A few months ago Sofia began to write. There was no warning. I was working at my desk and she appeared bearing a page of words she had written. I’d taught her the alphabet ages ago, and the sounds of many letters, and we had been reading together. But no writing. Here’s her first page:

4words

At first I thought this was just her typical nonsensical scribbling, but then, with a little encouragement, I saw that it all made perfect sense. For the phonetically challenged, we have pistol, policeman, Leo (her cousin), and pussy cat.

I suggested she try a little more. She was back in a flash with the following gem…

plesmn-pleska

the delightfully succinct policeman in a police car.

I was so thrilled. As the night went on, she brought longer and longer compositions, all perfectly logical, though extremely hard to make any sense of without her help.

Here’s another, which neither of us can any longer fully decipher:

story

That’s

Once (WS) upon (RPON) a time (TPE)
there (D) was (WS) a (R) pig (PEK)
the (B) pig (PEd) went to the (WTD) forest (FOWST)
???
out (RT) of (OF) the (d) bush (BU)
came (KM) a (R) fox (FOK)
and (N) the (D) pig (PEK) was scared (WSKRE)

I can’t make the fourth line out at all now. Can you?