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Baby’s got book! Tot shocks parents by reading
The amazing part if of course that she is from Texas and knows how to read! 
Elizabeth Barrett is to all appearances your standard 17-month-old girl, complete with wisps of gossamer hair so blond it’s almost white and the unsteady gait that is the definition of a toddler. As her parents and two other adults talk earnestly around her, she paws through a couple of large-format children’s books on a table, blissfully unaware of the conversation around her.Then TODAY’s Ann Curry holds up a sheet of paper with the word “HAPPY” printed in big, block letters and asks Elizabeth to read it.
“Hap-py,” Elizabeth chirps without hesitation, enunciating each syllable in a bright little voice.
Curry holds up another sheet of paper.
“Zip-per,” Elizabeth says.
Curry goes on flashing words, none of which Elizabeth has been coached on, and the remarkable little girl reads them.
“Kang-a-roo.” “Flow-er.” “Nice to meet you.” “Take a bath.” “Good morning, Ann.”
This happened on the TODAY show Monday in New York. Elizabeth wasn’t showing off or performing, this sort of thing being old hat to her. Way back when she was 13 months old, she read her first word, says her mother, Katy Barrett of Lubbock, Texas.
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Katy Barrett and her husband, Michael, are speech pathologists, and when Elizabeth was born, they said on Monday, they started teaching her sign language along with spoken language. They read to her often, and her favorite television program — the only one her parents let her watch — was a PBS show called “Signing Times,” which teaches kids sign language.
“Hap-py,” Elizabeth chirps without hesitation, enunciating each syllable in a bright little voice.
Curry holds up another sheet of paper.
“Zip-per,” Elizabeth says.
Curry goes on flashing words, none of which Elizabeth has been coached on, and the remarkable little girl reads them.
“Kang-a-roo.” “Flow-er.” “Nice to meet you.” “Take a bath.” “Good morning, Ann.”
This happened on the TODAY show Monday in New York. Elizabeth wasn’t showing off or performing, this sort of thing being old hat to her. Way back when she was 13 months old, she read her first word, says her mother, Katy Barrett of Lubbock, Texas.
-clip-
Katy Barrett and her husband, Michael, are speech pathologists, and when Elizabeth was born, they said on Monday, they started teaching her sign language along with spoken language. They read to her often, and her favorite television program — the only one her parents let her watch — was a PBS show called “Signing Times,” which teaches kids sign language.
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