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Your Baby Can Read

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fisherofmengirly

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Okay, I woke up early this morning and instead of falling back asleep after Paul left for work, I stayed up and flipped through the channels. I''m one of those crazy people who loves to see what infomercials are trying to sell in the middle of the night (or 6am, which might as well be 2am for me!).

There was one talking about a new program that, it is claimed, can teach a child to read as an infant. There were clips of home videos (or so they said) as well. There was a baby, I mean a chubby thighed maybe 5 or 6 month old child and they held up a card that read "Kicks" and the baby began kicking her legs. Um, I''m not sure that means the baby knows the term and recognizes it by sight or if that means the baby likes to kick her legs, but it''s not reading.

Then there were slightly older babies (18 months) reading cards and even books. I couldn''t clearly determine what they were saying because much of it was still the incoherent only-a-parent-knows-what-is-being-said verbage, but it sounded like the kid *may* have been reading.

Has anyone heard of this?

What are your opinions on teaching children these skills from infanthood?

The website listed on the infomercial was: www.Yourbabycanread.tv
 

mrs-h-

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I have the whole set for my daughter, she was 16 months when we started and is now 20 months old, she can read about 8 words and her vocabulary is growing by the day, she knew every part of her body at 17 months thanks to the DVD''s, we are now teaching her numbers and colors and she is loving it, the way it was described to us was a bit like Baby Einstein but this system was formulated 1st, i only know of 1 other mom using it and havent heard yet wether her child has taken to it or not, i let my DD watch it in the morning when she is having her milk, she''l then bring me the flashcards and books that accompany the DVD in the afternoon at some time for us to read them, if she didnt like it i wouldnt do it, TBH i dont really tell people what we are doing as the few people i have told think im nuts for teaching her to read at such a young age, it works for us, i''d be interested to see if any other parents show this system to their kids.
 

TravelingGal

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With all due respect for Mrsh, I would say a big no thanks to this.

Since I am one of those who believes that babies can be trained, this probably "works" to some degree. But the question I''d ask is "and?" So what? Why? To show myself how brilliant my kid is?

That''s great if the kid loves it, but there are also plenty of other things that kids will love that don''t involve my ego (again, this is my take on it...I am not saying that Mrsh is doing this because of any ego!). I also am one of those freaks who hates watching TV and so my daughter doesn''t get to watch any either. I''ll probably wait until she''s at least 2 years old. Instead of plopping my baby down in front of the TV to learn colors, I''d rather show her myself through play and fun. My mother never did anything like these DVDs and I became quite the voracious reader.

At a recent family get together (which I could not make since I had a one month old), apparently a cousin of mine and his wife kept prodding their baby to show off certain skills and tricks he''d learned. Finally another cousin of mine just blurted out, "He''s not your MONKEY, you know." I thought that was actually kind of profound. So many parents these days want to show off their kids...they might as well be monkeys. My kid is not my monkey...either in public or private.

That''s not to say I am opposed to learning "tricks" through repetition, but I look to have Amelia "do" things when she should be hitting milestones. Like waving, babbling certain sounds, etc. It''s more to check that my kid is progressing instead of knowing she is advanced. No where in any child development book that I''ve read states that babies need to be "reading" before age 2.

The baby stage is short. I think I''ll just let my baby enjoy being a baby. JMHO.
 

neatfreak

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Well said TGal.
 

TravelingGal

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OMG, I just went to the website you posted fisher and there is the pitch video. What a way to prey on parents. The baby's brain develops to 90% capacity in the first 5 years so you have to "seize" the opportunity to teach them then?
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This will help them get a better education and CAREER?

BTW, I'm not without some kind of knowledge about the educational industry. I used to work for a well known, very popular educational software company for many years. They had the typical elementary school programs but also decided to come out with a baby edition and toddler edition. I looked at the baby product and asked, why? WHY would you want to stick your baby in front of a computer at a few months? I was friends with the R&D people and they told me they would never use this product with their babies. It was crap and the reason why the company decided to produce a baby product? To increase the bottom line. Disgusting.
 

oobiecoo

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I don''t think I would try to teach my child to read so early, but what Mrs-h- said about her child knowing all of the body parts sounds like it could be helpful. The baby could possibly tell you better where they have pain or something like that maybe.
 

qtiekiki

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I think the babies in infant/toddler age are not reading per se. They probably just have things memorized. DH''s cousin''s son can "read" The Very Hungry Catepillar when he was 2 yrs old. But he wasn''t actually reading the words on the pages. Instead he had heard the CD that comes with the book enough time to repeat the story. At the early stage, it''s just learning through repetition and recognition. You can probably achieve what the programs claim to do yourselves by playing with and talking to your baby. I am not against these programs, but I prefer to just spend time with my baby instead of putting her in front of the TV.
 

puffy

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tgal very well said!!! i totally agree with you on that. granted that we did teach B to sign, but by no means do i go ''showing off" to other moms that "B is smarter than their child." i think that a lot of parents do that. just my view, but a lot of parent teach their kids things so that their child can repeat the "tricks" for other people when the parents tell them to. and i think it makes other parents feel that their child is not smart or they must not being doing a good job being a parent.
With the whole signing thing, we did teach it to B, but it isn''t for everyone. and if he never caught on to it, i would be 100% fine with that. there are a lot of things that he is ahead in, but there are also things that he is behind in. i don''t make a list of all the things that he can do and tell my entire circle of friends with kiddies about them to "compare."
sorry that i was all over the place on that, but this is something that i feel so strongly about because believe me, i have been that parent who felt like i wasn''t doing a good job because of someone else showing off their child''s "tricks."
 

