Monday, September 14, 2009

Phun With Phonics

In an ongoing effort to ensure that Jack (and, ultimately, Sam) don't become the consumeristic nincompoops that MTV hopes to craft out of the youth of today [man I sound like a 900 year old man saying that, but it gives my parents some validation], we try to read to/with Jack (and Sam) on a regular basis. We have a magnetic alphabet that announceds the phonetics of various letters when you insert the letter into the machine that hangs from our refridgerator (it, too, is magnetic). Most of the time, the letters are simply hazards that I step on when it's dark in the kitchen, but we do, from time to time, use it. So Jack gets the general idea.

From time to time, I'll quiz Jack about letters and phonetics. The other night, I asked him what letter the word "milk" started with, and he began the analysis as such:

TJ: "Jack, what letter does milk start with?"

Jack: "Milk? Mmmmmmm, mmmmmmm, mmmmmmm, milk. ... mmmmmm, mmmmmm,mmmmm, mamma."

TJ: "Very good, "mamma" starts with that letter too. What letter is that?"

Jack: "Mmmmmmm, mmmmmmm, mmmmmmmm, McDonalds."

Golden Arches for the Win!