"teaching your baby to read"

"Shena Delian O'Brien" wrote in message
news:jlYIb.187454$8y1.591655@attbi_s52...
Sue wrote:

Oh you would be surprised at what lengths people go to, to have a
smarter,
brighter child. It's all the rage now. Having an average child is not
enough
anymore.

It's nothing about smarter or brighter. Children are already smart and
bright. It's about giving them opportunities to communicate and
understand the adult world sooner, because it is the frustration of
every child to be hopelessly bored and misunderstood because of lack of
communication skills. I'd rather have my child occupied with and riveted
to their latest book than screaming in their playpen, bored to tears,
because I have to do the dishes.

But a child young enough to be stuck in a playpen isn't going to have the
physical control to read a book, even if he *could* read the words. And
"sight reading" is a wretched teaching method, if what I'm hearing you say
is right - the flash cards, with words to recognise? I've seen kids like
that, kids taught to recognise words by sight. When offered a word they'd
never seen, they *could* not figure it out. If it wasn't a memorized word,
they were doomed (except to memorize a new one) because they could they not
sound it out, and it was inaccessible to them.

I'd love it if my kids could read (they're 6, 4 and 4). One is close, one
will do all right, and the other one can't sit still to listen to a book to
save her own life. But, until they can read, *I* can read them fascinating
books with good vocabulary, like the Little House books, and so on. It's got
to be at least as good for them, none of this dumbed-down 'grade level' junk
with simple words and no challenge.

--angela

On 01 Jan 2004 01:55:05 GMT, (H Schinske) wrote:

If you look on Google Groups for "doman baby" (in quotation marks) and
"donna"
you will find some reasons you might not want to give the Domans any money
--
they're quacks who have done a lot of harm over the years.

and Daye ) wrote:

I did a search, but I couldn't find anything specific. Could you
please share some URLs??

Are you looking on Google GROUPS, http://groups.google.com , not just
google.com?

--Helen

Well now your going the opposite of what I mean. I'm not suggesting that you
ignore your child and never teach them anything. But what I am suggesting
that children learn at their own rate and pace and for parents to respect
that. Not forcing a child into learning something they are not ready for
will depress their love of learning.
--
Sue (mom to three girls)
I'm Just a Raggedy Ann in a Barbie Doll World...

Shena Delian O'Brien wrote in message
news:jlYIb.187454$8y1.591655@attbi_s52...
Sue wrote:

Oh you would be surprised at what lengths people go to, to have a
smarter,
brighter child. It's all the rage now. Having an average child is not
enough
anymore.

It's nothing about smarter or brighter. Children are already smart and
bright. It's about giving them opportunities to communicate and
understand the adult world sooner, because it is the frustration of
every child to be hopelessly bored and misunderstood because of lack of
communication skills. I'd rather have my child occupied with and riveted
to their latest book than screaming in their playpen, bored to tears,
because I have to do the dishes.

I also remember being very young (4-5) and throwing fits because people
wouldn't read more than 1-2 books to me at a time and I wanted to devour
them all. My family thinks the old story of me threatening to beat up my
big sister if she didn't read me another book is hilarious, and tells
how I huffed myself up to her reply of "No" with, "Then I'll just learn
how to read myself!" Unfortunately that didn't happen until I got to
school at age 6. I find it hopelessly tragic and am upset that they
didn't attempt to teach me anything besides my own name and what a stop
sign was.

Just reading everyday to your child will be enough. Don't worry about
trying
to teach it to read.

It's not enough for my child. Children have very bad eyesight (are
nearsighted) until their eyes fully develop around age 2-3. They can't
focus on the small text in most books and will only be able to see the
pictures. While it will teach them that books are fun things, I believe
in giving them more tools than this. If I sit down and transcribe books
so the text is bigger, so they can actually focus on them, and THEN read
the books with my child, THAT would be a much more rewarding experience
because then they could focus on the words and know that they stood for
something.

Sue wrote:

that children learn at their own rate and pace and for parents to respect
that. Not forcing a child into learning something they are not ready for
will depress their love of learning.

