Building Blocks

It seems like just about every day Finley amazes us.

It’s probably because a toddler’s brain is a great big sponge. And everything they learn is repeated right back at us, so we think they are the smartest kids in the world. Even when it’s stuff we take for granted as grown ups.

And there are certain achievements and milestones we seem to measure as more important than other things. I’m talking about the first smile, the first word, and the first step. But along the way, there are a bunch of smaller steps that we help her take and every one of them seem pretty big to us.

Case in point: We bought Finley some little wooden alphabet blocks. They’re the standard brightly colored ones, with every letter and number on them. Over the past few weeks, we’ve played with them, stacked them and learned about each of the letters. She’s been able to associate words and names to each letter – “A” is for apple, “D” is for daddy, “F” is for Finley, “M” is for momma. So, we get to play and learn at the same time.

Now she’s learning that the letters can be combined to make words – the first steps to reading. I actually wasn’t planning on working on words for a little bit, but she’s always asking how to spell names or animals. Somewhere in that mix, she got stuck on the fact that her name ends in “l-e-y.” I started working on the “F-i-n” part. She was having a little trouble connecting them, so we took a break for a bit.

I don’t know if they’d been working on names at school, but suddenly Friday night, while playing with her blocks, Finley started calling out “F-i-n-l-e-y!” Of course, to be sure, we had to ask her what she was spelling, and she said, “That’s my name.”

Maybe I’m a little biased, but I’m thinking that’s pretty cool for a two year old. She’s taken a very big step toward a giant world of reading and writing. Again, as adults, it’s something we take for granted, but it really is amazing how big of a deal making that first connection is.

As I mentioned before, it’s just the beginning steps of reading, but it’s much more than that. It’s realizing she is building a foundation of learning. She’s making connections and setting off the little light bulb of discovery in her head. It’s not so much that she can spell her name; it’s that she realizes she can spell her name. That she understands how she got there and what it means.

Hopefully, this will lead to a need to learn more. For me, I’m hoping that she’ll learn how wonderful words are and all the things that can be done with them. I’m also hoping she can learn and understand math better than I ever could.

Ideally, she’ll be well-rounded and enjoy learning about everything. And I can’t wait to help her along the way. There are plenty of books I can show her and music to play for her. I’ve got stories of history and maps for her to explore. But, I’ll have to wait just a bit longer.

There will surely be moments of frustration and anxiety, which will lead to the most important things I can teach her… patience and trust. For now, we’ll stick to the blocks. Maybe “daddy” will be the next word we spell.