One bright morning, a man with a very clever brain decided, "I'm going to write the best ABC book ever! A brand new one, much better than the old ones."

His old ABC book, which was a bit dusty and sat on a high shelf, heard this. "Hmph!" it grumbled softly, its pages rustling. "What's wrong with me? I've taught children their letters for ages!" But the man didn't hear it.

The man wanted his new ABC book to be full of exciting, modern things. He thought and thought. "What should A be for?" he wondered. "And B? And C?" He paced his room, looking for ideas.

Suddenly, from the farmyard next door, he heard a loud, clear "Cock-a-doodle-doo!" It was the rooster, standing tall on the fence, greeting the sun.

"Aha!" thought the man. "That rooster sounds like he's shouting the letter 'A'!"
The rooster puffed out his chest and crowed again. "Cock-a-doodle-DOO!"
"It's as if he's saying, 'A is for... Alarm clock!'" the man chuckled. "Yes, the rooster is like a living alarm clock!"

The rooster, as if he understood, flapped his wings proudly. Then he crowed a different sound, a bit like "Buh-buh-buh!"
"B!" said the man. "And B could be for... Barn! Where the rooster lives!"

The rooster seemed very pleased with this. He strutted back and forth on the fence. Then he let out a sharp "Cuh-cuh-cuh!"
"C!" exclaimed the man. "C is for... Corn! Which the rooster loves to eat!"

And so it went. The man listened carefully as the rooster crowed and clucked. Each sound the rooster made gave the man an idea for a letter and a simple word to go with it.
"D is for Day, that the rooster starts with his song!"
"E is for Eggs, that the hens lay nearby!"
"F is for Feathers, so bright on the rooster's tail!"

The man wrote down all these wonderful, simple ideas that came straight from the farmyard and the proud rooster. He realized that sometimes the best ideas are the simplest ones, the ones that are all around us.

His new ABC book wasn't filled with complicated things after all. It was filled with the cheerful sounds and sights of everyday life, inspired by a very helpful rooster. Children loved learning their letters with pictures of roosters, barns, corn, and sunny days.

And the rooster? He became quite famous in the neighborhood. Every morning, when he crowed his "Cock-a-doodle-doo!", everyone would smile and say, "There's the clever rooster who knows his ABCs!" He would just puff out his chest a little more, very proud to be the star of the best new ABC book.

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