Hi,
I've heard of and seen infomercials on "Your Baby Can Read," which is a developmental tool for babies in learning to read as an infant. I've also hear of "Phonics" and am unsure which of the two to consider and was curious to hear from you if you have an opinion, recommendation, passed experience/learning, etc. Any feedback will help... Thanks in advance for your time..I really appreciate it.
A. I do not know how well it works or if it does but always read to my kids at very early ages. I have just ordered this for my granddaughter that is 3 mos old. I got it because it was at an incredible price of $9.98 online with a code that was set to me. I always give educational gifts as they are helpful. I think it was hooked on phonics.com with code sale50.
As a teacher, I would recommend not pushing your child to read early. I have found most of my class room discipline problems have been from those kids who are bored because they already know it all. Please let your child learn naturally at their own pace.
Developmentally most children are not ready to learn to read until they start school and some won't be ready to read independently until they are almost 8. A 9 month old should be exploring the world through play.
The best thing you can do for your child is read to him, talk to him and play with him, and encourage him to try new experiences. Allow your son to enjoy being an infant. He will let you know when he is interested in learning to read.
A.,
Someone else asked that question a few weeks ago. Here is the link. http://www.mamasource.com/request/8667658683410350081
You'll see my post. And I'm very surprised to see that so many people disagree with teaching your baby to read. You'll see one post where a mother taught her down syndrome baby (using the above program) to read. Now, she's reading! It's simply amazing. You can do this program in many creative ways.
Here's the program: http://www.iahp.org/ And you can modify it to make it work for you and your baby.
It's not about pushing your child. It's about having the opinion that they are capable. They also support reading to your children non-stop. I've seen many children that have done this program and their confidence is high.
Also, I've even done this program with older kids that were getting poor spelling grades. I'd do the flash cards, and within 1 week, 100% on each spelling test. NO JOKE.
Good luck with your decision. Go with your intuition.
C. Giovanni
Miracle Nanny
Hi A.,
I was actually wondering about "Your baby can read" as well. I am a SAHM and would love to do it if I knew it worked. Hope we get some answers!
C.
Helping moms work from home
www.AtHome4MyGirls.com
Personally I think the easiest and fastest way to get your child started is to read to them daily and to have books readily available to your child. I have pictures of my kids at 2 years old surrounded by cardboard books they had pulled off "their" bookshelf. I have always made books easy to reach and age appropriate. Reading to them every day not only builds reading skills but creates bonding between you and your child.
IMO the worst thing to do is push things like flashcards. Let reading be fun!
All our children have done well in school and I am convinced it is because we have fostered a love for reading in all of them. We take bi-weekly trips to Half Priced Books in Freemont and come home with armloads of books!
Babies have their own natural developmental schedules, and if you interfere with their normal development, you are doing them a disservice. There is absolutely no reason for babies to learn to read, or to learn phonics. They will learn to read at age seven or eight, which is the appropriate developmental age to learn to read, and is the reason why reading instruction starts in the first grade.
We got it. We love it. Its so cute. Ummm, no need to push. She only watches it for 20 minutes or so (plenty of time for free playing and other developmentally appropriate stuff), and she loves it. It doesn't just teach reading it has nice clear videos of "things" and cute songs-teaches them names of objects. in my opinion, if you need 20 minutes to prepare dinner or a bottle, its better than putting the baby in front of random cartoons. And its more simple and a nice reprieve from Sesame Street! At least it shows them the concept that words may be tied to "things"- i don't think it pushes at all. Anyone who thinks it "pushes" reading hasn't watched it. Now. . . if you are a pushy parent and make your kid watch it for hours straight- that is not right- but neither is pushing your child to do ANYTHING for hours straight. Variety is key. :)
Oh and its NOT the same as Sesame Street. My daughter also likes sesame street, but this is more clear and simple objects and words.
Don't buy into it! I remember how everyone ran out to buy the Baby Einstein DVD's and books hoping their child would become
gifted with an early knowledge of art, science, language etc. What a waste of money and looking back at it.
The best thing you can do is make reading fun by going to the library and picking out books your child would enjoy. Read to them often and ask them questions about the story throughout. My kids are reading well above their grade level simply because we made reading time fun...not a chore. Good luck!
Babies need to MOVE not read. Their brains are getting wired now, right? It is developmental movement that is essential now. Let your child play, be physical and interact. Play music, go to the park- move, move, move, then rest, rest, rest. Ahhh...
