Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.

Today there is so much pressure placed on a child from an early age regarding their education. As parents we all want our children to excel in their school but what methods of learning do we use in order to achieve these results.

In many instances we place our children with lessons that they do not like and they are not able to accomplish and this is very discouraging for the child. It would be better if the child was presented with fun tasks which they can do and develop their learning ability that way. This in my opinion is an important key to learning.

Lessons which are happily done are internalized and in this manner talent is grown carefully. Children learn best when they are having fun! Parents are encouraged to create the best possible learning environment and utilize proper tools and materials to allow the child to enjoy learning and feel empowered to learn.

Use this as a tool and give them as much as they can do! Praise them with their efforts and their incentive to learn will become much higher. They will want to do better and in turn they will succeed! That fire has been lit and we as parents can keep on igniting that fire in our children.

Make Reading Fun!

Reading aloud can be a lot of fun, not just for parents but for all family members. Here are some ways to get the most out of reading to your young child:

Read with drama and excitement! Use different voices for different characters in the story. Use your childs name instead of a characters name. Make puppets and use them to act out a story.

Re-read your childs favourite stories as many times as your child wants to hear them, and choose books and authors that your child enjoys.

Read stories that have repetitive parts and encourage your child to join in.

Point to words as you read them. This will help your child make a connection between the words he or she hears you say and the words on the page.

Read all kinds of material – stories, poems, information books, magazine and newspaper articles, and comics.

Encourage relatives and friends to give your child books as gifts.

Take your child to the library and look at interactive CD-ROMs and the Internet, as well as books.

Subscribe to a magazine for your child. He or she will love receiving mail!

10 Reasons Why Books Are Still Important?

Has your toddler just learned the alphabet? Then this is the perfect time to introduce him/her to the wonderful world of books. In this time of personal computers and the Internet, many of us consider books to be things of the past. However, they still play a crucial role in the overall development of a child during the early years of life. Those “educational” toys and “pre-school development” shows on TV may look pretty appealing, but nothing can replace good old books. Here are 10 reasons why books are still important for a child’s development:

1. The more books children read, the faster their vocabulary is expanded. Books help them to learn new words and new ways of using the words that they already know. This accelerates preschool child development, and also improves their soft skills in the long run.

2. Reading books to children at bedtime is a wonderful bonding experience that nourishes emotional development. Parents can also help the child relate the incidents in the story to real events in their lives.

3. Encouraging a love of books in toddlers is a great way to prepare them for the school environment and to adapt to the concept of daily schoolwork.

4. Reading books regularly stimulates children’s imagination, accelerates their emotional development and fosters natural curiosity. Children quickly learn to visualize the scenarios mentioned in the stories by reading the text alone. This type of development works even better if a parent assists in the process. According to a recent research conducted by author Jim Trelease, regular reading of books “creates empathy toward other people, because literature values humanity and celebrates human spirit and potential, offering insight into different lifestyles while recognizing universality”.

5. As children read different books, their knowledge on various subjects increases multifold. In addition, everything that they learn at this age stays in their mind for a long time to come. This can help them become better students in school.

6. Reading books improves a child’s attention span. Books with colorful pictures work even better than text-only books.

7. Reading can successfully replace TV as a source of entertainment, especially if the child is introduced to preschool books as soon as he/she learns the alphabet. Reading helps children utilize their time in a more constructive manner.

8. Children who learn to read at an early age have a better chance of getting a job later in life. They also perform much better than those who grew up watching TV and playing games on computers. In a recent speech, renowned author/illustrator Rosemary Wells pointed out that, “a young child's growing mind needs active play and live conversation. Television puts a child into what neurologists call the passive Alpha state. A child cannot learn from screens because programs are meant to sell products not to teach”.

9. A parent reading to his/her toddler often becomes a role model in the child’s mind. In this way, the child learns to be more obedient towards parents.

10. Developing the habit of reading regularly from an early age helps the child to cope better with the rigors of academic education later on. Allowing your child to watch a few pre-school shows on TV isn’t a bad thing to do. However, reading books is a very important activity that no child should be deprived of during the early years of his/her life. Read a book to your child today. It will go a long way in forging a lifelong bond between you and your toddler.

“The most important thing that parents can do is talk and read to their children. During the toddler and preschool years, it is critical to provide children with different language and reading experiences.” (G. Reid Lyon, Ph.D., Chief of the Child Development and Behavior Branch within the National Institute of Child Healthy and Human Development

Parenting Tip: Children Love to Learn!

