"Your Baby Can Read"

[Guest crochetqueen]

Hello!

 

I just watched an infomercial for "Your Baby Can Read" and the testimonials were amazing! I know advertisers can make any product look good in an infomercial. I am a little cautious because they don't tell the final price after the $14.95 30-day trial offer...it makes me a little suspicious.

 

Has anyone used this product? If so, does it really work? Is it worth the money? Or should I run far away from this?!?!?!

 

I used "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" with my now 6 year old when he was 3. He was successful with the first 70 lessons then began to struggle. I am using OPGTR with my 3 year old now, and he loves it. He asks for his turn to do school a couple of times a day. He will just start saying "The Consonant Rhyme" while he's playing, just as easily as he sings the "ABC Song." I have 2 two year olds and a 6 month old and if "Your Baby Can Read" works, I would love to use it with them!

 

Looking forward to you replies!

Crochet Queen

:grouphug:

[LUV2EDU]

Hello!

 

I just watched an infomercial for "Your Baby Can Read" and the testimonials were amazing! I know advertisers can make any product look good in an infomercial. I am a little cautious because they don't tell the final price after the $14.95 30-day trial offer...it makes me a little suspicious.

 

Has anyone used this product? If so, does it really work? Is it worth the money? Or should I run far away from this?!?!?!

 

I used "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" with my now 6 year old when he was 3. He was successful with the first 70 lessons then began to struggle. I am using OPGTR with my 3 year old now, and he loves it. He asks for his turn to do school a couple of times a day. He will just start saying "The Consonant Rhyme" while he's playing, just as easily as he sings the "ABC Song." I have 2 two year olds and a 6 month old and if "Your Baby Can Read" works, I would love to use it with them!

 

Looking forward to you replies!

Crorhet Queen

:grouphug:

 

Yes, it does work. I am using it with my 3 year old. Older children (2 and up) will learn the words quicker. Just be patient and you will see the results.:001_smile:

 

I paid in full. However, click here to view the monthly payments on their website.http://www.yourbabycanread.com/ce-y-order.aspx

[mlbuchina]

I saw that infomercial, too. I wondered how it worked. It appears to be a whole to parts method, not parts to whole like WTM suggests using. It didn't appeal to me, but that is just me!:tongue_smilie:

[Ellie]

There have been studies done on that. By third grade, there was no difference between the dc who "learned to read" as babies and children who had learned to read the "normal" way. Also, children who had learned to read as babies had very poor read-aloud skills.

 

It isn't something *I* would do. I prefer giving dc a strong base in phonics as opposed to having them memorize words. If the dc learned to read on their own, as many dc do, that would be great, of course, but I'm not gonna do that with an infant, on purpose.

[SherryTX]

Is that what this is - just sight words? If so, I would skip it and stay with a solid phonics program as well. There is a big difference I think between those that learn to read with a solid phonics program versus just sight reading. Makes it hard on the wee ones when they get older and don't understand the how to read new words on their own because they didn't have the part -whole thing taught to them.

 

Why does a baby need to learn to read at 2 or 3 anyway? Not that there is anything wrong with that - but an early reader does not a genius make necessarily.

[sagira]

Yeah, I'm in the later camp as well. Later meaning as soon as dc is five years old. IMO the time spent on teaching reading for an infant/toddler could be better spent on exploring the world, in relational activities with family members, listening to many, many books and music and playing, playing, playing. Reading without the rich context acquired in life experience is just memorization without real meaning.

 

This precludes of course children who are precocious and every bit interested and ready to read on their own accord, from themselves at 2 or 3 or 4.

 

If anyone's interested in this subject, a good book to read is The Hurried Child by Elkind.

[musicianmom]

I did it with my first child when she was in the 9-14 months age range. It didn't teach her to read, but I think it increased her vocabulary and her awareness of the printed word. She did memorize some of the sight words.

 

The production of the videos is low-budget, but they're cute. They use poems and songs and video clips of children and animals. It's slower-paced than your average PBS show, which I consider a good thing.

 

If money is tight, I wouldn't put this in the "must have" category. But I think you can usually find used copies of the individual DVDs on half.com.

 

By the way, my oldest daughter has turned out to be an early reader, but as far as I can tell, it wasn't a result of YBCR. We used 100 Easy Lessons once she demonstrated readiness.

[Mom-ninja.]

I am not a fan of whole language memorizing. As the WTM says I follow parts to whole, and not the other way around.

[forty-two]

My mom did it with me (just with the book, though - she made her own cards), and it did work - I was reading things I'd never seen before when I was 2.5yo. It is definitely straight-up sight word memorization.

