Together with the earlier discovery of the consonants, the pirates are gradually uncovering another important part of learning to read and spell words.

The pirates thought they were searching for treasure. They didn’t realise that some of the most valuable treasure was made of letters!

R’s Pirate Letters: Handwriting Storybook Lowercase Letter Formation

Correct letter formation connects the muscle memory and the visual cue of letter into a storybook adventure. The pirates can not find their treasure with messy maps. They find the r-shaped seaweed on the island and learn making letters can be easy when the all share the same shape.

A Pirate Adventure That Makes Learning Handwriting an Exciting Discovery!

BUY NOW – AMAZON

R’s Pirate Letters: Handwriting Storybook Lowercase Letter Formation

This is the first book in the Pirate Handwriting series. The dive-down letters.

Join the pirates on a treasure-seeking adventure as they discover the secret of lowercase letter formation.

Six letters. One exciting discovery. A whole new handwriting adventure!

The letters in this book all share a similar ‘r’ shape and fine motor direction with a common downstroke and slide-up hook.

Letters: r, n, m, h, b, p

R-look! The h and b have the same hidden r-shape. That will be easy to make.

The discovery of the r-shaped foundation.

Take the letters h and b, for example. Both share a similar formation structure. Both tall letters that are made almost the same way.

By recognising the familiar r-shaped element, children can begin to understand the relationship between these letters and the movements involved in forming them.

Six Letters. One Underlying Shape. A Carefully Planned Learning Sequence.

The first Pirate Handwriting adventure introduces six lowercase letters: r, n, m, h, b and p.

These letters are not presented in alphabetical order. They are introduced in a carefully planned sequence that draws attention to their shared formation patterns, starting points and differences in letter height.

First, Discover the r-Shape: r, n, m

The adventure begins with the pirates discovering r-shaped seaweed patterns in the sand.

This familiar shape becomes the foundation for exploring the first three letters: r, n and m.

All three begin with the same starting movement and are formed to the same height. Children can build familiarity with this shared pattern as they progress from one letter to the next.

Next, Look Up: h, b

The pirates then discover that the familiar formation pattern can be found in taller letters too.

The letters h and b introduce an important new concept: letter height.

Although these letters share formation features with the first group, they extend much higher. This distinction helps children understand why n and h should look different, even though they have related formation patterns.

Finally, Dive Down: p

The last letter in the adventure is p.

Unlike the preceding letters, p extends below the writing line. Introducing it last gives children another important feature of lowercase letter formation to discover: the drop-down letter.

Learning Through Visual Discovery

Throughout the story, illustrations reveal the underlying r-shaped formation using seaweed patterns in the sand. A pirate coin provides a visual starting-point clue, helping children identify where to begin.

Rather than treating each letter as an entirely separate shape, children are invited to discover the patterns, movements and differences that connect the letters.

Pirate Handwriting brings letter formation to life through visual storytelling, helping children see how letters are made and how they relate to one another.

Get the pirate letter worksheet on TPT

Get the worksheet and images on TPT!

The lowercase r-shape is the foundation, not simply a shape that happens to appear in the other letters.

It has several connected purposes:

  1. A consistent formation movement: Children learn the r-shaped movement first and build familiarity and muscle memory through its use in the related letters.
  2. A visual reference: The underlying r shape remains visible within the other letters, helping children recognise their formation direction
  3. A reversal cue: The familiar shape provides a visual reference that helps children distinguish the correct orientation of letters.
  4. A starting-point reminder: The pirate coin identifies the top starting position.

Now Available in Hardcover ISBN 978-0-473-60223-9 (From IngramSpark)

The second book in the series is: C Pirate Letters, by D. Passmore

Letters: c, a, g, d, q, o, s, e

The pirates find vowels, and now they can read VC and CVC words. They play word games in the sand.

Best Handwriting Picture Book Series

Awesome Animal Alphabet Poems: ABC – Book

Created to help children learn the correct starting points for the lower case letters, and create an auditory link between the visually related objects that make the correct letter sound. Each page has color animal actions to follow.

This book can be found on Amazon HERE

The students really like the letter u page. they laugh at the word underwear. Uncle umbrella bird flies under the underwear, these are all short u vowels sounds. This is important because bossy r words block the short u sound and the long u words like ukulele do not help students with the short vowel decoding of CVC words. (consonant vowel consonant)

Ukulele is also a Hawaiian word, so the long e sound at the end of word does not follow the normal English spelling rules.

Letter tracing cards can be found on my Teachers Pay Teachers shop – Pure Joy Teaching

Link to my shop HERE

You can download and print these cards, that are based on the my book. Use them in your classroom or home to help students with handwriting.

Zebra countdown to Zoom book

10, 9, 8…..Counting down to zoom, with the excitement of a rocket balloon. Zack the Zebra illustrates how to make a balloon rocket with simple household items. A Stimulating way to inspire education, fun, science, and math. Great indoor entertainment, easy DIY. Kids love balloons, spark interest in physics and release fun.

This book is available on  Amazon in paperback and ebook.

Balloon Rocket Tack Cards, and printable Awards for a STEM Project

Printable downloads on TpT, Teachers Pay Teachers are in the works and will be available soon. Joining TpT is free.

Right now there is a free download of my shape & color cards.   

For classroom display and word wall poster printables, find my Alphabet cards, Maori Numbers, & more with the Zebra Frame Pattern.

See more of my items HERE.