Awesome!    Congratulations to both of you!   

Hi everyone,

Do you have any recommendations for board games that can emphasize phonics and math? There are so many out there that it is hard for me to decide which one is really interesting.

I am noticing that since I am currently relying on a few educational DVD's, my son seems to like the TV more than books these days and I want to change that. I do spend a lot of time planning out games etc, but now he keeps requesting to see the 'letter factory' , 'super why' etc....probably this is just a passing phase but I want to cut off TV from our curriculum for some time and see if board games interest him. He loves going outdoors, so thats my trump card now...when he says 'leapfrog again'...i say ' lets go for a walk' and that way i can distract him, but I can't always go out.

I didn't expose him to TV much till he was 2 but now we watch a lot of educational DVD's (from which he is learning...), but I think I am responsible for him taking a lot of interest in watching TV and am re-thinking my teaching strategy. I am not making a big deal out of it in front of him. I put in on when he wants it and put it off when I want to, so that way I can regulate the time but it is going beyond 2 hours a day!.... I think I need to do something soon...or am I just over reacting?    He doesn't want to see it by himself, I have to sit with him.......

I have collected some good books to read with him but he doesn't want to read or sit and do any worksheets with me. The good thing is that when I don't do flashcards with him for a day, he misses it and asks me for it

Any advice will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance,

Shaman

Thanks Akalori and TracyR4. I had seen the starfall website earlier when someone had recommended it but never went through it completely. I think it will definitely help us. I just have to find a way to be able to win the 'mouse control' thing with my son

I

Hi everyone,

my son has learnt his letter sounds but blending sounds is just not 'clicking'. I am probably not doing a very good job at that    I went through the previous posts and it seems like Hooked on phonics and My montessori house help. Should I buy both? Which of the Montessori house DVD'S are most helpful?

Thanks in advance,
Shaman

Amazing!

She is a gifted child, God bless her 

I showed the video to my son and he made me replay it- he wanted her to play 'twinkle twinkle' 

I have'nt done YBCR with my son. He has learnt all the letter sounds and I have started using the fleschcards with him but I think I need more help teaching him how to put the sounds together. Would the YCCR help?

Somehow I don't think I am doing a good job at this    I tried the word factory DVD but that seems to be fast paced.

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance.

PP118,

I went through the same thing for many months. I spoke to my son's daycare teacher about using flash cards and she did. I let her do it the way she wanted to but told her that she should limit each session to 2 minutes and try to do it atleast 2-3 times if possible. To her credit, she did do some flash cards with him- something is better than nothing I stressed the 2 minute session thing with her. During that time, she showed it to him, he played with it, tore it  but atleast he got used to seeing words and later did identify them!

I also wrote large words and labelled things around the house. I would just ask my husband to carry him around the house and stop for 10 seconds where he saw the word and show it to my son. My husband did'nt know how to use the LR- I think I scared him by telling him all the rules    My son would point at things when I asked him about the labelled items- that helped his vocabulary atleast.

I recently made a song from 1-20 forwards and backwards, sang it to the tune of the phonics song (on youtube- sing read spell and write) and recorded it on the iphone. I play that on and off or my son- he looks amused  and pays attention. Maybe you can record a few things in your voice and ask your nanny to play it for him.

Even if you do the LR once a day, he'll pick up things...just be consistent.

Hope that helps.

Shaman

Dad dude,

sorry for the delayed response. The survey is very well written.

Few thoughts:
 
Section I:

1. Child's date of birth (Month/Year)- may help when trying to understand the results ( by chance vs not by chance) since the age intervals are wide.

2. 'day-to-day care'- maybe you can ask how much of the time is the child away from the person that primarily teaches the child eg stays 30 hours a week in daycare/ at home with nanny OR alternately how much time does the teacher spend with the child. I don't know if I have explained myself well. This may be interesting to know since there are many working moms who are trying to make the best of the few hours they have with the child. We may know if something like LR which is easier to do may be worth the time when compared with home made flash cards which take a considerable amount to time to make and some moms are not able to do it.

3. Prior teaching experience? I often think about how this must be easier for someone who has already taught children than someone like me who is still learning how to teach   

Section II

Siblings? Children with siblings seem to learn faster than others because they watch their older brother or sister doing it and want to imitate them.

Age at which one started teaching the child (5 months etc)?

3. a.  'By what age could the child point etc'- my son could point letters, knew his colors and could point at random dots to 10 when he was 7 months old. I know many other kids on this forum were doing this before they were one. Maybe a category like 'less than 12 months' would cover this group.

Section III

I don't know if this can be included here but there was a break of almost 9 months when I could not teach my son and then started where we left off. Similary, we are taking a break from LR since my son is more interested in flashcards and manipulatives at this time. I know that sometimes, we have to take a break from some technique and then restart it when our LO's show interest in them again . Same thing happens when someone is having another baby/ moves/ becomes ill.  I don't know if this can be considered somewhere like 'had to take a break from educational activities due to maternity reasons/ moving/ no interest/other reasons' or if it doesn't pertain to the survey.

I would think any kind of break postpones the child's 'alphabet learning' etc and is not related to the child's intelligence.

Subsection C:

'Pre-chool prep series'- meet the numbers etc...

Subsection D:

2. There was an article that mentioned that if a language is spoken for atleast 30% of the total time one speaks to a child, he or she picks it up soon. If you find such studies, the percentage of time may be more specific than 'some of the time, only a little' etc

We speak 4 languages at home (including English) and I am teaching my son Sanskrit mantras/texts recitation- but I am not teaching him how to speak in Sanskrit or read it. So technically, I would be teaching him 2 other languages  and or answer to 2 would be " speak in language 1: most of the time" and "speak in language 2: none of the time"- there is no 'none' option for the question.

Phew!  All done! 

Thanks. We started doing the Fry sight words- Doman method is working for some of them and Heidisongs seems to be doing the trick too

I just found these websites while searching for ideas to teach sight words and thought I'd share them with you. Don't know if these were mentioned earlier:

http://www.mrsperkins.com/dolch.htm

http://www.msrossbec.com/sightwords.shtml

http://www.janbrett.com/games/jan_brett_dolch_word_list_main.htm   (I'll probably print this one for myself, since the illustrations are so good

Also check out the 'Katherine Finchy Kindergarten'  videos on YOU TUBE- I liked the 'high frequency words' and the 'counting' video.

Take care, Shaman

Thanks DadDude. I will keep doing the cards with him and try your technique (sounding out each word and blending it)- will let you know how it goes.

The survey you are working on sounds very interesting....I know its early but I had to write something....please try to keep it both subjective and objective, otherwise the companies making these educational products will use it for their benefit and parents who do not understand that these things work best when there is parental involvement will just put on the DVD's and expect magic. I am saying this from a recent experience with a friend who asked me about what I was using with my child ... and after she bought it, expected her child to learn everything by himself and later told me....'that thing you told me....doesn't work'....some people donot realize that a highly expensive activity/toy cannot do what an involved parent can do with simple home made things.

I believe these activities work best because of dedicated parents. Other things are very difficult to judge (age to start at, health status, siblings etc...) we are still learning about that. Its like a study we were doing on 'what things cause a particular cancer'...the air we breathe, the food or family to blame?....'oops did you make a note of the fact that I love peas and ate it every evening'    It is difficult to pinpoint...but atleast we get a general idea...it is a very difficult job for the investigator...good luck to you!

Also, if you need one more question     , please add 'prenatal stimulation'....I believe that did wonders for both my son and me.

Take care,
Shaman

Dad dude, thank you for making the Fleschcards. Karma to you!

I need some advice please:

I just made the first batch of Fleschcards for my son- and he loved them- loved holding them and looking at them that is I read the words as instructed and then showed him the pictures. After showing them to him 2 times, he started showing me the picture and telling me what word it is- just like the EK cards.

I broke a rule by starting these cards with him when he knows about 2/3 or 3/4 of his letter sounds. I think we are supposed to start these when he knows all the sounds. But I was impatient and just wanted to see what happens when we do these cards, since he knew the sounds of the letters in most of the words. I wanted to show him where we use the sounds we learnt.

Should I continue doing these cards with him or is it too early?

Making cards without the pictures will be a big risk since he loves books and cards with pictures.

Any ideas?

Thanks, Shaman

We started doing the Jones Geniuses math curriculum and my son has taken well to it. I think he gets the concept of numbers now. Yesterday, he told me ' zero has no dots'. The 'dots on the numbers idea' is really making it easier for him- he has started counting his toys etc. He also understands forward and backward counting but we still have to work on that. He knows counting to 20 and his shapes etc. We (brillkids members) get a discount on the JG kit and that helps a lot. Read some of the JG reviews on the forum, that may help you decide. There are a lot of other good ideas for math on the forum too.

Hi Kyles Mom,

I am no expert at parenting, I just have a few suggestions: try to find a way for him to channel his energy- some sport? swimming etc- sports help children in many ways than we can imagine- ' a sound mind in a sound body'

Its easy for me to say- but try not to let him know that you are worried about this- children are very sensitive and pick up on their moms emotions easily.

Best of luck- I am sure you will find a way to handle this. One of my friends told me 'God always helps moms'

Take care.

We had the same experience. My son went to a day care for about 6 months- they had their study plans chalked out, so we thought we'd send him there for a few hours for socializing and he would learn whatever they taught the other kids.

He loves to talk and interact with other people. However, at the daycare, he didn't speak to the teachers- they told me they hadn't heard him speak much at all, which was very unlike him. As soon as he came home, he would tell me what happened at daycare, the songs they sang and all the art work they did, so I assumed he was an observer and that is how he learnt. He did everything his teacher asked him to do and sat with the other students during story time etc etc.

I discussed this with his pediatrician, who told me that my son is probably getting bored since he already knows a lot of things they are teaching the other kids- she told me that he is not getting enough stimulation . I had told her only once that we were advocates of early education, did prenatal stimulation etc.....the rest of the things were all her deduction after observing my son on various occasions. She asked us to send him to a Montessori - thats where he will start going this week- 3 days a week.

Our children obviously get more attention and mental stimulation at home from all of us....I guess I should have know better than to choose a regular daycare and expect him to 'not expect more excitement' and just go there to socialize for those hours.

Lesson learnt. We will be paying closer attention to how much new material he gets to experiment with and new things he gets to learn at school- will have to make up for it at home. I am planning not to repeat the Montessori activities at home. That is why I chose to do JG at home (for reading and math) and let him be exposed to Montessori math and reading at school. We'll see if this helps.

I am sure he will enjoy Montessori.