 

I love, love, love reading, and I think I benefited from an early start, but I'm not doing it with my dd, even though, with her memory, she'd do great. Why? Because while I intuited most of the sound-letter correspondences, I did *not* intuit any of the rules. I'm a natural speller, but I can't correctly pronounce a word I've never heard before. I get the stress wrong, I divide syllables wrong, I pick the wrong vowel sound; I mentally self-censor to avoid saying words I'm not sure how to pronounce. I don't blame my mom - it wasn't her fault the school never taught me(or her, for that matter!) any of those things ; at least she made sure I could read.

 

But twenty years later, I'm still working to learn all those advanced phonics skills I *should* have learned by 3rd grade. I'm going to do it right the first time with my dds.

Edited June 27, 2009 by forty-two

[Whereneverever]

I think it's both developmentally inappropriate and also parts-to-whole, which the WTM doesn't suggest for good reason.

[Whereneverever]

My mom did it with me (just with the book, though - she made her own cards), and it did work - I was reading things I'd never seen before when I was 2.5yo. It is definitely straight-up sight word memorization.

 

I love, love, love reading, and I think I benefited from an early start, but I'm not doing it with my dd, even though, with her memory, she'd do great. Why? Because I while I intuited most of the sound-letter correspondences, I did *not* intuit any of the rules. I'm a natural speller, but I can't correctly pronounce a word I've never heard before. I get the stress wrong, I divide syllables wrong, I pick the wrong vowel sound; I mentally self-censor to avoid saying words I'm not sure how to pronounce. I don't blame my mom - it wasn't her fault the school never taught me(or her, for that matter!) any of those things ; at least she made sure I could read.

 

But twenty years later, I'm still working to learn all those advanced phonics skills I *should* have learned by 3rd grade. I'm going to do it right the first time with my dds.

 

 

That's a very interesting perspective, thanks!

[Terabith]

I would use Signing Time instead. You learn sign language (which is soooo good), and it is fun. Plus, it shows the written words, and many kids will learn to recognize the words. But that is not the focus.

[Guest crochetqueen]

Thank you for all of your responses!

 

Before posting my question, I searched to see if anyone else had posted about Your Baby Can Read, and couldn't find any. After posting, there were two discussions about the program at the bottom of the page.

 

One brought up something I hadn't thought about. If this program does work like the infomercial says, and your toddler can read anything she picks up, would you really want that? I mean, you could be in a dr.'s office and she picks up a magazine with articles on preventing STD's or helping your teen come out of abusive relationships...things we might want to read, but certainly would not want our 3 yo reading! I want to be able to protect my children as long as possible. That is one reason I will skip this program.

 

I think I will stick with what I have done for the older 2---lot's of read alouds, 100 Easy Lessons or OPGTR, and easy reader type books. It is working for the 6 yo and 3 yo. I'll save teaching the younger ones to read until they show readiness or get to Kindergarten!

[Lovedtodeath]

One brought up something I hadn't thought about. If this program does work like the infomercial says, and your toddler can read anything she picks up, would you really want that? I mean, you could be in a dr.'s office and she picks up a magazine with articles on preventing STD's or helping your teen come out of abusive relationships...things we might want to read, but certainly would not want our 3 yo reading! I want to be able to protect my children as long as possible. That is one reason I will skip this program.

It has caused some problems/explaining that DD was reading so early (not from this program), for sure! In the docs office, at the store (tabloids) and at home, reading all of my emails and forums! We couldn't spell things to each other for very long either. We tried Spanish instead, but she can catch on to some of that too!:lol:

 

If you want an educational program for your baby, I recommend "Talking Hands" (sign language) Jake has learned a lot from it.

[rockermom]

We have it (it was given to us when my son was 18 mos old). I previewed the DVDs and decided that I didn't want RockerTot to view them. We already had the Leapfrog Learning DVDs and he was learning so much from them. I do not want my son to memorize the way words look, I want him to be able to decode words. I was taught to read with phonics (by an elderly neighbor who was a retired teacher) using some very old readers.

 

I will probably be passing these DVDs on to family members who have babies. They may not have the opinions that I have about phonics/whole language.

[Quad Shot Academy]

My mom did it with me (just with the book, though - she made her own cards), and it did work - I was reading things I'd never seen before when I was 2.5yo. It is definitely straight-up sight word memorization.

 

I love, love, love reading, and I think I benefited from an early start, but I'm not doing it with my dd, even though, with her memory, she'd do great. Why? Because while I intuited most of the sound-letter correspondences, I did *not* intuit any of the rules. I'm a natural speller, but I can't correctly pronounce a word I've never heard before. I get the stress wrong, I divide syllables wrong, I pick the wrong vowel sound; I mentally self-censor to avoid saying words I'm not sure how to pronounce. I don't blame my mom - it wasn't her fault the school never taught me(or her, for that matter!) any of those things ; at least she made sure I could read.

 

But twenty years later, I'm still working to learn all those advanced phonics skills I *should* have learned by 3rd grade. I'm going to do it right the first time with my dds.

