More Adventures in Reading

We have a lot of those "Step into Reading" books. If you have a young child, perhaps you're familiar with them. Logan likes to call them his "reader books." I like to call them "Today's Dick and Jane." The wide range of titles come within a framework of 5 levels. The first is for pre-readers. It sets the stage - a lot of rhyming, a lot of site words. Stage 2 is labeled "reading with help."

Several weeks ago Logan insisted we buy him "more twos." So I did. I mean really, I'm a book whore. I just can't bring myself to say no when one of my kids wants a book.

Last night Logan opted out of Tom Sawyer. He wanted to read one of the "Twos." The plan was to take turns reading sentences. Me. Then him. Me. Then him. His idea.

I read.

He read. He sounded out words a letter at a time when it wasn't one he recognized. Then he'd announce what he'd discovered proudly. One such sentence was spoken by one of the characters:

"I kah-now..." Logan said with gusto before I stopped him from going on.

I smiled. I rubbed his head and said, "Well, ok. I understand why you *think* that says kah-now, but that's not quite it. That word is know. As in I know how to read."

Logan stared at me with that look that he pulls out when he thinks I'm messing with him and he's not finding me funny. "No, Mommy. That's wrong. I know how to read. That word is KAH-NOW. See! K is Kah. N is Nuh and O with a W is oww! Kah-Now. Know is spelled N - O."

I nodded. I squelched the urge to just ignore it and move on, this wasn't like when he made up the rules to the board games we play. I tried to explain the silent K and the long vowels and the short vowels and the way some words sound the same as other words but are spelled differently.

I showed him how if we covered up the K we'd have the word "now." Logan nodded, and then he put his little finger over the W.

"See, mommy," said Logan with a little bit of know-it-all-ism seeping out, "If we had no K and no W we'd have NO."

It was then that I decided the guy writing down all these phonics rules was most certainly drunk at the time.

(And today, for good measure I bought Logan the "Step 2" book "Here comes Silent E." Which we've read already. Logan has prounounced the "silent E" rule "Stupid." Again I say, who can blame him.)

(Read on to find out why I'm melting...if you care. ha!)