The Boy Done Good!

I was going to give you an update on how the seeds are progressing but that can wait, this is much more thrilling,
Yesterday when we picked Oliver up from nursery, Amy his carer, showed us a list of words she had written  out which Oliver then learnt.

 I was highly impressed, as he isn't 3 until April. I said as much to her and she said half apologetically 'I think he's only memorised them' but what else is reading? When I read I don't sound out the word first, letter by letter.

So this morning when I was reading to him in bed, I was tempted to try him with another word. I chose zoo because as I since discovered, it appears 30 times in the book, we are reading 'Put me in the Zoo'.
 He soon picked it up and started looking for it on the next page, but unfortunately he can read it but he can't say it, he was saying 'Look  hoo'.
On the way to nursery I bumped into my neighbour Nicky and had to tell her. As a former primary school headmistress and a keen reader herself, I knew she would understand my excitement. Oliver rose to the challenge by reading out to her all the words on yesterday's list. Rather than dismiss this as a memory trick she pointed out that there were no visual clues on the paper so he is literally reading them.
We then contentedly shared the prospect of the pleasures and benefits to him, if as seems likely he is reading properly by the time he goes to school. Nicky pointed out the extra knowledge of the world children gain from reading and this is very true, the only knowledge I have about sailing I gained from Arthur Ransome, the care of horses from 'Jill has Two Ponies' and the first stirrings of a feminist consciousness at the age of 6 from reading the Famous Five books.
Just the other day there was a report from Dutch university on how reading fiction increases empathy. I'm sure this is true, I spent my childhood reading obsessively and compulsively and now I cannot bear horror films in particular films of torture like 'Saw' as I cannot stop myself feeling the victim's pain.
So I want Oliver to have increased empathy, and knowledge and to have a head start on school but most of all I want him to know the complete pleasure of being able to lose yourself in a book.