When my first daughter Claire was approaching reading age, my father Bob, who had recently retired from the law, wanted to do something special for her.

All his life he had recognized the importance of education and reading. Outside of his career, which of course was focused on words, he was a huge reader and student of world history. These themes fueled his lifelong passion for social justice and opportunity for all.

He fully understood the importance of phonics in learning to read. And he wanted to make this tool even more effective for the young reader. He came up with the idea of combining phonics with the power of association.

His great idea—a familiar image with a simple key word—unlocked all the related words on the page, and helped Claire make sense of the letters and sounds and meanings. And so… We Can Books was born.

A head start in life

Today Claire and Chloe (who’s better known as Dove) are thriving adults. Learning to read with Claire Can and Chloe Can, nestled in my lap (and often their grandfather’s lap) they learned to recognize and sound out the words on each page, as photos of people, animals, and things they knew helped them to decode key words. Not only did they learn to read… but they learned to love to read. Reading became fun.

Their grandfather’s labor of love and imagination gave them a wonderful head start in life. Both girls have built incredibly successful careers which would not have been possible without their confidence in the written word. This head start was so important, and we all have wonderful memories of time spent reading together.