Aha, you’re wondering what the future has in store for your baby? Perfectly reasonable question: you spend all this time preparing the materials, coming up with creative ways to show cards and words, and in the end… what happens?
Glenn Doman dedicates the whole chapter of his book to the letters from happy parents (download Chapter 9, What Parents Say ). Although, not every parent arrives to a happy ending: this program requires consistency, this program requires dedication, it isn’t as simple as slogan “90 seconds a day” appears to be. Therefore the results wary. Some kids (and parents!) turn out to be more receptive to this approach, some switch to phonics and other tried-and-true ways to learn to read. And I believe there is nothing wrong with them either. Moreover, I believe those kids managed to benefit from whatever method, or whatever system being used, for whatever amount of time it was presented to them, as long as it is tought joyously.
You still don’t believe it is possible to teach children to read at such early age? Or you just need plain encouragement? Here you go: some videos of toddlers reading. Isn’t it increadible?!
Baby reading video example 1Baby reading video example 2
Baby reading video example 3
Baby reading video example 4
Below you would find (and I hope – share!) your own take on the method: how is it going? How long do you do it, how often and what results did you get?
With my own son… we have good days and bad days. Some days my son unexpectedly surprises me and my spirit flies up through the roof and on some days, my reserved boy acts absolutely discouragingly. Since there is no testing, I can’t tell for sure how much he actually knows. He was able to identify inidual words that I was hanging for him on the fridge when he was just 10 moths old and he can point to the right words from time to time in the home-made books that I spend so much time creating. Somedays he seems completely oblivious to everything and says “Done!” even before I fish out the cards ouf our card-bag. And somedays he is begging for more… go figure! But we keep going, keep having fun, keep learning and I hope that soon I’ll be able to update this article with much more encouraging results!
And here is an amazing account of Thierry Vivet baby’s progress, that she recently shared:
“I am still amazed my 16 month old can read! He really enjoys reading the words in his little book. He just giggles and giggles after he reads the words. You are welcome to share the news about my 16 month old reading. I am trying to catch him reading on video.
My older son read his first word at 18 months. We were at the Botanical Garden and he enjoyed touching all the signs on the plants. The signs are close to the ground and easy for him to reach. It was so sweet to watch him touch all the words. One day while we were videoing him touching the signs, he read the word Lily. I put the camera down and walked over to him to see what was on the sign. The sign read “Plantain Lily.” We were speechless. We never even saw the sign before he read it. I wonder if he remembered the word Lily from the Leap Frog Phonics DVD. We never presented phonics to him. We just let him watch the DVD. Lily is the name of Leap’s sister on the DVD.
When our older son read his first word, we thought it was totally normal. We had no idea what to expect. Last year I found out about Glenn Doman and IAHP. IAHP has made my life so much easier. I invested a lot of time teaching my older son. We made countless visits to the teachers store to find interesting things for our play time. I knew he enjoyed learning but I just did not have a clue how to teach him. As a result, we did so many things similar to IAHP through trial and error. I attended an IAHP class last year. Now, I understand so much more about child brain development! With my 16 month old, I have great teaching tools and a plan to teach him. With my older son, I was guessing everyday what I should do with him. Life is more enjoyable and peaceful now that we have a great plan with IAHP. My older son really enjoyed flashcards. I purchased several thousand cards for him from Trend. I thought I was just teaching him the verbal words to go with the pictures. I learned from a music teacher that I should give him a large vocabulary by telling him the words of as many things as possible. We used flashcards to learn verbal words. I had no idea he was actually associating the written words with the pictures on the flashcards. Today, my older son is 4 years 3 months. He enjoys reading everything! He enjoys learning new words and spelling. For him, words are a very fun game to play everyday. I cannot tell you how much IAHP has helped me understand and appreciate how little children learn. “
Read more testimonials and feel free to share your own ones in the comments below!
