Your Baby Can Read

[JoshuasMommy]

I just wanted to share our experience with everyone. On April 4th of this year I attended the Baby and Child Expo with my son Joshua who will be 3 in July. While there I met Dr.Titzer who was promoting his learning to read system. I was very impressed with what he told me and the demonstration of the DVD sytem as well as blown away by the testimonials. Needless to say I purchased the system for my son. My only hesitation was the fact that Joshua won't watch TV unless it Sesame Street. I was afraid he wouldn't have interest in the DVD's. Wow! Was I wrong. He fell in love with the starter video and has now moved on to the second in the 5 part series. He is actually reading words. I am so amazed. The system is designed to start teaching children to read as early as 3 months. Please check out the web site www.yourbabycanread.com. My son knows his alphabet inside and out and can count to 30 forward and backwards and is now learning to read words. I am overflowing with pride and excitement for him. Sorry this is so long I just really wanted to share with all of you. Tina

[applejuice]

I used the Glenn Dolman method a generation ago for my children; he is from the Human Potential Movement in PA .

He sold books for reading and math.

I eventually used both methods, but my children did not learn to read until age 6-7.

[Dar]

Teaching a 3 month old baby how to read? Arrrghh! Why bother? What's the hurry? Why not enjoy smelling little baby heads and kissing their fingers and singing songs... why put them on the racetrack to better-faster-younger as freakin' newborns?

All research that I've seen shows that learning to read later has no effect on reading skill as an adult or adolescent. However, studies do show that teaching children to read at younger ages can descrease the pleasure they take in reading, and how much time they chose to spend reading.

If your child is interested in reading at 2 or 3, fine, play with it, talk about it, whatever. But don't push... and parroting numbers forwards and backwards is pretty meaningless... many kids, IMO, get into a counting thing where they spend a few weeks counting higher and higher, for fun, and they enjoy figuring out the linguistic patterns of our number system... that's fun.

Dar

[Faith]

I don't mean this to be rude at all... I just honestly don't get it. Why would you *want* your baby to read? :

I know about this program. I saw a long TV program on it a few years ago. DH and I agreed that is was interesting and looked 'neat,' but neither one of us understood the point of it at all.

We wanted our babies to be babies, our kids to act like kids, yk? We want their learning to be child-directed and aimed at their interests, when they are old enough.

I guess this is just another 'to each their own' thing.

[TiredX2]

Be ready for problems with early readers, lol.

DD was self-taught before she turned four and came up with some questions that would have better been left til later (what are guns and why can't you have them here? what is an adult superstore? etc...)

DS is just starting to really recognize letters (all on his own, we read a horribly small amt which I feel very guilty about--- its so much harder w/2) and he is 2.5. I think that's great.

If learning to read is something your child wants to do--- great! I would be hesitant to let a child that young (3 months) watch TV/videos/DVDs though due to the AAP warnings regarding that.

[sleeping queen]

Do they teach reading by learning phonics?

[JoshuasMommy]

The video's are fun to watch. They are about children, animals and songs. And they are presented by children and meant to be a shared experience between parent and child. The fact that it is teaching them to read at the same time is an added benfit. Frankly I am taken back by the responses to my post. I was feeling excited and proud when I shared our story this morning. My son loves to learn and experience things. Obviously these video's aren't for everyone.

[SagMom]

Originally Posted by JoshuasMommy

Obviously these video's aren't for everyone.

I guess not.

Frankly, your initial post sounded like spam to me--but then I realized that you've posted in other areas of mdc. Really, I thought you were trying to sell this program!
:

But alarm bells went off for me on a number of issues--I don't have a problem with a child watching tv/videos when they're old enough to request them, but I would not park a child in front of the tv in infancy--especially not with the goal of learning to read.

Infants need to be snuggled and held and just loved. What's the point of being able to read if you can't understand what you're reading?

