T-R PHOTO BY ROBERT MAHARRY Woodbury Elementary School Early Childhood Special Education Teacher Melissa “Missy” Mintle reads from a copy of her children’s book titled “See You Later, Alligator!” in her classroom on Wednesday afternoon.

Melissa “Missy” Mintle is now in her 29th year as an educator and her second as an early childhood special ed teacher at Marshalltown’s Woodbury Elementary School. But wherever she’s gone in her career, which included a stop in Massachusetts, she’s carried a special message with her.

When she was teaching head start at Drake University in the late 1990s, she and her fellow staff would send their students off for the day with positive, rhyming messages: the familiar “See you later, alligator,” and “After a while, crocodile,” to name a few. The idea eventually grew into a children’s song book aptly titled “See You Later, Alligator!” and when she later moved onto the Urbandale school district after completing her master’s degree in early childhood special education, Mintle connected with a parent named Kemlyn Tan Bappe who surprised her with an offer to illustrate the book as a Christmas present.

Mintle read “See You Later, Alligator!” every day in class to a group of her students with autism, and one named Sophie made a particularly lasting impact on her. Though she communicated through various noises, Sophie, then three years old, had not spoken a single word until Mintle found her hiding in a classroom one day singing the book — “See you soon, raccoon!” “Give a hug, ladybug!”

“I recorded it and I sent it to her parents. And her mom was obviously in tears, so I dedicated the book to all the Sophies in the world hoping that it would help them find their voices someday,” Mintle said.

When her husband’s job took Mintle and her family to Massachusetts a few years later, Bappe found a publisher interested in the book, and they came up with the money to make it a reality in 2010. It sold out quickly, but they haven’t had the resources to republish it with another press run since — a single, tattered copy still sits in Mintle’s Marshalltown classroom each day.

“I’ve got two kids in college, so that’s my priority. I would love to bring it back out again, but I think we’d have to find a new publisher. This company’s not even in business anymore,” she said.

Even in Marshalltown, the book is read on a daily basis, with the students demanding it if they haven’t had their chance to say goodbye.

“There’s not a day where we don’t read this book. They will not let us out the door without this book,” Mintle said.

In addition, when parents come in for graduation, they join together to sing a goodbye song. Thus far, “See You Later, Alligator!” is Mintle’s lone authorial effort, but she joked that once she finally retires, it may finally be time to write her next one.

And when asked what message she hopes students and parents take from her book, she kept it simple.

“Just sitting with a child and reading a book with them, putting books in their hands,” she said. “This is a simple book that any parent can pick up and read. They don’t even need to know how to read to pick up this book and be able to sing it with their children. It’s a positive message, and it just creates a nice, warm feeling.”