Thursday, July 29, 2010

Need your thoughts on something!


What are you thoughts on YOUR BABY CAN READ? Before Easton was born I thought about getting the videos for him to watch. Now, he's 4 months old and I feel if I'm going to start showing it to him NOW is the time.

He LOVES to watch TV and I do freak out about this. BIG TIME. When Wil is watching the news I will take Easton in the other room because he just stares at the TV. Both Wil and I were raised without one (We got one when I entered JR. HIGH.) Wil...never. But, I do think the videos are very educational. I have watched one video at a friend's house and I will say it seemed boring---BUT that's what I'm looking for to show Easton! Something that's not flashy and violent, and REAL life.

What are your thoughts? Have you used them? Do you know someone who did?

I'm also a teacher and did my fair share of writing papers on WHOLE LANGUAGE vs. PHONICS. I DO recall saying children should be introduced to both. The school Easton will be attending when he goes into school in 5 years (yep...I'm a total teacher!) focuses on Phonics so I thought that I'd introduce him to whole language at home. Getting that best of both worlds. :)

Please, share your feelings. After doing research online I found this program to be somewhat controversial. Whole language/phonics. Boring. My kid hated it. My kid loved it. My kid didn't read. My kid read the dictionary starting at 2. But, I need REAL moms who I can trust (meaning YOU) to share their thoughts.

So ladies...let's get the chatter started!

3 comments:

Unknown said...

lol It's me!! :) i agree totally with the Idea of whole language and phonics combined! I like the "Your Bayb can Read" series because: 1. They are educational, not just introducing your baby to words, but the concept of left to right, and vocabulary.
2. if you are gonna let your baby watch anything, why not something that he will eventually need to know anyway!
3. it introduces them the the concept that avery word means something! some kids are 5 yrs. old and have never asked "what does that word say"?
bottom line?? Early readers have a huge advantage! My daughters started reading at 3 & 4 yrs and today at 7&9 yrs they are reading middle school books and higher. my 9 yr old just finished a 215 pg book in less than 2 days. and was able to tell me what the book was about! So IMO if your baby is gonna watch anything.... yes, YBCR is the way to go!!!

Leslie H. said...

I don't know anything about the YBCR program, but here I some of my thoughts on teaching reading...

--First, I'd teach baby sign language. It's totally developmentally appropriate and it works really well! I started at 4 months. At 51/2 months my son recognized his first sign. At 6 m. he produced his first sign. At 8-10 months he had an explotion of signs.
(This is a lot like teaching a second language in the sense that children learn that words are symbols that convey emotions, objects, actions etc..) My son is 20 months and he insistes that each picture in his book should have a name...if he doesn't know it he'll ask me:-))
--Focus on vocabulary. this is one of the building blocks for reading, that's very difficult to teach at school. Lack of exposure to vocabulary is almost impossible to overcome (not that your child will have this problem!!)
--Focus on ryhming (nursery ryhms, poems etc). Another building block to reading is understanding that cat, hat, mat all ryhme(sp?).
Beyond that...do whatever you want. It can't hurt right?
Also...your son is probably just attracted to the light/sound of the TV and not the content. My son is just now starting to get something out of watching TV, although he enjoyed Praise Baby type videos are 12 months.

Jamie Willow said...

personally I think babies/toddlers are learning SO much every single minute already that I am not even going down the road of teaching mine to read until more like preschool age.

and for tv we do things like curious george and sesame street and classical baby...they introduce lots of concepts and in a fashion that shows the concepts in families and in situations kids/babies experience every day. which I like. and the more music something has the better...