You should expect to be amazed!   

We started a little bit later, but still well under one year of age.  She was reading words just after her first birthday & by age 3.5 years, she was reading simple, commercial print stories.  She was recently evaluated at a 4th grade reading level.

We started with home made flashcards & switched to mainly Little Reader flashcards by about 15 months of age. We mainly stuck with fast flashing printed, laminated flashcards until fairly recently because dd seemed to learn best that way, but have finally switched to using it as a computer program.

Check out my blog in my siggy for more information & videos of my daughter if you are interested.

Welcome Lexy!

We are using the above mentioned math program, & have also had wonderful success with Little Reader. Check out my blog if yiu want to read more about our experiences  the link is in my siggy. I have an important posts page that would be good to read as well as a link to all my BrillKids posts in the right hand sidebar of the blog.

Please feel free to post an introduction thread to tell us all about your little son or ask any questions you may have

I don't think there is that much in the actual workbook. There is a cd which includes additional writing practice, but you can choose to do as many or as few as you like.  If you want to see an example of what a few of the pages are like, pm me your email & I'll send you a few pics.

Yes, I am using it, & I really like it.  I also have Numicon Math, which is one of the most commonly recommended programs for kids with DS, but I like ELFM better.  It is so well laid out & easy to follow for me.  I also like the way it really builds as you go along.  My dd's neurodevelopmentalist explained how it works even once you get into division & subtraction & it just made so much sense to me.  We're about 1/2 way through the first book, & my dd has gone from not liking math, to asking to do it if we have skipped a few days. My dd is 4, but could easily have started this last year (actually, I was supposed to, but her preschool purchased Numicon for us so I tried it first, but never got to far with it as it was harder to figure out what to do).

We have been homeschooling our 4 year old with DS, & will likely continue to do so for another year before putting her in kindergartenat our tiny local school where she will be in a multi graded classroom with about 12 or 14 other kids. Our plan is to continue with that school, however if there is ever an occasion where we feel it is not appropriate, we will go back to homeschooling.

I agrree about kids progressing so well with all the one on one at home.  Our hope is that with the intensive neurodevelopmental program we have been doing at home, she will do well at school.

Part of me thinks that continuing to homeschool would be best, however, my older kids go  to school & K has had a taste of it at preschool & loves it, so for now this is the plan, but it is always flexible.

Here is a blogpost that I did with more details about the special needs sponsorship

http://downsyndromeupupupandaway.blogspot.com/2011/03/exciting-announcement-from-brillkids.html

HTH

I think you mean "red shirting"?

We are most likely going to hold our 4 year old with DS back next year.  It is a very difficult decision, because academically, she is much more advanced than most typical kids her age, however, she doesn't speak quite as well & is not quite as mature in some areas. My biggest concern is that she will be bored, however I think it is more important that she is has the extra year to catch up in the areas that she works harder at.

We also held one of her big sisters back.  KJ, one of my typical dd's just turned 9 in mid December. We held her back mostly because she was born so late in the year.  If she had been born less than a week past her due date, she would not have been eligilbe to go anyways because we have a Dec 31 cut off here.  This is a child who did not have the benefit of early learning, yet she still often has straight A report cards & glowing reports that she is a true leader amongst her class - exactly what I wanted when holding her back. Edited to add that it is not just the scholastic stuff. KJ is confident, yet so caring that she is the first to help another child who is struggling & is very attentive & very respectful & kind to all.

This is what I am hoping for with my dd with DS also.  I want her to be more of a leader than a follower & I'm hoping the extra year of learning at home with mom & learning to talk more clearly will help her to achieve this.  

I also feel that a benefit to holding back is that I have many extra hours per day to focus on 1 to 1 learning with her.  I fully expect K to head to kindergarten fully able to participate independantly & already knowing the curriculum & well beyond.  I want her to be able to prove to the teachers that she is just as smart (or smarter   ) than the other kids in her class & that they need to teach her just her just like the other kids.

My blog is at downsyndromeupupupandaway.blogspot.com

I'm not really sure where it wound go in your categories - maybe homeschooling?

At age 8, does be have to show his reading knowledge because he is school aged? If so I would still require as little feedback as possible. keep sessions very short, but frequent & fun.

Yes, they are related. Bob's father was Robert Doman Sr. He & Glenn were brothers. Robert started NACD quite a few years ago. It is not common knowledge as to why they chose to operate seperately.

Glen Doman - from iahp.org He is the original creator of  (ND) programs.  We are doing our ND program through ICAN.

My dd was also nonverbal when we started at around 6 months of age - it is better just to provide lots of input & not worry about testing. Yiu want reading to be an enjoyable experience so the less you test the better. if you must test, be sneaky. Use words like wave, sit, walk & other actions & see if he responds. Body parts work well for this too. 



How old is your son?

