Stirring the interest

Need some suggestions from seasoned moms/dads about great crafts or games to encourage the learning of abc's and 123's with toddlers. My son grasps the concept pretty good but I need more creativity to help him learn??? All suggestions welcomed!!

There are a variety of really cool computer games like Reader Rabbit. My kids ate them up. I have a video, even, of my 2 year old son turning on the computer, waiting for it to boot, loading HIS game and playing it. :eek:

READING to them is the biggest incentive. Dr. Suess books, the early readers, are TERRIFIC for this purpose.

I would not worry about writing until your child reaches about 4, then you can begin working on tracing letters and numbers. In the meantime, just read, read, read. Get games and books oriented towards the basics and keep Sesame Street on in the background.. ;) My brother, although he NEVER paid direct attention to the TV, would parrot Sesame Street and the Count and the SPANISH. LOL.

~phos

Thanks Fos! Great advice. Yep we read together all the time. I will look into the computer games.

This will sound really silly Nibbles, but I made songs out of anything and everything, my kids LOVED it....the alphabet was easy to do, numbers not so, and the sillier the better and the more then enjoyed it. I also read constantly to all my kids which I think is absolutely the number one thing you can do as a parent. The gift of reading keeps on giving through out there lives.

One thing I did have a lot of were childrens atlas's and maps. My oldest son knew all 50 states by kindergarden. We would in the evening before bed spend a few minutes with a huge US map and I'd say....FIND ME.....they loved it. We did this with everything. We would go for walks and name flowers and plants....its never ending how much fun you can make learning when they are little.

I just tried to make everything fun by using our imaginations....with lots of laughs and giggles.

Absolutely, Michele. :D On the numbers thing, when you're at the playground, make everything about counting. Count how many swings they take on the swings. Count how many slats in the moving bridge. Count how many people are there. And definitely add a song to it. I did/do the same thing! We make up freaky funky songs all the time.

And use big words. Lots of people think that you shouldn't talk with big words to little kids. Pshaaa! My kids have a rich and varied vocabulary and use BIG words in context and ask the meaning if they don't know. I always try to bring new words into use and sometimes its good for a barrel of laughs.

My son just LOVES that at 10 he can say things to other people that make them go "what??" Like using words like obnoxious and moronic and fatuous. Other kids just look at him funny and he laughs hysterically over it.

~phos

...READING to them is the biggest incentive. Dr. Suess books, the early readers, are TERRIFIC for this purpose.

I would not worry about writing until your child reaches about 4, then you can begin working on tracing letters and numbers. In the meantime, just read, read, read. Get games and books oriented towards the basics and keep Sesame Street on in the background.. ;) ...

Once as a bookstore clerk, I witnessed the most remarkable thing: A four-year-old child fluently reading a child's book aloud. It was a standard children's storybook. Maybe at 2nd grade-level, I'm not sure. The kid was so little and that made it amazing to watch. :)

I chatted with his parents; they were obviously intelligent, thoughtful and engaged adults. I'm not sure if their kid was performing that way mainly due to an unusually high IQ -- or simply because of extraordinary coaching on the parents' part.

Any thoughts on this? I know that parents have VASTLY differing amounts of free time, patience, ability and interest when it comes to teaching reading skills to kids.

What's your approach Nibbles? (Meaning are you happy with reading at age 6? Or is age 4 better? Or, maybe just whenever/go-with-the-flow?)

Fos -- your thoughts?

Age 4 is young to read but not unheard of. Some kids pick up on things quicker than others. I don't want to overly push my son to do things but more encouraging. I do all the things that Phos and Michele do with counting etc. We make train tracks with the letters on the fridge. I haven't done the song stuff but will!!!(thanks!)

Every child will learn at a different level and encouragement is the key. You can just see when I praise my son he beams and wants to do it again.

I have just recently got out the dominos and started teaching him how many dots there are an make it a matching game and then stack em and knock em over. It is a learning game and lots of fun to destroy as well!

To be honest if my son is happy, healthy, and encouraged/persistant with learning than I am a happy mother. I just have to make it a point to always encourage!!!

I'm not sure if their kid was performing that way mainly due to an unusually high IQ -- or simply because of extraordinary coaching on the parents' part.

I would be inclined to think.... neither. As Nibbles pointed out, all kids are different and their interest levels are different.

My son, at 2 1/2, could write his own name and read simple readers like Hop on Pop. By four, his interest in these things evaporated (right about the time his Asperger's onset became apparent ~ despite his high IQ ~ thanks to five thimerosal containing vaccines) and just recently started to really come back in full force ~ as he is way into history right now.

My daughter, on the other hand, just turned five. Over the last year she has read ALL of the Dick & Jane books on her own, all of the Dora the Explorer readers, and several Dr. Suess's... she reads them to me, her grandmother and anyone who will listen. I don't think she has an exceptionally high IQ... high, sure, but unusually high? No. Nor do I think I have done anything extraordinary where she is concerned. And I KNOW her father didn't. :eek: We just read a book or two every night and if it's late, her brother will read to her or she to him these days. LOL.

I recollect quite vividly meeting my ex-step-son at age 6. He did not even know his LETTERS. Within a 3 month time frame reading nightly together, using the Reader Rabbit computer games and the like, he had memorized his alphabet (forward AND backwards, thank you) and was reading aloud some basic readers. I couldn't believe his progress in such a short time. NO ONE had read to him in his 6 years of life. Five older siblings, two parents and grandparents and NO ONE had read to him?? THAT I could not believe. The sponge absorbed information like.. well... a sponge. LOL. And I definitely wouldn't say he had an unusually high IQ, just an interest.

It probably helps that when we read its more like theatre than some monotonous, detached voice just parroting the words. We do voices, sometimes SING some books aloud, take turns reading and express ourselves with cadence, rhythm, and character. I remember my sons Dad (the one who doesn't read) trying to read to him back when he was little and it was like hearing some machine drone on... I asked him, "Is that how you HEAR the words in your own head when you read them?" He said... "Yeah?" I said "GOD, no wonder you don't like to read!!"

~phos

I would be inclined to think.... neither. As Nibbles pointed out, all kids are different and their interest levels are different.



I agree all children are different and develop differently... I love the leap frog products and the vtechs personally... My son is only 17 months old right now and he's already counting to ten and saying his alphabet he actually sings the whole song it's so cute... he was 14 months when he started the counting to ten thing.. I swear by TAD LOL I love that little frog LOL

I used food to teach my kids math. When cutting a pizza or pancake, we do halfs, quarters... etc. When giving them a sandwich, it would be 'do you want 2 pieces or 1?'

It may be bad but my granddaughter, since age 3, loves to put my medication in my weekly pill box. I totally watch her and hand her the pills... 'ok, 2 in each one'. This has really given her the CONCEPT of how many is 2 or 3. (The meds are locked up and up very high.)

She is now 4 and goes to Nickolodean webstie. She can totally naviagate the songs and stories.

We also count when we climb the stairs, all 22 of them at my home. :eek: So she has been able to count to 22 since she was 2 years old. :p