Who would’ve thunk?
More importantly… glad that he is comprehending so well and otherwise doing so great!!!
I think a combination of that, and seeing other family members read; including, ideally, both reading for pleasure and reading to find things out.
Young kids generally want to be able to do what the grownups are doing. I don’t think it occurred to me not to learn to read any more than it occurred to me not to learn to walk or to talk. In my life, it was just what people did.
Great, I’m so glad it happened.
My kid, also on the autism spectrum, did the same thing of trying to guess the word from the first two sounds. I don’t know if that is ASD specific, or just a general kid thing. I suspect lots of kids do it. The problem was they would get very frustrated when they couldn’t get the word right away. That interacted with the perfectionist part, so it was better to refuse to read than to misread.
They would refuse to read and claim they didn’t know how to read, but lacking stealth, would then immediately ask a question related to something they had clearly just read (words on a passing truck, or whatever).
Reading to us, reading to dogs, reading to even littler kids all just resulted in preemptive tantrums. Then we just left it alone, and it all sorted itself out as they became a better reader. The point of that, is try not to worry about regressions and refusals if they appear.
He definitely sees me read. He calls my Kindle “Mama’s book.”
Dad reads mostly comic books, but they often do it together. Or he will read our son the D&D Monster Manual.
This is A+ 
parenting!
Reading comic books is reading. And, depending on the comic, it’s often a good place for kids to start (and, of course, depending on the comics, often a good place for them to continue; just eventually adding additional types of writing.)
All of which I suspect you know.
I think he could very well someday be as into comic books as much as his father. And D&D for that matter. Lots of numbers in that game.
Just a fun update.
The kid, who is now four, is reading like crazy. He’s especially interested in books about science things: animals, blood, viruses, molecules. He’s wanting to learn about very tiny things right now. I think he got all this from the size comparison videos on YouTube. He often surprises me with the things he can read on the spot, as he often reads signs and posters out loud when we’re out and about.
His BCBA, just for kicks, created a multiple choice test for him asking basic questions like, “Who do I see at school?” He was able to read the entire test on his own and get the answers correct. My husband then launched into his own project having him read a book about earthworms and then take a test on it. He only got 3/7 correct the first time, but once he realized the answers were in the book he insisted on going back and correcting the wrong answers.
I don’t think explicitly teaching phonics is what did it for him. I think because we read to him so much he started memorizing words, and then once he had so many words in his database he began to see the overlapping sounds, which made him better at guessing future words. He still guesses when confronted with a word he doesn’t know. But it seems he’s having to guess less often these days.
Now we have family library days and I’ve started implementing Family Reading Hour and I’m hoping this helps just normalizing the whole reading for fun thing. Personally I love it because it gives ME an excuse to get more reading done.
WOOT!
Happy Days and yes encourage reading. Glad to see that your little one is diggin’ on the written word.
I remember decades ago reading the British publication the Rupert Bear Annual books. They were quite interesting, with a picture panel like a comic, but a headline at the top of each page in large type describing the action on the page (i.e. “Rupert explores the cave and finds glowing crytals”), then dialog underneath each panel, and then a text portion about an inch or two at the bottom of each page, with even more detail - so the reading options progressed from picture panels to full book text.
A bit more sophisticated than a punch-out with Doc Oc.