Why There Are Uppercase and Lowercase Letters
Sept. 28, 2014
Once upon a time in a distant land called Letterland there lived a family of friendly letters. They lived happily and never argued with each other. People loved letters because they formed words, so little children could learn from them.
All letters were lowercase and were equally treated by people. Once some of them decided that they wanted to become Uppercase. They started quarrelling because each of them thought it deserved to be a capital letter.
They decided to choose the best letter who would then become Uppercase. It’s easier said than done. None of them meant to back off and all of them started to call out their merits.
“I’m the most gracious letter of the land,” said letter s. “That’s why I deserve to be the largest.”
“And I’m the most frequently used letter in the alphabet,” said letter e. “So it’s me who should be called Uppercase.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. That doesn’t mean anything,” letters z, q and x spoke in unison. “We’re the rarest English letters so if someone deserves being Uppercase, that’s us!”
“C’mmon guys, I’m the widest letter of the land so it’s me who should take the lead,” said letter w.
After these words, all letters started shouting and fighting. This would have lasted forever if it hadn’t been for the letter a, the oldest and the wisest letter of the land.
“There’s no need to compete or fight with each other,” said letter a.” Every one of us is brilliant and deserves to be Uppercase. Let those letters which come first in a sentence be Uppercase and those which follow them be lowercase. Thus every letter would have a chance to be Uppercase once in a while.”
The moment letter a went silent, the audience burst into applause. All the letters started kissing, hugging and thanking letter a for having masterly set their argument. Now they could change from lowercase to uppercase and vice versa whenever they wanted. No letter has complained ever since and they all lived happily ever after.
If you are looking for easy and enjoyable learning opportunities for your child, try kids apps and writing worksheets.