Age to start?

[saige]

Hi I'm new to this.My daughter will be 3 on Jan.20th.She knew her alphabet,colors,shapes,numbers,ect.by 20 months I talked to her all day long and she picks up everything.I bought some workbooks because she loves stuff like that so now we take an hour when baby sleeps(If!!) and we do like alphabet stuff,learning to identify letters then we do a craft and she loves it.Do you think I'm doing this stuff too young? I want her to have fun being little and I don't want to rush her along.Also are there any good websites that have tools to help? Thanks,Mandy

[Linda in Arizona]

I think that if she is having fun, it is fine. Kids are ready for different things at different ages, and different kids enjoy different types of activities. I've done a ton of research and can't find any evidence that early academics help a child at all. There is evidence that pushing a child can be damaging, but if you aren't pushing but rather just enjoying time together, it is OK.

One things that is important to me is that my kids learn to hold the pencil correctly rather than getting into bad habits that will have to be fixed later, so my 3 year old doesn't do the kind of tracing letters and numbers that shows up so often in early workbooks because she can't hold a pencil correctly.

A book we love at our house is "Sandbox Scientist: Real Science Activities for Young Children" by Ross. It has directions for science kits that you put together and then your child play with as they see fit. Many of the ideas are very simple and easy to put together, and my kids LOVE everything we've done from this book.

There are tons of arts and crafts ideas on the WEB. Our fav is

http://www.theideabox.com/


Here is a nice article on homeschooling for preschool.

http://eho.org/features/preschoo.htm

[Silly Willies]

If she is enjoying herself then go for it.

I think this is what they would call pre-school. LOL

Holding the pencil is an issue. My 7 yr old does not hold it right and boy does his handwriting hurt. HE went to ps and they did not care.

We also found that ball and stick is hard for him.

On this page you will see zaner-bloser and then D'nealian. For our son D'nealian is easier because it is closer to cursive and you pick up your pencil less. Also it is suppose to help make distenguishing b and d's easier. http://www.learningpage.com/free_pag...pha_zaner.html