Hi everyone
Sorry, I have been so busy lately. I hope you will all forgive my incredibly late (and long!) post.
Nikolett,
purplefungi and
VNV, thanks for your sweet comments!
Hsmummy, I feel your pain.
I persevered because I wanted to prove that Naimah could read those words. If you don't persevere and just have a casual go, you could end up with something like
Signing Genius!
I think if you do what I did - isolate the words your baby knows, present them in monochrome, and keep trying - you
will get there.
People say testing is bad, but I actually found that Naimah got even more into reading after I made the video. She was stunned by her own brilliance, I think, after a few sessions of being able to read every word (!). Normally she will not know at least 2/3 of the words I show her.
LUV2READ, as I explained in my
blog post, I made the discovery that Naimah was having trouble reading colored words on colored backgrounds (and maybe also in certain fonts). She could read the words perfectly when they were black on white, but then the words were not visible on cam. Then I realized that white on black would be just as legible to Nim, and also visible on cam!
patreiche, aww shucks!
It sounds like Colin was more interested in the animals than Nim tho. I mean,
only the squirrel - for like, two seconds! And then it was just leaves, leaves, leaves.
Kids are hilarious! (But then,
Disneyland was another matter. Certain parts of Disneyland are just
made for the under two's.)
norcalmommy, another aww shucks! Nim now says "Mine"
(a lot) instead of "Nine" - we're in the full throes of toddlerdom now.
If you saw some of my early attempts at shooting the reading video, you would see me constantly taking Nim's hand off the mouse and stopping her from bashing at the keyboard. That's why you need to put the keyboard away. And did you notice the mouse is out of reach??
Come to think of it, although I never meant to shoot the video at night, it might have helped in the sense that Nim was a bit too subdued to be grabbing at things. So although mornings are best for kids, maybe evenings are not so bad when it comes to making LR videos!
Ayesha Nicole, I think that what you're doing is
awesome and you should not change a thing. Personally, I did something more lazy - I'm not proud of it, ha ha... but I think you have to do what works for you.
In the beginning, I would make a playlist out of five categories and put it on shuffle. Then, I would make a whole new playlist for the following week - but at the weekend I would revisit the old playlist(s).
Later, it became a bit more random. I didn't make so many new playlists. As soon as she saw the LR screen, Naimah would be saying, "Amals, amals..." (animals), so I would show her animal categories. Luckily, there are plenty available through the Forum!
Very good teaching, Ayesha! I had to do something similar when Naimah was
hurting me while nursing. A
great lady told me to immediately stop whenever it happened and wait 15-20 mins before resuming. It was really hard to do at first (Nim's desperate cries would really get to me)... but man, did she learn fast!
MIP1999, sounds like you're doing the same sort of thing as me - only with fewer words! I would show Nim several dozen words, but if your baby is younger, it would be appropriate to show fewer in the beginning.
trinity papa, no I didn't keep repeating those words over two months. I actually had a much bigger playlist to begin with - words I had noticed Nim knew (funnily enough, it was when I couldn't get my speakers to work that I noticed how many words Nim could read!). As I tried to make the video, the playlist got whittled down to just those words - the ones that she knew
every time, without fail. Some words were added towards the end of the two months too, because her normal lessons were going on at the same time.
I wasn't doing any other programs at the same time (except for Signing Time DVDs - which reinforced some of the vocabulary actually). I am only just starting with Little Math - after my initial, aborted
attempt at Doman math. Basically, I won't do anything that requires six repetitions a day!
I do some foreign language stuff on LR, yes - but not as much as the English. It's more to get Naimah's ear in (for example, in Chinese) - but I don't expect her to remember how the words are written. Especially as
I don't! Ha ha...
I would say that if your child doesn't want to see the same words, the most important thing is the follow your child's lead. Getting a video is not the most important thing. It's just that in my case, Nim has a few obsessions (like animals... and body parts - especially her belly button! Every child, it seems, has a belly button obsession!!). So we actually used to watch the same words a lot - at Nim's request.
I think that's everything. Let me know if there are any more questions, and I promise not to take so long to reply this time!!
Maddy
PS For all those who read my blog, I thank you! And I say: leave a comment. Don't be shy!!
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