My 3-year Old Can Read! How 'Bout Yours?

We like to read at our house. We go to the library each week. We check out as many books as we are allowed. The kids and I really like going to the library. Last time we were there we saw a whole flock of peacocks. We have A LOT of children's books at our house. I was a teacher in a former life so it comes with the territory. But we like to go and get new ones to add variety to our lives. Let me rephrase that.... I, MOM, like to get new ones. The kids could read the same book over and over and over and over again. In fact, we have to have a rule that we must read every library book we got before we do repeats. (Mom's rule...not Dad's...he doesn't care)
At the library the children have interesting methods of selecting books. Jessenia selects all books that have pink binding (did I mention girly-girl?) and Reese tries to find all of the ones with trains on the cover. Although this last time he selected five books in mass, all sitting together on the first shelf he saw. And then immediately asked me if we could go look at the movies. Grrr.... we are looking at movies first next time so that I don't end up with a bunch of really long books, with lots of words, that were written eighty years ago, with terrible illustrations, about sailors.
This last week we were checking out some books and I selected Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr. illustrated by Eric Carle. It's a classic, if you are like my husband and have never read it. Run to your nearest library!
When I was in college and was learning about teaching children to read one of my professors told us that even little children who don't read words can read. She used Brown Bear, Brown Bear as an example. She said that kids will look at the pictures and be able to follow the pattern of the story and 'read' (aka memorize with the help of the pictures) the book. No kidding, I read the book to the kids one time and soon enough Reese was sitting on the sofa 'reading' it again. (For those who have never read the book. It says the same thing on each page but with reference to a different animal and it's color.) He asked me the next day if I would read it to him and I told him no, but that he could read it to me.
In other reading news, the kids have Quiet Time every day in the afternoon. Quiet Time consists of Brisbane napping, Reese sitting on my bed and playing with puzzles, books, coloring, but not coming out to chat me up, and Jessenia attempting to do what Reese gets to do (but in her room) and eventually falling asleep. The older kids always pick two library books to take to Quiet Time. The other day Reese chose this really obnoxious train book that has no plot and repeats the same thing over and over and is ridiculous. I think it is nonfiction but what it really is is LAME. I digress. He took the lame train book with him and a few minutes later I heard him in his room saying "clickity-clack" and "choo-choo". He was pretty into it. And it was adorable.
What can I say? My three year old is a reader!