Love at First Read

At the library today, Baby L fell in love with this book! I've never seen her become so attached, so quickly, to a book.

She pulled it out of the board book section completely on her own and brought it over to me saying "Book! Book!" Then she demanded that I read it to her multiple times!

Has your child ever fallen in love with a book at first sight? Post a comment and tell us about it!

March is the Month for Text Sets

In first grade classrooms from New York City to Seattle, teachers are about to launch the March Unit of Study for Reading Workshop: Putting Texts Together: Reading Across Genres To Learn About a Topic and

Build Your Vocabulary.

And guess what, you can do the same at home!

Just collect up a whole bunch of books about a topic you and your little ones are interested in. Stick them in a box or a basket and have fun reading!

Baby L and I have been reading our winter books all season long. We've got stories, poems, board books, lift-the-flap books, nonfiction books, you name it. It's so much fun to watch Baby L make a connection from one book to another!

Winter is almost over (hopefully), so soon we'll be busting out a bunch of books about spring! Yippee!

Comments From the Peanut Gallery

Baby L is learning more and more words by the minute! Her newest craze is to chime in to conversations, books, songs, anything with her own "comments." Usually "Dooooo!" or "Deeda deeda deeda" or something like that, but she sounds like she's really adding to the conversation! We respond with all due seriousness, "Yes, Baby L., of course. What else would you like to say?" And she responds!

Adorable!

Add that to her fascinating "self conversations" that she has nightly in her crib before she drops off to sleep, and each morning when she awakes. She can be heard listing off the words she knows, cooing, and babbling. It's the best alarm clock ever!

So cute!

She can also be heard "talking" to Indigo, our dog, and Baby L's best bud. "Dee! Dee! Heh heh heh." She smiles, and pats him, or waves to him from across the living room and says as clear as day, "Hi!"

Too bad Indigo can't talk. Maybe with enough reading aloud, modeling conversations, responding to his attempts at conversation...