I agree. Keep it fun for the child. If the child is having fun, they are
learning, and learning will remain fun. It is the #1 rule with these
early learning programs - go at a pace your child finds fun, stop before
your child is bored, and don't continue if they get bored during.

Chotii wrote:
But a child young enough to be stuck in a playpen isn't going to have the
physical control to read a book, even if he *could* read the words. And
"sight reading" is a wretched teaching method, if what I'm hearing you say
is right - the flash cards, with words to recognise? I've seen kids like
that, kids taught to recognise words by sight. When offered a word they'd
never seen, they *could* not figure it out. If it wasn't a memorized word,
they were doomed (except to memorize a new one) because they could they not
sound it out, and it was inaccessible to them.

I disagree about sight reading. It can give a child an enormous amount
of power to read -- especially the Dr Seuss books -- with just a few
memorized words. Phonics has its time and place as well. The two
complement each other perfectly. Sight reading gives you works like
'some', which Julian still forgets a lot and it is hard to sound out
for a beginning reader.

Now that he is learning some phonics (mostly the idea of the first
letter sound in words, not complicated rules yet) he can figure out
lots of words when reading with me to help him. The idea of phonics is
to sound out and understand a word so you can memorize it and not
sound it out again!! I wish he would get over 'some' plus a few other
hard to sound out words, and just memorize them so we don't have to
take so much time on each when we get to them.

An equal extreme like your example is the all phonics kids who sound
every single word out and by the time they get to the end of the
sentence, have no idea of the meaning of the sentence they started
some time ago.


Carolyn



--
Carolyn Fairman (to email me, terra is earth...)
Mom to Julian, born Sept. 28, 1998
ds #2 due mid Feb 2004!

Carolyn ) wrote:

The idea of phonics is
to sound out and understand a word so you can memorize it and not
sound it out again!! I wish he would get over 'some' plus a few other
hard to sound out words, and just memorize them so we don't have to
take so much time on each when we get to them.

Oh, I remember that phase. Peter was actually sounding out words like "it" for
what seemed like just ages. I don't think it was really very long at all though
(possibly a month or two), and a year later his sight words now include things
like "synergy."

I am not kidding. This is what buying up the natural cereals aisle at Trader
Joe's will do for you. There is a cereal called Eight Grain Synergy. My husband
and I were inventing variations on it this morning, Eight Grain Coalition,
Eight Grain Committee, etc.

--Helen

"Carolyn Fairman" wrote in message
...
Chotii wrote:
But a child young enough to be stuck in a playpen isn't going to have
the
physical control to read a book, even if he *could* read the words. And
"sight reading" is a wretched teaching method, if what I'm hearing you
say
is right - the flash cards, with words to recognise? I've seen kids like
that, kids taught to recognise words by sight. When offered a word
they'd
never seen, they *could* not figure it out. If it wasn't a memorized
word,
they were doomed (except to memorize a new one) because they could they
not
sound it out, and it was inaccessible to them.

I disagree about sight reading. It can give a child an enormous amount
of power to read -- especially the Dr Seuss books -- with just a few
memorized words. Phonics has its time and place as well. The two
complement each other perfectly. Sight reading gives you works like
'some', which Julian still forgets a lot and it is hard to sound out
for a beginning reader.

Ahhhh, yes, I see what you mean. And I can see where either extreme is bad.
Even most phonics systems I've seen, however, include words that simply must
be memorised to move ahead, like 'to', 'do', 'the' and so on. They're not
pronounced anything like they're written, and you run across them all the
time.

--angela

Shena Delian O'Brien wrote in message

.. I'd rather have my child occupied with and riveted
to their latest book than screaming in their playpen, bored to tears,
because I have to do the dishes.

I'm going to have to respond further to this because raising super kids is
one of my pet peeves.

Ah, but they are still learning while they are in the playpen. Do you not
plan to do anything around the house, except give input to your child?
Constant entertainment and stimulation from you is not in the best interest
of your child. Your child will need to learn to amuse himself on his own.
How else is h/she going to figure out what interests h/her if he doesn't get
a chance to be a child and explore things on his own.

