The ‘We Can’ Story…
This started with one simple idea:
What if learning to read felt familiar from the very beginning?
When my daughter Claire was learning to read, her grandfather had an idea.
He paired simple phonics-based words with photos from her own life—people, places, and things she already knew.
Something clicked.
She wasn’t just sounding out words—she understood them.
And for the first time, reading felt meaningful.
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—often curled up in my lap or their grandfather’s—they began to recognize and sound out words, supported by photos of people, animals, and things they already knew.
Not only did they learn to read—they learned to love reading. It became something they looked forward to.
Their grandfather’s labor of love gave them a powerful head start—building the confidence in reading that carries forward into everything else.
Cut and Paste
He borrowed our family photo albums, sorting through hundreds of photos to find images Claire could connect to the phonics word sets he had developed.
With a photocopier, a pair of scissors, and some glue, he built the first We Can book by hand.
Claire devoured it. And soon after, Claire Can 2 and Claire Can 3 followed.
By the time she finished the series, she was reading with confidence—and the idea was already growing.
From Then to Now
What began with cut-and-paste and a stack of family photos has become something much easier to create—and just as meaningful.
Today, you can build your own We Can Book in minutes, using photos from your phone. The words stay carefully structured, and the experience becomes something your child will want to return to again and again.
Bonnie
That simple idea became We Can Books — personalized phonics books designed to help children not just learn to read, but want to read.
You can create this for your child, too.
Create Your
Child’s First Book
It takes as little as 10–15 minutes to get started.
No subscription required • One book at a time