Hi everyone!

I'm after some advice on how to teach my 31month old maths.

I've never really done right brain maths with her. She somehow figured out what fingers represent 1-5, she can count to 20, and with help with the 30s,40etc, can count beyond. Also she can count objects to I'll say 5 confidently and then we play simple addition and subtraction games eg, give me 2 of your 5 bricks- how many do you have left?

All those I think are left brain exercises. But I've just startedthinking of right brain maths and mu questions are;

1. Is 31 months too late to get any real benefits from flash cards and right brain training for maths.

2. How can I help with her maths. Ps, I never tried LM but she never really took to LR so I didn't bother trying LM.

3. Are there any DVDs that could help. She seems to prefer DVDs! She learnt her reading from preschool prep! She loves signing time too. She won't sit still for flashcards and stuff.

Any advise would be really appreciated. Thanks.
Ps I also have questions on reading and writing which are in the relevant threads. So any advise on those would be great! Thanks

My daughter is 31 months now and I'm just wondering when babies typially start to write instead of scribbling.

She holds her pencil the right way, she actually has held it properly since she was just over a year old and I assumed that meant she would write early. She loves scribbling a lot and colouring too. She only manages to write 1! When she tries to draw a circle, she draws concentric rings instead of just one circle. Also she doesn't seem to get the hang of joining the dots yet.

So my queries are;
1. What age (on the average) do they start writing. If 31 months is too early, maybe i should just concentrate on building her motor skills

2. How can I help her write better?

3. Is there any article or any information on developmental milestones on writing ie what age they make marks, do scribbles, copy circles etc.

Thanks a lot.

3.

hello! I'm looking to buy the easy reader books levels1-3 preferably.

Anyone got one for sale/ thanks

Hello there! I identify with your title- I'm exactly the same! Welcome on board.

Like you rightly said, do the best you can with whatever time you have! I sometimes go through guilty phases thinking I could be doing much more than I am but with all my other responsibilities, I've learnt to just par myself on the back for trying!!!

I'm sure you'll get really good support on brillkids.

We recently got soft mozart, which by the way I think is an excellent resource to teach music.

I'm just not sure how to get her to learn anything with it. She likes the 'guess the note' where she presses the corresponding note on the piano.  But she presses each note repeatedly instead of just once, so when playing a song, she keeps pressing a key so many times and gets it all muddled up. And then instead of playing 'do' on middle c for instance, she presses random do's all over the piano

Could it be her age or is too early to start trying to get her to play songs. Maybe get her used to the guess the notes first.

So can anyone share how they used it with their children.

Thanks

Hello there! I completely understand how you feel. I was getting frustrated with my daughter as well not settling down to do anything really. We tried LR on and off but she never really seemed to take o it. She did like her signing time and she always asked for it. Eventually, I just stopped all I was trying to teach and just went at her pace doing what she wanted to do. I would read if she wanted to and point to words etc.

She turned 2 in December and just took a new turn! She learnt her alphabets- upper and lower case as well as the sounds in about 2 weeks with hooked on phonics.  I got her meet the sightvwords and it's been amazing. She points to words on billboards, in magazines, everywhere and says "look mummy, that's like". Also when we're Reading, because she knows the letter sounds, she uses picture cues to make out what some words are.

I think theyvreally develop at their own pace. And because they're not responding like we want them doesn't mean they don't know it. I tried teaching colours for a long time and she would call every single thing blue! Until one day I noticed she named all the colours correctly including brown, black and White! It made me realise she knew it all along but wasn't ready to let me know!

My advice to cut the long story short, do little at a time, go at her own pace and when she's ready, she'll show u she's really learning all you're teaching her now.

All the best.

Our soft Mozart just arrived in the post and I'm really excited to start with it. We're just waiting for the USB connection.

Question is- can the software be installed on more than one computer. I'd like to install it on the desktop downstairs and also on the laptop just so it can be used anywhere in the house.

Any idea pls? Thanks.

I was with a friend over the weekend and she was kicking herself for not teaching her son anything all this while. She feels she has lost a lot of the opportunities to teach him, especially when she saw a lot of babies reading and doing other stuff on brillkids.

I told her it's really never too late to start and at least she still has a few more years to maximize his learning, but she wasn't really convinced!

