My name is Michael T. Jones and I just recently wrote an article about beginning to read for young ones. Linguistics is one of my specialties and I worked with children three and four years old teaching them reading skills among other things The article is called "The Reading Age is right now" The Reading Age is right now! and in it, I talk about how to approach this subject with your young one, teaching the Alphabet, learning word comprehension and first of all, teaching young kids the value of reading. Take a look at it, especially if you're a parent! Enjoy!
We began with signing to our children from almost the first few days of life, then by the time they were a few months old would read to them every night. They're all advanced readers and we feel it's a key to success in school and life.
They have some great parents. Makes me feel so happy to hear about children who were given the choice of acquiring knowledge when their young. Beginning to read early is for children such a great gift they can receive from a parent!
we did the same with our kids (no signing) and it was a tremendous help to the m through school and in their study habits. it has been said that the harry potter book series influenced a tremendous amount of children and young adults to read and that is great but unfortunate that their parents didn't instill this in them earlier.
Everyone in our family is an avid reader, and we all started at an early age. Well, except the dog - she seems a bit of a slow learner in that department, and doesn't always pay attention to her bedtime story. She seems to be very skilled in other areas, so we'll have to be patient and appreciate what talents she has. The other kids, though, love reading so much we sometimes have to encourage them to do something else. We happened to be chatting about learning styles just yesterday, and my youngest told a story about her teacher being angry with her and a friend for wanting to visit the school library every day instead of the usual once a week. The teacher refused to believe that they'd burned through their book allotment in an evening. I still love nothing better than devouring a book whole - no need for bookmarks - but I rarely get the opportunity.
I am not an advocate of forcing young children to focus on the printed page. I believe it is detrimental to their visual and nervous system development. For a reference, see Homeschooling Articles - Homeschool.com - The #1 Homeschooling Community I am, however, a HUGE advocate of reading to one's children early and often! My son, with ADD, and an early diagnosis of dyslexia, took off reading on his own when my oral reading of J.R.R. Tolkien was taking too long. At 8 years old, he grabbed The Two Towers and read it for himself - and never stopped!
I think kids should be forbidden to read. If they start reading, they may start thinking for themselves, and God knows where THAT would lead us!