Yes, you should show it more than once, but not necessarily more than you would with a typical child.  I do think it depends a bit on the child.  If you were doing a true Doman style reading schedule, you would add some new words as well as removing some old words each day.  I am not the most organized person & for me, that was just one more little thing to add to the already full day, so I chose not to do it that way.  When K was very little & just learning words, I used to show the same words for a week - I can hardly remember now, but I think it was about 20 when she was young, up to about 60 or so at a time by age 3.  At the end of the week, I would retire the whole bunch of words & start a whole new set. After the first thousand or so words, I noticed that K was getting bored much more quickly & often learned words after seeing the once or twice. We now do a new set every 3 or 4 days.  I am certain that she knows the words much more quickly than that, but with all that we do in a day with her neurodevelopmental program, twice a week is as often as I am able to change  her Little Reader playlist.  It really doesn't take long, but now that she is needing much more of a challenge, I have to customize most of the files which is the time consuming part.

Hope this helps, but feel free to ask away if you have any more questions

My reply is probably going to be very different than many of the parents here.  When I first started teaching my daughter, my goal was for her to be able to read at a beginning level by grade one.  She has far exceeded my expectations & taught me so much more than I have ever taught her.

When K was born with Down syndrome 4.5 years ago, several well meaning doctors & nurses told me that she would probably be very happy & love music.  Their expectations were very low.  It wasn't until I got home & started researching on the internet that I learned about a very small minority of parents who were teaching their kids with DS to read.  I honestly found it difficult to believe & more than once I have admitted   that if, 5 years ago, you had told me that your child with DS was reading at almost a 4th grade level at 4.5 years, I would have politely said " Oh, that's wonderful." & probably walked away snickering. As I said, my daughter has taught me a lot!

I was intrigued enough though, that by the time K was 8 months old, I had built her a crawling track & to the doctor's surprise & disbelief (he had to see it before he would believe it), she was crawling! I was so excited by that success, that at abbout the same time, I started showing K the large, red, Doman style flashcards. Of course, ever the skeptic, I really had my doubts, so I was a "closet flash card Mom" for the longest time, but sure enough, just a few months after K's first birthday, she began showing me that she was learning some of the words!  She knew many sight words & had self taught herself all of the letters & sounds of the alphabet by age 2. She read her first commercial print book that we had not practiced at age 3.5.

Back to my goals - I had originally hoped K would read by grade 1.  I had 2 reasons for this:

1. I wanted the teachers to see a little girl who had potential to learn just like the other students in her class & I wanted them to have very high expectations because the higher the expectations, the more success a child will have.

2.  I wanted K to be able to pick up her books & read the directions, so that if she didn't understand or hear the teacher properly, then at least she could read & try to figure it out for herself.  She is already doing this by the way - she reads her math workbook instructions all the time.

Now, at age 4.5, my concerns have changed.  We have always planned to hold K back in school (as we did her older sister who was born in December), to allow her to have one more year of maturing as well as physical growth because she is quite tiny.  Rather than worrying about her keeping up, at least in the early years of school, I am worried about her being bored - it is a funny dilemma & one that I look forward to working on.  

My reasons for teaching her are still the same though.  I want her teachers to see that she has just as much potential as any other student & therefore, they need to have very high expectations. Also, although K speaks well for her age, she is not speaking as well as most typical kids her age. When the other kids in kindergarten are learning that the letter A say aaa, & she is already reading novels, I anticipate that she can work on catching up on speech.

I hope it's a long elevator ride, because I wrote a bit of a novel!

I thought it was recommended to do it twice a day, but don't quote me because I haven't looked up that sort of info since we started over 3 years ago.  I think I remember reading something about twice a day being an easier goal for working parents because they can do it before work, then again after arriving home in the evening.

We do Little Reader at least 2 times a day & often 3 or 4.  We do it before or after breakfast or lunch &, if K insists, around dinner time. She is 4.5 now, so she has learned to use the program independently, so she will sometimes put it on herself.  Originally when we were trying to get into a routine of doing a Doman program, I found that it was easiest for me to do certain activities (Math, physical, memory etc) at the same time as a regular routine activity like diaper changes & meal times. Now it is just habit to do it at that time of day.

I really recommend doing it at least twice a day. It is better to do shorter sessions more often than to do only 1 longer session.  If your child loves it & asks for it often, there is no harm in doing 3 or 4 sessions in a day.

Hope this helps 

Welcome!  My 4 year old daughter also has DS & the Little Reader program has been a huge part of her success. She is now reading above a 3rd grade level!

I don't know a lot about apraxia, so I'm not sure if our experience will help you, but I will share my observations just in case. When my daughter reads, her speech is more clear than when she is just talking. I also noticed when she was younger, that words she learned by reading, we're spoken more clearly than those she learned by us speaking  to her.  Kids with DS are very often visual learners, so it makes sense that reading wound be a visual way to learn to speak.

Congrats!