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Active from A to Z
This alphabet learning book encourages kids to get active, by playfully showcasing animals participating in fun sports, along with interesting facts about each activity.
Active from A to Z (paperback) is available for $12.95 and on Amazon Kindle for $4.99.
When Jay Ablondi, IHRSA’s executive vice president of Global Products, was reading to his daughter Elle, he noticed there were plenty of alphabet books but not necessarily many that had a message of exercise. That gave him an idea. Or, actually, sparked an old idea that had been shelved for more than five years.
Ablondi and Stan Tran, IHRSA’s Association Management Systems administrator, had started working on a children’s book in the late 2000s but put it on hold due to time restraints and the recession. With his new revelation, he went to Tran and set a deadline to finish, and publish, the book.
Active from A to Z, IHRSA’s first children’s book, is full of bright illustrations by Tran that complement Ablondi’s rhyming about animals being active and accompanying fun facts.
“Apes, chimps and monkeys eat bananas and grass. Aerobic exercise makes your heart beat fast.”
IHRSA dipping into the children’s book pool shouldn’t be too surprising. Part of the organization’s mission to help provide solutions for the growing obesity epidemic and dearth of activity by both adults and children. So, a book that IHRSA envisions will get kids interested in exercise with their parents’ participation fits in perfectly.
With bears playing baseball, cheetahs on cycles and elephants on ellipticals, children will be introduced to new animals, physical activities and exercise equipment.
IHRSA associate member Helix, creator of the Lateral Trainer, decided to sponsor the book. President Lenny Snyderman said the book struck a chord with him and that is why he decided to have Helix be involved. He says he feels kids these days don’t heed the words he often heard as a child: “Go outside and play!”
“Today, we see less and less of kids exercising with limited freedom due to safety concerns as well as the growing dependence on ‘electronic’ activities,” Snyderman explains. “I was very pleased to see someone taking the time to write about children and fitness while utilizing the power of IHRSA to raise a subject that really needs more focus in our country.”