What I want to know really is how much can be done from this age.can he still benefit from LR and LM? Is there anyone here that started late and your babies still learnt quite a lot.

I started with my daughter at about 7months, but wasn't really consistent but she still learnt a lot (eventually!)

Any thoughts please. Thanks.

I recently started buying photo paper. I got a pack of 80 for 99p (in the Uk). not sure where you live but  maybe they have it cheap where you are.

I found it saves me loads of time, energy AND money as I just write straight on it with permanent marker and I don't need to laminate at all.

My daughter learnt upper case using hooked on phonics but I'm still not completely sure how she picked up lower case. Mind you, a lot of the lower case letters are similar to upper cases so those were easy but I think what we did was play lots of games with wooden alphabets. We got this Melissa and doug magnetic alphabet set and I would ask her 'show me B, and then I'll put the lower case b next to it and say ' look, that's another b' I think she just figured it out that way.

Hopefully someone else might be able to share a more concrete way to teach it!

I'm a doctor currently working part time- part time in medicine by the way is Monday to Friday 9-5! But at least I have all my nights and weekends free! It's quite hectic as my daughter has to be in nursery all day but I do try to make up the time btw 6-8 when she goes to bed and weekend. I'm looking into cutting my hours diwn further to 3 times a week or something.

I really admire moms who stay home with their LOs though. I was Home with her for a year and half but had to go back. I think I've finally managed to get over the guilt of being away from her so long in the day but the only consolation is she's ver happy at nursery and they're happy to stimulate her and continue things we do with her at home.

I agree with teachingmytoddler, it's not flash cards and stuff. There's lots of repitition but it's quite interesting for the kids to watch- at least the meet the sight words!

My daughter really likes watching them and she knows nearly all the words on DVD 1 and we just started on Friday! I slept out the word 'of' with her magnetic letters today and asked what I spelt and she told me. So far I only know she knows the words when I ask her to point to word. Jarred some variation today, I spelt out words eg 'play' and ask her'is this that?' and she would say 'no!' I'd go on missing it on purpose and when I say the correct thing she claps for me and says'good girl mummy!' it was a cute game and she enjoyed it and it took away the pressure of testing!

All in all, I think it's a fantastic resource to have for your kids. I look forward to when she can read her 1st preschool prep book!

I absolutely love meet the sight words. Last year, I was worried as my daughter would call EVERY colour blue! Someone recommended meet the colours which I think were too boring for her and she wouldn't sit to watch. We eventually learnt colours with signing time!

Anyway, I recently ordered meet the sight words and it came yesterday and she watched it last night and this morning and I tried showing her the flash cards, even though she won't say the words, but she would pick it out of about 4 different cards. i.e I would place 4 or 5 cards and ask "where is said" and 9 out of ten times, she'd pick the right word. And that's after less than 24 hours of watching. I would say in total she's watched it 3 times!

I'm really glad I got it as we didn't have much success with the 1st ones, maybe apart from meet the numbers. So it's amazing seeing her showing interest in meet the sight words and learning so quickly.

I would also like to share out experience with hooked on phonics. Just by watching the alphabet videos, she learnt all her alphabets in less than 2 weeks. And she knows a lot of the sounds too.

She is 25 months now. And I guess a lot of other 25 months are doing much more but for her, she just didn't really take to much of reading or early learning until very recently she's just blossoming. I guess she's just bringing out all the things she learnt the 1st 2 years!

I remember when I was about 8years old, I had a penpal, we got to write back and forth and it was such an interesting thing, never meeting someone but communicating with them. I got to learn a bit about a different culture and vise versa, somehow it all fizzled out.

I was thinking today if it'll be a good idea for my almost 7year old to have a penpal. In this day of emails and easy access to faster communication, I thought it would be nice to get him to actually write a letter, address and post it, and it'll be quite exciting for him as well getting a letter addressed to him in the post.

Obviously, I recognize in this day and age of a few 'sick' individuals, I have to be cautious,of course no pictures sent and all but I was just wondering if anyone thinks I should or if it'll be a bad idea.

thanks.

hop.com

you could get them on eBay or amazon as well. But check the website so you can see all the things they have an pick an appropriate one for your child.

They came up with some really cool videos last year. You could check them on YouTube. they should come up if you type in hooked on phonics. I plan to get them for my daughter when she's a bit older.