 

I can say "ditto" to this entire post, except that I am not a natural speller and my spelling is quite embarrassing. I really struggled to learn phonics with my first born, but now I am a much better speller.

 

I think children would be much better off using their brains to memorize typical things like, colors, shapes, letters, numbers, animals and even stories, poems and scriptures.

[sweetbaby]

We have this program which was purchased as a gift from grandma. My dd (3) loves the videos and books but doesn't want to watch the same video for a month as the program suggests so we alternate. I think it's more of a reading readiness program but it is fun and she enjoys it.

[Jeanne in MN]

I think it's terribly misleading to say those little ones are reading. They memorize how the words look-esp. when they have the picture with the word. Um, yeah, if they see a duck, they will know the word is duck. I'm sure they take the picture away after awhile and they recognize the letters, but I don't call that reading.

[ElizabethB]

It is whole word methods, a bunch of sight words. Sight words work for maybe 40% of the population, but some of them will have lingering spelling difficulties. I have remediated students since 1994 who have some degree of difficulties reading due to sight words, and don't highly recommend teaching more than a dozen sight words. In fact, I have a web page explaining how and why to teach all but 5 of the 220 Dolch sight words phonetically:

http://www.thephonicspage.org/On%20Reading/sightwords.html

 

A good book showing how to teach phonics to a young child is Sidney Ledson's "Teach Your Child to Read in Just 10 Minutes a Day." There are some fun games in there, and also the book recommends using uppercase for that age, which I found worked better for my daughter at a young age. It also helps prevent B/D reversal problems and is easier to write neatly on a white board.

 

I taught my daughter to read at 3 1/2 when she started guessing at words from being read to, after all my remedial student's guessing problems, I wanted to make sure she learned a good phonics base from the get go.

 

She's been able to read well since 4, and has been able to read just about anything since she was 5 1/2 when we completed Webster's Speller. When she was 4, she informed me that the shopping cart sign (text, not a picture) said that it was not safe for her to sit in the basket!

 

I do not let her read things above her emotional level, and stuck to board books for a long time--they are written for an adult to read aloud, so are written at a high grade level, but they are appropriate for a young child.

 

It is very handy to have her be able to read instructions for me--and, it was even handier when her brother was closer to 2 and looking for trouble at every turn, it came in handy to have a good reader around more often than I would have thought. She also enjoys reading books to her brother.

[Carrie12345]

Every time the commercial comes on, my big kids want to get it for the little one. :glare:

 

I have to admit, he'd probably get a kick out of it, but I'm a phonics parent! He's just starting to understand that some shapes are letters, and that's impressive enough, imo. ;)

[Pamela H in Texas]

Sure it works. This is just a more modern version of Teach Your Baby to Read (Doman). And there are multiple benefits to learning to read early even if they do all even out by 3rd grade (btw, there are plenty of studies stating otherwise so pick your studies).

 

I would do the Doman method but I think the Your Baby Can Read is fine. They also have foreign languages and a book collection. Doman also has math, science, history, and physical ability programs. They all take two minutes a couple times a day. It's low key and fun. No big deal.

 

I didn't do it with my own children (as mentioned in a speech thread, I did short term with ds to jumpstart speech. We did about 70 words), but I'd be willing to :)

 

And as for this whole thing about sight vs phonics. Babies learn with sight words. And we all move to sight words. I have no issue with that and doing phonics when appropriate. My own daughter (and A LOT of kids) learned to read by 3. We simply did a phonics program so she'd have the rules in order to read anything and to learn to spell. That is how I learned also. I learned to read as a preschooler then my mom and teachers gave me phonics. No big deal, really.

[mom2att]

Thank you for all of your responses!

One brought up something I hadn't thought about. If this program does work like the infomercial says, and your toddler can read anything she picks up, would you really want that?

 

That's one of the things that bothers me about the YBCR commercials. They have this adorable 2-year-old reading aloud from Charlotte's Web. The part she is reading is where Fern rushes to take the ax from her father, who is about to kill Wilbur. Now Charlotte's Web is a great children's book, but to give it to a two-year-old to read just because she can seems just crazy--the whole ax/killing the pig thing is weighty baggage for a toddler to have to sort through.

 

My oldest begged to learn to read at three, and read well by the time she was four. It was hard enough to choose appropriate reading material for her then--I'd just as soon let two-year-olds be two-year-olds than to thrust reading on them so early. But that's just me--I have a friend who has used this program with her two toddlers, and she is thrilled with the results.

[LilMama]

We have the DVD's. I bought the set used through Amazon for $38. They've been great for my youngest who is speech delayed. The reason is because the language naturally progresses in the videos. We got these when she was somewhere between 1.5 - 2 yrs.

