Okay, so I got sucked into the infomercial about the "Your Baby Can Read" program. One of the results is that children as early as 2 are reading books like Charlotte's Web. I used the "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" when my daughter was 3 1/2 and it worked well -- she's now 4 1/2 and can read Step 3 books. I specifically liked it because words were always spelled correctly when taught and it showed her the keys to pronouncing words, so really she can unlock almost any new "regular" word on her own. I hesitate with the "Your Baby Can Read" program because it seems to teach by sight. Please respond only if you have PERSONAL experience with this program. Did you have success? Does it teach life-long skills for reading and pronunciation? I'd hate to spend $200 and find out later I need to start over anyway. Thanks for your help!
I got suckered in to this program. I feel it was a waste of money. My three year old likes to watch them now and then but so far we have not seen results like was shown on tv. As far as teaching infants to read big quistion mark, My baby does not even watch tv for more than two seconds and I don't think its the best idea to teach bad tv habbits so young, in the program they want you to show it to you child three times a day.
YES, THIS PROGRAM IS A BLESSING!!!
I purchased the set when my daughter was 2 and a half, and she is now 4 and a half reading at a third-grade level!!!
We ran each volume for about 3 weeks, 2-3 times per day. I found the best way to keep her interested after the first week was to play in the car during even 20 minute rides (fewer distractions this way).
We played with the flashcards every night, and had a lot of fun with the program.
The key is-----this is a START, and you continue to build on this foundation. I found her age (at 2.5) was a perfect time to begin, she was able to communicate what she was learning, SO I KNEW IT WAS WORKING.
We now go to the library once a week and check out over 20 books, and read every night together.
They now sell the volumes individually, so you can try it for less than $20! People think my 4 year old is a genius, especially her Preschool teachers!!!
WHAT IS VERY INTERESTING IS THAT SOME PARENTS SEE AND HEAR MY DAUGHTER READING (EVEN BEFORE SHE WAS 3) AND THEY OFTEN HAVE SOMETHING NEGATIVE TO SAY ABOUT IT.
It did take consistancy, and with working together with the flashcards, we saw real reading results right away.
Like any book or even toy, some kids might be drawn to it, while others may need some encouragement.
And with all of the recent negative publicity, DR BOB TITZER has been a gift to me and my family, but most of all, A TRUE BLESSING FOR MY DAUGHTER'S LIFE. I AM FOREVER THANKFUL FOR HIM SHARING THIS SYSTEM.
I have this program and you are correct in stating that the words teach primarily by sight. The difference is the pictures or actions are shown in conjunction with the word.
What I don't like about the program is that it teaches single words in isolation. As are result, the portions of the program where children are reading chapter books is very misleading in my opinion. Your child will not be taught letter sounds and how to break down and blend sounds in order to read words.
I will be looking into the program you used for your daughter. Thanks for the info and save your money.
I feel like I read somewhere that the reason we don't remember being born is that something happens around two years old that we just lose those first two years of memory.. I don't see how these programs could actually work, considering.
No it does not work. It is not teaching a child to read phonetically. It is word recognition through repetition. When baby sees a new word they do not know, they will not be able to read it because they don't know the correct way to actually read it phonetically.
I do not have experience with this program, but like you, I also used "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons," and I think it is one of the BEST ways to teach your child to read. You've already had success with it, and I say stick with what works! (Also, I can't figure out why a baby needs to read anyway. Shouldn't they be doing baby things?)
I learned to read off a similar program as a baby and have always been ahead of my class. I was reading past what achievement tests could test by the time I got to school. We are doing the program with our 2 younger kids, 3 and 1. They love it. They do genuinely seem to be reading. The 3 yo more. We really like it. The kids prefer their Italian CD. They can sing the songs in Italian, and tell us what the song is about. It's half English, though. Anyway, since I learned under the same principles, I would think it was good. My mom is the one who bought it for us and she's got a PHD (ABD) in Early Childhood Development, so this is right up her alley. Have fun!
My neighbor has told me about this program, and she did it a little with her baby. I don't know if she still does it. I would investigate a little more at this website: http://www.childandme.com/howteachbabyreadenglish/. They have free powerpoints you can download to start out. Just see if you like it.
What I did was order the whole set with dvd's, use the 30-day trial to thoroughly investigate and backwards engineer it for my own kids, copy/burn the dvd's with DVD fab (make a remote offsite backup of the program)
and send the whole kit-n-caboodle back to em'. I paid maybe $15 plus shipping it back to them, so total of about $45 altogether. So they still made a little money off it, and I got a really reasonably priced product that I can reproduce for $50 total with the dvd's, homemade flashcards and pics and didn't have to shell out the almost $300 they wanted total. I suspect the doctor who 'designed' this program had alot of help, and is making money hand over fist off the selling of this course, much more than it cost to produce. I looked it over and it's just double-layer flashcards with flip-open pictures to correspond with the words so the child can make the
'connection' between the two plus the dvd's of what amounts to home-movie quality of kids demonstrating what the words are. How hard can that be to produce?
I have exposed my son to this program since he was 3 months old. He started saying words from this program as early as 9 months. Things like "dog" and "head". It is about picture and word association, but the booklets and cards that are offered as part of the program allow you to teach your child by reading as well. The cards and books are a vital part of making this program work. When we spend time with the cards, he can read the words without pictures. At 11 months he pointed to the the word and said "turtle". I was blown away.
for a while Usborne Books was selling Your Baby Can Read as part of our product line (I'm a consultant) and so I bought it to try it out, my dd was 18 at the time. the instructions say to have your child watch the same dvd over and over daily for 2 months before moving on to the next one. My daughter learned some word recognition, like Hi, Car, Star at 19 months...however at age 3 she does not know these words anymore. if you are rigorous and do the program every day the way they say to use it your child might learn to read but I feel it is more word recognition from exposure. it has kids running around and talking on it which my daughter responded to--when our starter DVD broke I found the starter DVD on the your baby can read website for $15 with a book. since they stopped using Usborne as a retailer their prices have gone way up...I would try to get my hands on a copy of the starter DVD and see how your kid responds to it and if you like the program or not before spending $200 on it...and you can get the set of the DVD's on Amazon for $59.99 it has the 5 DVD's and the basic flash card set. I wish you lived closer I would just lend it to you and let you see if you like it. it is a sight recognition program and if the program you have already has her reading step 3 books I wouldn't "regress" with your baby can read. I got my set at a greatly discounted price using an incentive I had as a consultant so I don't feel I wasted money but I never sold the set or pushed it because I didn't feel it was worth $80. I had customers get it as their half price item or at 35% of the cost but I told them flat out when they asked I didn't think it was worth $80. I could have had better commissions I am sure but I didn't feel honest doing it. I often lent out my set or the starter and found most moms agreed with me that unless you are going to religiously put your kid in front of the same DVD day after day after day just so they can recognize a word it really isn't worth it. it was fun being places having my 19 month old point out the word car or star to people but really it was word recognition and once we weren't watching the dvd's as much it left. I don't want to pressure her to read, i want her to love it and enjoy it and she loves books and I beleive she will be reading on her own when she is ready--I read at age 4, self taught because I was read to all the time. no your baby can read program for me!
on another note, the company was bankrupt when Usborne took over as their distributer here in the states and as soon as they were out of the red they cut usborne out of the mix started selling it on their own and raised prices on everything--another thing I don't like is businesses who have bad ethics...I think that also speaks volumes for the product.
