Counterpane’s Early Literacy Workshop – a community outreach for families of children 0-36 months – brings Moms, Dads, and their little ones together to share stories about Souns and parenting. During our last get-together we watched a short video encouraging parents to foster independence for their children in the home environment. Today’s harvest included one family who avoids the before dinner chaos by having their young child set the table. She loves it! Another celebrated their new “dishwasher”  –  all that is needed is a stool and happiness prevails with, “I want to do ALL the dishes!” This story was shared by the mother that, after the previous meeting, emailed the following –

Then there was the delightful onion story. One mom was fixing dinner and her little son saw the sliced onions on the counter and targeted one piece, taking it in his hands and exclaiming, “Ahhh! This is ahh!” He has indeed learned the most common sound for the “o.”  He refused to let his mom cook the ahhh.

Souns is an amazing program and seeing these children want to match the sounds they knew with the sounds I wrote on the board and wipe specific sounds off  the board brings smiles to all of us.  Little hands placing each Souns symbol in the basket during clean-up is proof that play is the best way to teach. Reading builds vocabulary and Souns builds letter-sound associations. The desire for independence came in these little packages of humanity. The same drive for independence that wants to sweep the floor, wash a dish, crack an egg can be experienced with the symbols of our print. Just give the real tool – letter- sounds! The most magic words are, “I can do it myself!”