My 3 year old can read???

Ethan has ALWAYS been fascinated with letters, numbers, puzzles, shapes....anything academic, really. So, it was no surprise to me when he could count to 100 by 10s, spell his name, and recognize words all before his 3rd birthday. However, there are moments when he really shocks me with what he knows....and this story is one of these times.

On Ethan's first day of preschool, my husband wrote Ethan a note since he would already be at work when Ethan woke up for the day. Here is the note.....

So, during our morning of getting ready for school, I called Ethan over to see the note that Daddy had written to him. I asked Ethan, "What is that?"......pointing to his name. All I really wanted him to read was his name. And he did.....and then he continued to read the rest of the note!!!!!! OH MY WORD!!!!!!!!!

He often reads books to himself, but they are always books that we have already read to him. But this was a BRAND NEW piece of literature!!! The only words that he misread were "first" (he said feet) and "Buddy" (he said bunny)....but I think that is AMAZING!

The other day my sister was spelling random numbers in order to see if Ethan could read them. I knew that he could read the words of numbers 1-10, but I wasn't sure if he could read the words of numbers 11-20.....he could. Then she busted out numbers like, "seventy-three" and "twenty-four".....and he totally read them, too!!! Who knows how much he actually knows! I NEVER dreamed he would be able to read this note from Corey, but he totally surprised us!

So, now, we have a new game....let's see what Ethan can read! We were suit shopping last weekend, and I was asking Ethan was different signs read....like the "Big&Tall" sign....and he totally read it.."Big, Tall!" Awesome! (On a side note, he was counting a bunch of gold buttons on the suit jackets....he called them "Gold Doubloons" from the Jake & The Neverland Pirates cartoon that he loves. "Four! Four gold doubloons!"...super funny.)

We were watching a new movie the other night, and the production company was called "Blue Sky." When I asked Ethan what it read, he was able to read that as well.....I am just amazed.

I really thought that teaching my child to read would be a challenge that I would face as a parent. However, this doesn't seem to be the case. Instead, my challenge as a parent has been teaching him social skills, grooming skills, anxiety calming techniques, etc. Most kids will pick up the understanding of the game of tag pretty quickly, but Ethan has to be reminded of the concept over & over again. But reading the word, "seventy-three"......no biggie. Amazing. He truly is my favorite puzzle, and I love discovering the pieces!