 

In order to learn to read, you have to watch them 1-2X per day. I don't think any video is worth that much of my child's time. The developer does not consider it whole language. He considers it a combo. He believes children exposed to this method of learning to read will develop an intuitive sense of phonics. Having watched the DVD's, I can see how the progression and presentation of words encourages that.

 

DD is now 2.5 and still enjoys them 1-2x per week. She still has an expressive speech delay. But, she participates physically with the video, it encourages her receptive language, and she will sometimes call out the words she can say. She has not watched TV very much, so YBCR is pretty exciting for her.

 

I'll probably be looking into signing times and Leap Frog next.

 

LilMama

[Karen sn]

No evidence to back this up, but I feel deep in my bones that there is something really wrong with this.

I wonder if kids who do all this sight reading are short circuiting their brains. I think it's skipping important steps.

Like trying to walk before you crawl.

 

I think the brain needs other stimulation.

Like another poster commented: play, play, play..... and dance and listen to music.

Go outside and discuss nature, etc.....

 

These activities make pathways in the brain and I think it's quite important to the future education and ability of the child.

In the rush to make everyone so smart I think we are actually hindering!

[Lovedtodeath]

Of course! I didn't list the benefits. DD has been able to help me with many things due to being able to read early and at higher levels, like reading ingredients, signs, closed captioning, directions, menus by herself... I am sure there are more. So it evens out the challenges.:)

 

We have the DVD's. I bought the set used through Amazon for $38. They've been great for my youngest who is speech delayed. The reason is because the language naturally progresses in the videos. We got these when she was somewhere between 1.5 - 2 yrs.

That is what we like sign language videos for.;) They have the added benefit of mommy understanding that Jake is saying potty as opposed to about 5 other similar sounding words, because he is signing it at the same time.:tongue_smilie:

[lisasaysto]

That's one of the things that bothers me about the YBCR commercials. They have this adorable 2-year-old reading aloud from Charlotte's Web. The part she is reading is where Fern rushes to take the ax from her father, who is about to kill Wilbur.

 

 

 

I thought the same thing! Why can't she be reading from a nice picture book!?!

[siloam]

My mom did it with me (just with the book, though - she made her own cards), and it did work - I was reading things I'd never seen before when I was 2.5yo. It is definitely straight-up sight word memorization.

 

I love, love, love reading, and I think I benefited from an early start, but I'm not doing it with my dd, even though, with her memory, she'd do great. Why? Because while I intuited most of the sound-letter correspondences, I did *not* intuit any of the rules. I'm a natural speller, but I can't correctly pronounce a word I've never heard before. I get the stress wrong, I divide syllables wrong, I pick the wrong vowel sound; I mentally self-censor to avoid saying words I'm not sure how to pronounce. I don't blame my mom - it wasn't her fault the school never taught me(or her, for that matter!) any of those things ; at least she made sure I could read.

 

But twenty years later, I'm still working to learn all those advanced phonics skills I *should* have learned by 3rd grade. I'm going to do it right the first time with my dds.

 

I love this post!

 

There are studies that show that when a child learns whole word reading there is a window to them being able to pick up phonics. For most students by 2nd grade that window had closed and they had either been wired to a whole word or to a phonics based method. After that window it was twice the work to teach a child based on phonics. Sorry I tried but I can't find the study to site, and can't remember where I first learned of it.

 

Whole word reading obviously also has limits that phonics does not have.

 

My answer would be why? Why does the child need to read this early? Why chance they will imprint whole language and struggle with phonics all their life?

 

My oldest was 5.75 before I began to teach her phonics, because the birth of my 4th child delayed her school. By the time she finished 1st grade she was reading beyond a 3rd grade level and by the time the end of 2nd grade she read beyond a 7th grade level. Teaching her was easy and fun, we both enjoyed it and she reads a TON. Waiting didn't hurt her at all.

 

Heather

 

[squirtymomma]

I personally try to keep my preschoolers away from TV or computer screens. I am leery of any kind of educational materials that are learned passively like that, especially for young ones. Reading is a skill that requires active participation, and in my mind screen "learning" is counterproductive to that.

[cillakat]

Also, children who had learned to read as babies had very poor read-aloud skills.

 

Yup. Because they don't know how to sound words out. They learn everything as a sight word and miss the foundation of phonics.

 

However, if someone really wants to do it, it can be done without an expensive program, Glen Doman's books outline what to do.

 

:)

K

[elw_miller]

No evidence to back this up, but I feel deep in my bones that there is something really wrong with this.

I wonder if kids who do all this sight reading are short circuiting their brains. I think it's skipping important steps.

Like trying to walk before you crawl.

 

To echo this with an example from a perspective on music education: Shinichi Suzuki based his method on the idea that we learn to speak pretty well before we read. Children are immersed in music and learn to play by ear long before they ever learn to read music.

 

I am also uneasy with the whole-to-part focus. Just my two cents... :001_smile: