, I do believe in early learning and I am still holding on to the flash cards. As a mother, I want the best for my son and when I see someone doubting about what I have been doing, I will take a step back to look at what went wrong with it. I have not read this book and I intend to do so. One of the reasons is to understand if there is any supporting document or statistic to prove that it is wrong using the flash cards. At the same time, I would also like to understand how successful GD method and I am sure we can find some examples as this method has been around for decades. Can anyone share with us if you came across this?

I like the comment from iyph28. Yes, love conquers all fears. Love has make me a better person.

There's aplenty to choose from and this is creating confusion. Not wanting to be "kiasu" but really, sometimes I wonder how not to.
[/quote]

Yup, I agree with you. I think we are in the dilemma on what to do with the kids education. Not wanting to be "kiasu" but at the same time we do not want him to be left behind and missed the window of opportunity.

There is a lot of argument on the early learning. Some people argued that we should not teach the children at all. The following is the video clip from Dr. Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, Professor at Temple University and author of the book "Einstein Never Used Flash Cards: How Our Children Really Learn-- And Why They Need to Play More and Memorize Less".

Part 1 - <a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/iYANf5DlhLU&rel=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/iYANf5DlhLU&rel=1</a>
Part 2 - <a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/u1TEynH9UmU&rel=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/u1TEynH9UmU&rel=1</a>
Part 3 - <a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/kxLGP3kZ1n4&rel=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/kxLGP3kZ1n4&rel=1</a>
Part 4 - <a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/6_FfFdYCIjM&rel=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/6_FfFdYCIjM&rel=1</a>

Shall we? Shall we not?

Cheers,
Angie

Hi KL,

The exchange rate is US$1 = S$1.41 (as per Aug 28). The average Singaporean monthly household income is S$6280 in 2007 with the inflation held at 7.5% y-o-y in June 2008. The household income is the income of both husband and wife as generally both husband and wife are working full time.

20% of the income will be channelled to CPF (for retirement and housing though we don't think it is enough for retirement). If you have 2 kids going for Shichida lesson, this will amount 11.5% of the household income which is quite a substantial amount for an average Singaporean family.

Wow - thanks for the info, Angie! Looks like Singapore is quite possibly the leading city in the world for early education!

 , I guess these early learning centres are meant for what we called "kiasu" parents in Singapore. "Kiasu" means afraid of loosing. There are also a lot of enrichment classes within walking distance. Parents are willing to splurge for their kids.

Hi,

There are a few right brain centers in Singapore.

1. iGenius - http://www.igenius.sg/
2. Little Neuro Tree (formerly known as Trio) - most of the staffs are from Shichida. http://www.littleneurotree.com/
3. Glenn Doman - http://www.gdbaby.com.sg/
4. Right Brain Networkz - http://www.rightbrain-networkz.com/

There are a lot more brain centers for older kids such as MindChamps, Singapore Brain Development Centre, Tony Buzan Learning Centre, LogicMills, Adam Khoo etc...

Go figure.

Cheers,
Angie

Hi,

I am a Singaporean with a 5 year old son. Allow me to make some comments on Shichida class in Singapore. I was about to sign up Shichida class for him but I didn't do so. There are a few things which were holding me back. 1st, the waiting list is too long. I need to waitlist for at least 3 to 6 months and put S$300 deposit for waitlisting, even that can't guarantee that I will get a seat for my son.

2nd, the fee is too high. Annual registration is S$50 (yes, payable after every 12 months) and term fee (12 weeks) is S$780 + parent edu course is S$290 per term. All these exclude materials cost.

3rd, the management is very slow in response and not very helpful. As the business is very good, they didn't take the parents comment seriously. Teacher turnover rate is also very high. Hence, a lot of parents complain about class cancellation without prior notice, grouping kids with different level, inexperience teacher.

Hmm, though their method comes from Prof Shichida, they are very secretive about the method they used. Luckily, they are not the only right brain center in Singapore. We also gather some parents staying nearby and do home practice for our kids. We have a lot of helpful parents who are willing to share resources to benefit our kids.

These might be some negative comments for Shichida in Singapore, others can chime in to share some positive feedback on Shichida method.

Cheers,
Angie

Hi,

I need the to extend my Little Reader license. My son loves it especially for the mother goose. Thanks.

Regards,
Angie

I just uploaded painting and flower, waiting for approval now.

It sounds great that you are trying 3 different languages with your son. I'm not sure about the implications, so we can wait on an answer from Maddy our Brillbaby editor or anyone else who has this experience.

Hi all,

I think it really does not matter how many languages a kid can learn. I grew up in a family which speaks a few languages and dialects. My parents speak both English and Mandarin, but my grand mother can only speak Hainanese (which is totally different from the 2 languages). So, I speak both English and Mandarin when I communicate with my parents and of course, when I turn to my grand mother, the Hainanese will automatically comes out from my mouth. My neighbours are Hokkien and Cantonese and I pick up the dialects from them. Though I am not expert in it but I do understand the dialects. While, let's just said that I don't have any problem with communication when I was travelling to Hong Kong. 

On how to teach a few languages at the same time, agreed with KL on repeating the same words with a few languages. This is what i have been doing with my son.

With best regards,
Angie

Hi, I am Angie. I just joined this forum and I would like to share my experience.

I started using GD and YBCR method when my son was 2 years old. And since then, I have seen amazing results which really inspired me that the babies can actually read at the very young age. I have retired YBCR DVDs after a while as my son found them boring as they keep repeating the same words. I am still using GD method until now though every now and then, I am changing the way of learning. I put in a lot of efforts to spice up the learning to keep him attended. For example, if he is bored of flashing cards, you can put the flash card together to make a sentence. If he is bored of the sentences, try some silly sentence to make his day. Example, when you show the sentence "the elephant is dancing", you can ask your child how does the elephant dance. Does it shake his backside? Let his imagination runs wild and he will laugh when he sees all these silly sentences again. 

I speak both Mandarin and English at home. My son is able to communicate in both the languages. He is also able to read in both languages. I think it is important that at this age, the right brain is the still expanding and we should stimulate the brains. Besides languages, he has piano, swimming and abacus class. Although we are the one that sign up the classes for him, as time goes by, he sees the interest in it. Remember to compliment your kids when they did well, or when they have tried their best.

I know some parents might disagree with me that we should not teach our children to read at such a young age. To me, age does not matter, as long as the learning experience is fun. If they are not willing to learn, don't try to push your kids. Stop and think of other innovative ways to get their attention. Remember, kids have very short attention span. Hence, you need to make the whole learning as fun as you can.

One thing to take note is, if you can randomize the words and pictures just like we do using the flash card. That will help. Ultimately, we want the kids to learn the words and not the sequence. Also, according to GD, the background of the picture flash card should be plain so the object will look more prominent. If the background has other objects, it will distract the kids and they might be looking at the wrong things.

I believe that parents are the best teacher in the world. Let's make learning fun and interesting.

Regards,
Angie

Hi, I am Angie from Singapore. My son is 5 years old and I was using both Glenn Doman and YBCR method when he was 2 years old. The little reader is quite impressive but I found that little reader is a bit too simple for him. Hmm, can you add things like science, art and geography to the list? I started showing him flash card on painting from Michaelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Vincent van Gogh and he simply loves it. I have also showed him things like solar system, planets, flags and maps. Hope this will add to the variety of what the baby should be learning.

Oh, by the way, there is a great website for downloading (for Chinese). Hope to share with everyone. http://www.happyfamilynet.com/baby/