Glenn Doman received his degree in physical therapy from the University of Pennsylvania in 1940, and began pioneering the field of child brain development. In 1955, he founded The Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential® , whose work with brain-injured children led to vital discoveries regarding well children. Glenn is the best-selling author of 6 books, all part of the Gentle Revolution Series

Why Teach your baby to Read?

Just read the book on How to Teach your baby to Read by Glenn Doman.
Here is the summary on what he has written-

I think that it is a wonderful thing for a mother (or father) to teach her baby to read for a number of reasons:

1. It is easier to teach a two-year-old to read at home than it is to teach a six-year-old at school. Much easier.

2. Since babies would rather learn than do anything else in the world, and would rather be with their parents than with anyone else in the world, there are few activities as joyous for mothers and babies as learning-to-read sessions.

3. Reading is the very basis of all learning and the acquisition of knowledge, and if mother teaches her baby to read at one, two, or three years of age he will not fail to learn to read in school at six, seven, or eight years of age. Literacy and success go hand-in-hand, and illiteracy and failure go hand-in-hand. This is true in nations, in states, in cities, and in neighborhoods, and is especially true in individuals.

4. It is a wondrous thing for a baby, or child, or an adult to be able to read.

5. Most importantly:

We parents go through all the early years of baby's life, taking care of the running noses, the dirty diapers, the sheer horror of losing sight of the tiny child on the crowded beach for thirty seconds which seems like an hour, the frantic silent prayers on the way to the hospital at 2 a.m. with the five-year-old's temperature rising to a new world record, and all the other prices we pay so willingly for the joy and privilege of squeezing that beloved tiny body and beholding that beautiful little face.

Then when, as custom has had it, at six years of age, it becomes time to introduce him to all the golden and glorious things that have been written in his own language and in others, and thus to open the truly magic door to all knowledge and all that is beautiful in this world, we turn him over to a stranger called a teacher, and pray that the teacher will know what a truly brilliant and eager-to-know mind this most exceptional of all children has.

Having put up with all the loving problems, we are entitled to all the loving fun to be had in teaching our babies to read, and in so doing, to lift our babies on to our shoulders and say, "Behold, my child, the world in all its splendor. It is our gift to you."

The truth is that we expose children to reading too late. By six years of age the ability to take in raw facts, whether auditory (spoken) or visual (written), without the slightest effort is just about gone. If children did not hear words until they were six years old, we would have another staggering educational problem to match the present staggering reading problem and a flood of books with titles like Why Johnny Can't Talk.

It is easier to teach a five-year-old to read than it is to teach a six-year-old. It is easier at four than at five, easier at three than at four, easier at two than at three, easier at one than at two and easiest of all (for the baby) below one.

The superb truth is that babies take in raw facts such as written and spoken words at a rate that no adult could come close to matching.

Babies are linguistic geniuses and no adult who values his ego should get himself into a foreign language learning contest with any baby. To your eleven-day-old baby, English is a foreign language. By three he'll have completely functional use of English, which he'll speak with a perfect American accent. Don't you try to match that three years from now with a foreign language you heard for the first time eleven days ago.

In order for a baby to learn spoken words, there are three requirements from a neurophysiological standpoint. The words must be spoken loudly, clearly, and repeatedly in order for his immature auditory pathway to understand and remember. All mothers understand this instinctually and speak to their babies in loud, clear, repeated words. The result is that all well babies have a functional use of their mother tongue by three. Indeed, it is this very process of speaking to a baby in a loud, clear, repeated voice that physically grows his brain's auditory pathway.

Learning to understand spoken language through the ear is not a school subject, it is a brain function. So also is learning language through the eye a brain function rather than a school subject.

Why, then, do not all babies learn to read spontaneously as they learn to speak spontaneously?

The problem is that we have made the print too small.

In order for a baby to read words, there are three requirements. The print must be large, clear, and repeated. The baby's immature visual pathways are not able to deal with small print. Indeed, it is the very process of showing the baby large words which physically grow and mature his brain's visual pathway.

All that the mother of a two-year-old has to do to prove this to herself is to get a piece of white poster board, with a red marker print the word Mommy clearly in letters six inches high, and show it to her baby a half dozen times an hour apart, saying in a happy excited voice, "This says Mommy."

Don't test him; just tell him. Soon he'll tell you. Hundreds of thousands of mothers have taught their babies to read this way, which is a wonderful thing indeed.

by Glenn Doman,

Founder of The Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential

Why is reading to my baby good for him?

