Writing my 100th post today (please, hold
the applause) puts me in a reflective mood
about how my young reader began.
I read to my boy from the start. Even before the
start actually, since I read aloud to him when I
was pregnant. I remember reading But Not the
Hippopotamus to him when he was two weeks
old. He eventually grew tired of that one,
though I never did.
My son, like many children,
showed no signs of autism (unless you count
precocity) until he was about 18 months old.
Here's what I wrote about his reading just before
the time he started losing words and gestures:
"Find the Teddy" & "Baby Frens"
for instance, and can 'read' parts of them to us.
1/8/2002 My boy used to "read" his books aloud like this
"abeba da dee do."
Now he reads them like this
"I see airplane. I see frog. I see fren."
He enjoyed reading to us then and had no
problems with focus. We're long past
declarative fully illustrated sentences now.
He would rather ponder page minutiae that
I don't even notice than read with me and
rarely makes the expected connections.
But he still loves books.
I think we can do that for all our kids,
non-verbal or hyperlexic, read with
them early and give them a love of
books.
If you have a book-resistant kid,
write in-we need to share our stories
in every sense of the word.
Okay, you can applaud now,
prompting another 100 posts.
Or better yet, comment.
-Spectrum Mom