Don't forget the value of having a child be able to entertain himself. There
is also self exploration that is important for a child. Also, the child is
learning gratification delay when you need to do something and the child
needs to wait for a bit (I'm not talking newborns and little babies). And
never underestimate the power of a child watching a ceiling fan go around.
These are all things that babies learn. Babies are learning when they put a
toy in their mouth. My point is, you don't have to constantly give your
child input for them to be a smart individual. Perhaps your little one won't
be able to stand sitting there long enough for you to flash flashcards in
front of them. And with reading so early, most kids don't have the ability
to understand what they are reading. And if they can read farther ahead of
their age group, there are a lot of books that just because a child *can*
read them, they are not appropriate for them to be reading. So I guess I
don't see the advantage of a child reading really early. I also don't see
the advantage of raising a super child. Perhaps I am going off further than
you were thinking. I just happen to see the result of such parents trying to
raise super kids. With one girl in particular (my oldest daughter's age, 11)
it is really sad to talk to her. She never gets to just play and be a kid.
Her mom makes her study so much so that she could get into the talented and
gifted program. She makes her take piano and ballet. The child cannot even
make it at a slumber party because she doesn't have the social interaction
that it takes to be with other kids. It's really sad. I would encourage a
child to be the best they can, but I will never push them to the point that
they miss out on being a kid. And to me, that is more important than being
able to recite Einstein's theory.
--
Sue (mom to three girls)
I'm Just a Raggedy Ann in a Barbie Doll World...

How else is h/she going to figure out what interests h/her if he doesn't get
a chance to be a child and explore things on his own.

I could not agree more. EXACTLY.

I will never push them to the point that they miss out
on being a kid. And to me, that is more important than being
able to recite Einstein's theory.

Also, when you place such gigantic importance on academic achievement
and your child comes in contact with people "smarter" than he/she is,
they may feel like a failure. It is inevitable. OR, even worse.....in
my own family, for instance, one of my cousins is 6. He was unable to
get into the private school his mom teaches at. She was devastated,
even though they live in a great public school district. He MUST feel
her disappointment! YUCK!

doesn't have to be by Doman methods particularly. You can do immense
harm
trying to force a child into something s/he is not ready for, but that
is
another matter and I am sure you would not do that.

I seriously doubt that showing a kid flashcards is going to irreparably
harm them. If they aren't interested they won't pay attention. There's
no forcing involved. Did you think I would strap them down and hold
their eyes open or something?


Omigod... I would *so* not do any method with a baby that involved
flashcards. Babyhood is for being a baby!

If you're looking for ways of helping your child maximize his or her
potential, try having good nutrition during pregnancy, breastfeeding,
reading to your child, holding your baby lots, and responding when your baby
cries.

Why not teach babies to do things "very young" so they can be geniuses?

Because it is a waste of their developmental time!

For example, you could probably teach a 2 year old to tell time. It might
take many hours, weeks, months of your child's time, but you could teach the
kid to do it. OTOH, if you wait until that same kid is, say, 5 or 6 (or even
4), the same lesson may only take an hour or two.

So you can spend hours showing your baby flashcards to teach them what they
would pick up, quite naturally and without your even noticing, maybe, a few
years later if you spent the same "baby" time reading them stories or making
silly noises with them.

Babies have *so* many things to learn about their environments. They learn
it best by moving along with an adult through the adult's day, IMO,
occasionally getting down to play in the dirt, but mostly just being carried
along as an adult does what adults do all day. They have to learn about
being safe, being loved, being human. They have to learn that stoves are hot
and water is wet and ice is cold and nothing in the world tastes better than
Mama's milk when you're tired and hungry. They are in the process of
learning how to speak, not just words, but cadences of language that go much
farther than any flashcard can. Have you ever heard a baby babble an entire
"sentence"? The best way to teach babies language is to talk to them and the
best way to teach reading is to read to them.

Flashcards for babies, are, IMO, a complete waste of time in every sense of
the word.

Whether they work or not is irrelevant. That's not the point. The point is
that you don't need to waste your baby's precious short "babyhood" time
teaching them things they'll just "get" or learn quickly a few years down
the road. It matters not one whit whether you child is a bookworm at age 3
or age 5. It matters that by the time your child is an adult, he or she can
read, and enjoy reading.

Jenrose