ljmorgan

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I would imagine they're learning memorization rather than learning to read so soon, but I think that it's very neat Mrs H's daughter learned all of her body parts so early. Love that it teaches colors and numbers too. I think that there are many ways to teach your children the basics, and don't think that this method necessarily should warrant the harsh criticism it's receiving in this thread. Thanks for the interesting post fisher, and thanks to Mrs H for the feedback. Judging from the responses here, no wonder you said you don't share the fact that you do this with many people!
 

fisherofmengirly

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The whole show (or infomercial, but to me it was like watching a show), I kept thinking about that 8 month old kicking it''s legs and the adult was holding up a card saying "Kick." I was like, "Really? Does he really, really the child is kicking because of the sign?"

It just baffled me.

I do have friends who have taught their babies sign language as a form of communication, though. I don''t know how differen that is from this method, but it seemed to work well for them in being able to determine what their babies needed at an earlier age.
 

Tacori E-ring

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It''s amazing we all turned out okay without all these new parenting tools!
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fisherofmengirly

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Yeah, man.

Hooked on Phonics was as far as it went when I was kid and I don''t know a person who used it.
 

ladyciel

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Let''s suppose it works, and the child is reading at a 1st grade level in preschool or kindergarden. From my own personal experience, that result has both its pros and cons. I loved learning and my parents encouraged it at home. The result, however, was that when I got to elementary school....they didn''t know what to do with me. I started 1st grade in ''87 in a small school with only 1-2 classes of each grade. Every teacher knew every student. I was a year or more advanced in my reading, but only at the upper end of my class in all the other subjects. The school''s solution was to send me to 2nd grade for reading time in the morning, and then I spent the rest of my time with the 1st graders. As a new kid (we moved to a new state right after I finished kindergarten), this was NOT a good way to make new friends. The 1st graders figured I thought I was too good for them, and the 2nd graders wanted to make sure I knew my place. I had some friends, but I always felt out of place and it haunted me all the way through school. 2nd grade...went to 3rd grade for reading. Then in 3rd grade....4th grade was in a different school and it was too difficult to get me the material. Their solution? They effectively stalled me for a year. I got to pick books I wanted to read, and then for spelling tests I had to choose 5 words I "didn''t know". Since at that age I was figuring out most words from context, I never really felt like I didn''t "know" the words. I would pretend I didn''t know some just to have a spelling list for the week. Then, during the spelling test as the teacher read words out loud to the rest of the class, I had to write each of my 5 words in a sentence, from memory. Needless to say it sucked. All the way through school I had to find my own books to read for English class, because I could read the teacher''s in-house selection in the span of a month.

Anyway, I''m not upset my parents helped me learn to read early - I excelled at school all the way through. However, I do wonder what my experience would have been like had a) I''d been left to learn at the public school''s pace, or b) the school had a better system in place for dealing w/ kids in my position. Oh, the funny part? They tested me for gifted and said I didn''t qualify. Wanna know how they tested? They asked me questions based on the kindergarten ciriculum, not taking into account I came from a different state with different lessons. I didn''t know where the Eiffel tower was, but I could read a grade and half above my level. Go figure.
 

oobiecoo

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Date: 10/16/2008 10:01:35 PM
Author: fisherofmengirly
Yeah, man.


Hooked on Phonics was as far as it went when I was kid and I don''t know a person who used it.


My niece and nephew used it... and they didn''t turn out so well academically.
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mia1181

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Yeah I think it is just memorization. Babies can memorize, if you want them to memorize words on cards you can do it yourself, you don''t need a video. But I can think of million other age-appropriate activities that you could do to better spend the time.

Now signing is different because that isn''t just a neat trick, it actually allows babies to communicate before their vocal skills are developed enough. I am a nanny and we do sign language with my special needs charge. It wasn''t long before her baby sister started doing the signs (I think at about 10 months)even though we never actually focused on teaching her. It was especially helpful when she hit the age were she could talk but it was hard to understand, she would just get frustrated and finally do the sign.
 

snowflakeluvr

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Jul 15, 2006
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dh and i are "old" parents and i have to say that i am much more relaxed this time around(our youngest are 3 and almost 5) and our oldest two are 20 and 18, our middle is 13. our oldest, a girl, could read at 4...our youngest, a girl, who just turned 3, often seems to know as much as her 4 yr old brother! i do think girls have stronger language development sooner-happened in our family anyway and although it''s generalizing, girls and boys are different when it comes to learning, play, etc...
i did "sign" with these two younger ones and it helped us! that wasn''t really mainstream, if at all? when my older two were little ones. i have seen snippets of the infomercial and was intrigued. really, any exposure to stimulation, new things is good for babies but i am really letting my two little ones be little. i have been more lax on weaning, potty training, etc...
who do i have to impress? i had two kids then went directly into menopause
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well, not reallly, but sort of...
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