Brains will soak up languages like crazy now so put on videos in french and spanish, etc if language is important to you but leave the reading till later. Best ting is to encourage a love of reading. Reading stories together are some of the happiest times I spend with my children and we can do it for hours some days- espec now that we are in chapter books. I think expressing a love of reading is more important than starting to read at an early age.
Enjoy!
I've seen and wondered about those infomercials too. As a child care professional, I think the material is likely good, but am not convinced it's worth the cost. If you have age appropriate books that you read, plenty of stimulating materials for your child to play with and experiment with, and talk with your child a lot, he will begin to learn at his own pace. I like to differentiate talking 'with' a child from talking 'to' or 'at' a child. Make sure you keep a conversational tone, and give your child time to respond. Even at nine months of age, a child has responses. We may not understand them, but by listening closely you'll give him the idea that you are interested in what he's 'saying' and soon you will start to understand him and be able to carry on a 'real' conversation.
It honestly makes me sad thinking of people trying to get there babies to read. My advice, opinion.... let them be a baby, learn about things through touch, and taste and mouth things and learn to walk, and talk, and interact with there surroundings. These are the things babies should be working on. If you want to teach your 3 year old to read, fine. Still way early in my opinion, but at that point if you feel so strongly that they should be so far ahead of the game. Go for it. I think there are other things to learn about getting a long in the world that are far more important. Just from my opinion, I have three very different children. A special needs 8 year old, a son who is now 6, we also have a 2 year old baby boy. The 6 year old talked early, and was reading by the time he was 4, and now at 6, reads at a second grade level at the least. Did we push him, no, we encouraged him to follow what he was passionate about, and led him in the direction he seemed to naturally go. The baby, doesn't seem quite as bent on staying ahead of the curve, and is enjoying more time just being a silly boy.
Anyway, that is my opinion. Let your babies be babies and kids be kids, and encourage them when they show interest.
W.
I'll repeat what I said on the previous thread on the subject. Since I have no experience with the program I won't say I think it's flat out a bad thing, but I *will* say that for most kids it's probably not necessary and that there are plenty of other better ways to invest the money that would have been spent on the program.
Just my two cents: I'm not sure what this "system" is, but personally I think your money and time would be better spent borrowing picture books from the library and spending time doing things like reading and talking with your child and taking him/her to things like baby/toddler lap sits and story times at your local library.
I'm a bit suspicious of any "system" that supposedly teaches babies to read. Besides, there are so many other age-appropriate things for babies to learn (you know, sitting up, crawling, peek-a-boo, etc. ;-)) that I'm really doubtful that adding 'reading' to the mix will provide a significant enough benefit to be worth the $$. If anything, I'd be worried that an emphasis on trying to produce super-early readers might have some unintentional negative effects on other areas of a child's development.
BTW, I have a couple of 7.5YOs that *love* reading and I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that they've been visiting our local public libraries on average at least once a week pretty much all their life, and we've always spent time reading together (even though they read well independently, I still read to them every night before bedtime). Teaching a kid *how* to read is not always the same as helping a kid learn to *love* reading.
Most of the research into child development I have read says that the most important thing at this age is free play. They can 'learn' to read very early (and count, identify letters) but it is largely rote learning. The 'advantages' of such early learning disappear by the time children reach middle school age, i.e. it doesn't create any long term benefits in terms of educational achievement.
Plus the idea that children actually learn from televisions, computers etc is not very well supported by evidence. The argument is most of what they learn is how to interact with televisions. They learn better from interacting with real people.
E.
Don't be a sucka...
The company selling this, like the Baby Einstein company, is in it for PROFIT not the benifit of baby-kind. They are trying to convince you to spend money on a program that involves putting an infant in front of a television, which the American Academy of Pediatrics strongly recommends you do not do. The program's literature draws on research to make some true statements (yes, kids learn language most easily early in life. yes, babies are developing synapses rapidly). But they flash these facts in front of you while failing to tell you that that there is absolutely no research to demonstrate that this program improves a child's ability to learn to read or gets them to read at an earlier age. What will help children learn to read is being read to and being cognitively stimulated. The television is the WORST thing for that. They may get some benefit from the involvement of adults with them in the OTHER activities (games), but basically this is a program to convince you that plopping your kid in front of the tv will be good for him/her, which it will not. Children who are read to and are invovled with the written word will learn to read when they are developmentally ready to do so.