In my own experience, with my kids, reading happened when it was THEIR idea, well after their speaking ability had developed. In fact, it was after they had a large vocabulary and good understanding of abstract concepts. My youngest is not yet reading--he wasn't speaking until after his 2nd birthday and I find it amusing to imagine trying to teach him to read before he was even verbal.

But most of all, I believe that children should direct their own learning--that they learn best when they're interested in the subject matter and when it's something that they want to learn. I'd object to any experience where the parent decides a child is going to learn something. (My oldest was taught to read, before he was ready--it was disasterous.)

That said, I would consider using this program if my 3 month old were to say, "Mommy, I want to learn to read." and if reading alongside me was not satisfying his urge.

[thistle]

I started the Glen Doman program with dd when she was about 19 months, but I actually only did it for like a week and then quit b/c I am lazy. She was enjoying it though. I was really suprised when she found the "Mommy" and "Daddy" cards and could differentiate between the two. This was months later. She just turned 2 and is getting really interested in letters and counting. We read to her all the time and she watches absolutely no tv.

I bought the Doman book used, out of perverse curiosity rather than a real interest in using the methods. I was impressed at how respectful he is toward children though. He insists that you only do it as a fun activity for the child and that if the child doesn't seem to be enjoying it to quit.

He also has quite a little speech about how children shouldn't be confined to playpens.

I don't know anything about this program but I am SURE that parking a 3 mo baby in front of a dvd is a bad idea.

[Maeve]

I completely agree. I *do not* think that parking a child in front of the tv is in any way good for them. Plus, there is a huge difference between word recognition and reading/comprehension. They may be able to recognize the word and point it out, but it's not the same as actually reading and understanding what is read. Kwim?
But then again, I'm really not big on tv watching for kids. I would much rather have them doing something or reading to them myself (though my 6 yr old can read to herself now, I still like to . I believe they can learn so much more from parental interaction than from any video. And I also don't see the point in trying to push them at such a young age to read, etc. Too much pressure.

[MamaMonica]

My dd started reading at four when she sat at her magandoodle and I heard her say" C-A-T " and sound it out and then say "cat!" making the link. I think they can learn without programs at their own pace and if you push them, where's the joy in that?

I think kids need to be kids and what's the rush?

[JoshuasMommy]

I am confused...Where is it written in my original post that I advocate parking my child or yours in front of the television or forcing him to learn? My intent was to a express how good I was feeling about my son and his thirst for learning. Which, I might add is self initiated. And to share a product that I have used and think is great. It's a 20 minute video and he enjoys it and is learning something while being entertained. That simple...

[SagMom]

Originally Posted by JoshuasMommy

I am confused...Where is it written in my original post that I advocate parking my child or yours in front of the television or forcing him to learn?

Since the product you're speaking of is a DVD, using it would require sitting in front of a tv set, no? You also wrote that it is designed for children as young as 3 months. Since a child of that age cannot ASK to use the program, it must be assumed that this is a parent-led experience. Many of us were pointing that out--that it's not at the CHILD's request that they are using this program.

Personally, my mention of "you" was in a general, collective sense--I was not pointing to you, personally.

There are lots of products and methods out there--what you love or think is great, others won't. People raised some questions about this program and made some good points--you can consider them, or not.

[zealsmom]

Personally, I would much rather have my child outside, exploring life, telling stories, acting them out, dressing up, being creative than him being able to read the words on a given page. They will learn to read, folks. I don't doubt that at all. But when the focus moves from hearing and imagining a story to actually decoding or recognizing the words, then the EXPERIENCE changes. My 3 year old is starting to read, spell aan write words and frankly I would have liked to see him spend more time with the experience of storytelling etc than move so quickly into the decoding. That said, we do regularly take the focus off of the actual printed word and stress the creativity and imaginative end of stories and storytelling, unique vocab etc. Because who really cares if you could read words and count when you were three or whenever? I sure don't think that timeline is anything to brag about if it means the kid is losing opportunities to truly be creative, which can be hard to be if you are focusing on symbols (ie letters, numbers)

