Have You Tried the "Your Baby Can Read" Program?

I haven't used it but I read a couple reviews of it. Educators said that it caused problems with children entering Kindergarten. The system is simply memorizing but not learning to decode, work out or sound out words in anyway. So unless it was a word they memorized from the set they did not have the skill to read it. They essentially had to start all over and teach them to read.

Toddlers need lots of play for their early development, not sitting in front of a screen memorizing words by shape. This can actually confuse them when they need to start learning letter sounds with the phonics approach taught in lower grades. I've heard complaints from teachers that kids who learned some words this way can be very resistant to learning phonics. And lots of physical activity is needed to develop the eye-hand motor skills which making writing possible.

Having a very young child who recognizes words might be a bragging point, but it doesn't give a child an "advantage" when they are in school. Their brains are not yet wired for the kind of activity required for true reading.

(BTW: I tutored kids entering high school who had weak reading skills. Except for a limited range of "sight" words, every one of them needed to go back to learning letter sounds, and then combination letter sounds.)

i haven't used this, but I wanted to share some information I recently read in case it helped your decision. They are discovering that early teaching actually hinders deeper development later on. It is actually not good to use early readers or early anything, unless your child is wanting to read/learn that thing and expressing a deep interest in it.

They've discovered that a young child's brain is not fully developed and when you teach them these things, they develop a less efficient pathway in the brain because they are under developed. Whereas, if you were to wait longer, the brain would develop more, and the child would then develop a much more efficient pathway in the brain - leading to deeper understanding and a deeper ability to continue learning.

Preschool and early learning are not showing in studies to be beneficial. It's actually showing opposite. Sure, some kids will be interested younger, and I think you should let the child's interest lead the way. But in the long run, it doesn't mean one child is smarter than another.

There's another study I read that showed one country starting school at 5 years vs another country starting school at age 7. The children at age 7 learned much faster, had better comprehension in the long run, and clearly did better waiting to be older to learn when compared to the 5 year olds.

Children are very good at memorizing, but it doesn't mean they comprehend and understand. So, I think for a while people were thinking children were truly learning these things when in reality it wasn't a deep understanding. Again, that's not to say that some children aren't truly understanding at a young age...maybe their brain has developed faster. But even in those cases, there's no harm in waiting longer.

Anyway, hopefully this is helpful info for you. I used to be very interested in early learning until I looked it up and realized how much better it is to wait. That being said, my son got interested in reading when he turned four. I went ahead and started teaching him. In a few month's time, he was up to 1st grade level reading. He was no longer interested after that, so we stopped. But it shows that when they are interested, they can just soak it up and do it fast! :-)

Good luck!

Hi G.,
I can think of A LOT of reasons why Your Baby Shouldn't Read,

But I can only think of ONE reason for Your Baby Can Read.

Capitalism.

:)

this question comes up every now and then, and I'm copying my response from another thread about this program:

personally, I'd stick with the "old fashioned" method of spending the time you would have spent on this "program" on reading with your child instead (and squirrel aside the money you would have spent into his/her college fund :-)). Your local public library is a treasure trove of wonderful books that will capture your child's imagination better than any program would IMO, and Children's Librarians are worth their weight in gold when it comes to helping you find books that are likely to captivate your child whatever age he/she might be. Most public libraries also have regular Story Times for toddlers and older children that combine stories with rhymes, songs, and other activities.

I've said this before but IMO there's a big difference between teaching your child to read and teaching your child to *LOVE* reading. When you read with your child, he/she's not only learning reading, he/ she's learning that reading is the doorway to countless worlds of imaginative stories or fascinating information.

I taught first grade and kindergarten. I have a 3 and 1 year old. I never used the program and never would. Why? First of all, why does a baby need to read? My 3 year old enjoyed learning letters and sounds when he was 11 mos-found it to be a game. Now he is putting them together to sound out words. I find that natural and something he was into -therefore okay.
My other son doesn't care about letters, sounds or words. He finds looking at the tv boring. If I forced him to watch your baby can read, he'd hate it. I wouldn't dream of forcing him to learn letters or sounds so young if he doesn't want to- learning words by staring at tv? Sounds like pain to me.
Here's my suggestion. If your child is into letters and sounds, start there. Point out a letter in a book and say its sound. If the child seems interested, teach them more and increase what they know. Please don't force them to read to help them "get ahead." They need to enjoy childhood and know that learning new things is fun, not forced.

Hello G.!

I have not tried this program, and I'm glad I didn't!! What a wonderful bunch of ladies with TONS of insight!!! WOW!!

I just wanted to share something with you; I went to a garage sale last summer and bought my son a used LeapFrog dvd. He loved it so much, that over time, we bought all the videos. I would recommend to you to go buy one, and see if your little one likes it too. All of the videos are wonderful, but there are some areas they don't touch on that I wish they would. But, guess I can't have it ALL! lol

Because of these videos, my son has learned to skip count, sound out letter sounds and more. This impresses me because my son is autistic. So for him to grasp these skills is priceless!!

Good luck! No one said raising kids was EASY!!! lol ~ls

How old is your child?

I did not buy or try the 'YBCR' program, but did let my son watch the "Meet the Letters", "Meet the Numbers", "Meet the Sight Words", and now they have a new "Meet the Phonics." My library had them. My son (3) LOVES to learn his sounds and likes these videos. Leap-Frog also has a DVD about letter sounds. My son loves that one too. He knows all of his letter sounds!

I have this program and it did work at first. But because you have to show the video over and over again she started getting bored. I started it when she was 2. She did great at first. She was able to recognize some of the words but got bored and refused to watch the videos. I just keep buying her books and she "reads" them to me. She is 3 1/2 now. She looks at the pictures and makes up her own story. It sounds great upfront but in the long run I would rather her use an actual book. I read her a story just about every night. So because she got bored with the videos I stopped using it. I was afraid that if she was bored with that then she wouldn't read at all. Don't waste your money.