I realized tonight while giving Levi a bath that every night we go through our letters by writing them on the tub walls with his bath markers or homemade finger paints. We do this every night. But tonight was different. He begin by telling me “A” and pointing to the wall. Insistant on me writing “A” after “A” after “A” I got tired and decided to turn this into a learned game because I’ve also noticed that early morning and late evening is when he seems to be more absorbent on learning things. So I starting writing letters. Since teaching preschoolers for 7 years I learned not to teach them letters in order to mix them up. It’s a lot more challenging that way too because they just aren’t learning a memory skill or a song they are actually learning it. So I began “B”, “T”, “D”, “S”, etc….until we had the entire alphabet. I would write it on the tub wall and he would tell me what it was. Out of 26 letters he knows 13. I was so proud. And he really knows them. He would say it as soon as I wrote it and never hesitate about answering. He’d look at me when he’d say the answer and smile when he knew he was right.
These little learning moments bring back the joys of when I was teaching and a child would pick up something and remember it. It’s amazing how I can teach my Levi something and he knows it. It’s not like he is just repeating it because I said it. Usually I never say anything but let him figure it out. I love that feeling!
He can now also count to two. He can look at two objects and say one, two. And then he will look at me and say “two” like “hey there are two here”. He did that last night when I handed him two of his cups while emptying the dishwasher. He loves to put his cups in his cabinet so I handed them to him without saying anything but “put these in the cabinet please” and he took them and said “two” looking at each cup in both hands. I love it! You could actually see those little wheels turning.
We go Friday for our 2 year old check up so hopefully it will all be good news.
Leave you with a smile tonight. After we finished up our alphabet game he decided to paint. It was so funny and I have no idea where he got it but he began putting the paintbrush in his mouth and using his mouth to paint on the walls. Then he got even more creative and started dipping his paintbrush with it still in his mouth into the paint and then onto the walls. It was so funny and creative. So I had to snap a few photos-because that’s the photographer in me catching every moment. So enjoy a smile for the evening-I know I could use it.
The Riner Family 