[peacenlove]

I think it is great that you have found somthing that you enjoy and you think your dc is learning from! I think children need to be exposed to many different forms of stimulation and learning. My son reads, i read. I read to my son. My son also watches video's, plays board games, computer games, lego. plays at the beach at the park and plays by himself. I would not presume to tell any other parent how to teach their child. I think anything you do with good intentions is all your kids need. I find the tone of some of the posters to be - a bit harsh. Just my $.02

peace kathleen

[Aura_Kitten]

Personally, I would much rather have my child outside, exploring life, telling stories, acting them out, dressing up, being creative than him being able to read the words on a given page.

me too.

my son is just beginning to explore reading. as much as i wanted to teach him to read early (i learned to read when i was about 2), i also understood that maybe that wasn't what was really best for him.

the only way to teach a child that young (3 months?!) to read would be to use the whole-word method... which isn't a good way to teach a child how to read. using phonics leads to better readers and better reading *comprehension*, and a better ability to *think* later in life than the whole-word method. i'd be wary of this program... if for no other reason than it seems very counter-productive to sit a child down to watch TV in order to teach them how to READ. kids that young don't need 20 minutes of their active play time taken up by TV -- they don't need TV at all. read to them, and they'll learn to read. why put so much emphasis on how *soon* they're able to?

(anyone ever read the satire, Learn to read with BOOK?)

[TiredX2]

Okay, I'm intrigued. Going to check it out at the library. DD will probably be *ticked* that I am wasting her video time on a "baby show" lol!

[Dar]

Originally Posted by klothos

to use the whole-word method... which isn't a good way to teach a child how to read. using phonics leads to better readers and better reading *comprehension*, and a better ability to *think* later in life than the whole-word method.

My experience has been the opposite, both as a teacher and a mom. Actually, whole-word or look-say hasn't been really used in twenty years, but IME whole language creates better readers, and straight phonics leads to kids who think sounding out *is* reading...

Dar

[moominmamma]

I'm with Dar. Some kids need phonics to get started in reading. Those who naturally gravitate to whole-word reading become, in my experience, extremely proficient fluent readers with excellent comprehension. Two of my three independent readers learned (self-taught) using a whole-word approach. They have higher levels of comprehension than their sibling, who used primarily a phonetic approach. The gap is narrowing somewhat as time goes on, but for the first year or two of fluent reading the kids who saw a word and just knew what it was could then think about what it meant, whereas the kids who had to dissect a word into letters and build up the phonemes into a word had already used up a lot of energy just in the decoding process and had less for comprehension.

Of course if you're using flashcards at age 3 months, you don't really know whether your child will "naturally" gravitate to whole-word reading. This is the beef I have with schools too: if you choose an approach for a child or for a population of children, you'll choose the wrong approach a significant proportion of the time, for a significant proportion of children.

As the mom of one startlingly precocious self-taught early reader, I second the caution others have raised: early reading has its pitfalls. I really wish my eldest had had at least one or two more years of pre-literate existence. There's a precious window of opportunity for the honing of other intellectual skills that closes when a child becomes a fluent reader. There is absolutely no point, IMO, in hurrying that window shut, simply because our society puts such value on reading skills.

Miranda

[lilyka]

I have also heard that teaching children to read, esepcially early, will decrease thier ability to produce and appreciate art. The basic principal was that before we learn to read we see the world as a whole. Samew with art. we look at what is there and draw it or we look at a picture and zero in on different things. Once we start reading though we nconsciencely see the world from top to bottom and left to right which decreases our ability to just look at things. If that makes any sense.

Also there is just so much I wouldn't want my baby oir cmall child reading and so much other things I would rather them be doing than sitting around watching videos or looking at flash cards. I think there are definite benifits to actively delaying reading. granted there are those kids who will read regardless of the amount of instruction we give them or don't. They are fine and natural. but I see no reason to teach a small child and for heavens sake, especially a baby, to read.