Reading will help build your child's vocabulary, stimulate his imagination, and improve his communication skills. In fact, the more you speak to your child from the get-go, the better it is for his growth and development. Studies have shown that language skills — and even intelligence — are related to how many words an infant hears each day. In one study, babies whose parents spoke to them a lot (an average of 2,100 words an hour) scored higher on standard tests when they reached age 3 than did children whose parents hadn't been as verbal. A running commentary on the state of the neighborhood during your walk and naming your child's body parts as you bathe him are good ways to chat. Reading is one more fun way to add variety to your verbal interactions.

But my baby doesn’t seem interested!”
Newborns may not respond to your reading, so it may be difficult to tell if they’re really even listening or benefiting from your efforts. But, you will see that with time, your baby will begin to understand the routine, be curious about the book you’re holding, show interest in the pictures and generally, begin to enjoy reading time. The advantage of starting early(if you want to) is that by the time your baby is 6 months old or ready to observe pictures and register words, she would already be familiar with the books. She would already have a head start and you will actually have to put in very little effort to get her interested in reading with you

Early Childhood

Early childhood is an important phase in the life of human beings. It may prove to be a troublesome time for the parents of toddlers since they have to be extremely conscious about the child’s physical care. The biological and brain development of children during the first few years of their lives depend entirely on the quality of stimulation that is evoked by their environment – at all the three levels of family, community, as well as the society.

Studies have indicated that the first three years of a child’s life are extremely crucial for both the emotional and intellectual development.

According to James J. Heckman, “Early childhood interventions of high quality have lasting effects on learning and motivation”.
Early childhood development is actually an umbrella term encompassing a child’s social, emotional, language, literacy, physical, creative, and cognitive development. All these developmental stages are inter-related. They collectively contribute to the all-round development of the child. However, children develop their milestones at their own pace.

Therefore, it is imperative for parents to give special attention to the needs of their children. Early child development is thus a lifelong determinant of well-being, health, and learning skills of the child in the future. Here are some important aspects of early childhood development that parents need to be aware of:

1. The first six years of life are extremely crucial for the growth and development in children. As a matter of fact, their mental growth is accelerated when they receive adequate attention, love and affection, mental stimulation, and encouragement. Preschool child development occupies a pivotal position in the lives of the infants. It is during this phase that parental responsibilities towards the growing child become most important. It has been proved by research studies that children tend to develop a more extensive vocabulary if their parents involve them in frequent conversations.

2. Early childhood is an exploratory age when kids begin to discover their surroundings. It is an imitative age as well. Kids start picking up the mannerisms, speech, and actions of elders around them. Parents therefore should be appropriate in their behavior in front of children. Research has identified the particularly critical areas in early childhood development: vision, logical thinking, language, music, and emotion. These are considered as "windows of opportunity", and should be considered as important aspects of their development.

3. In early childhood, behavior problems seem to be more troublesome and frequent as compared to problems related to the physical care of children. If their actions are unsupervised, they might grow up to be disobedient, obstinate, antagonistic, and stubborn. Parents should pay extra attention to the needs of their children.The social behavior of individuals at a grown up stage is determined by the way they have been nurtured by parents during their early childhood years. Therefore, it is extremely crucial to ensure that children are not only provided with proper nutrition and education, but also protected from abuse, harm, and discrimination.

The state of early childhood development, when measured with a comparable approach, results in the betterment of the child and subsequently, the entire community

How do Get ready for Primary 1?

5 Ways to Develop Your Child's Curiosity!

A very important part of childhood is the awareness of the five senses in the body. As children learn to observe their surroundings, they begin to both identify and distinguish between sounds, sights, tastes, smells, and sensations. They develop a sense of curiosity about themselves and the world around them, and this in turn helps them understand their own selves. In fact, curiosity also fosters a feeling of learning, which can prove to be of great help in the future.

Parents may often feel irritated while answering the numerous questions children come up with. But it is necessary to understand that for a child, everything around him/ her is new, and hence exciting. This latent inquisitiveness of children leaves them awestruck at almost everything they look at.

Children are naturally curious from early infancy. From the tender age of eight months, a child’s brain starts posing questions. Physical activities stimulate the curiosity in children, and since they are naturally curious about their surroundings, they explore their environment mostly while playing. In fact, the latest medical trends in child development encourage parents to foster the sense of curiosity among kids.

According to noted pediatrician and author Thomas Berry Brazelton, “As a child becomes more adept at handling their body, their hands become freer, more exciting, and more available for learning”.

How can you develop your child’s curiosity?

1. Games and other physical activities are perhaps the best way to inculcate curiosity among children. They are basically inquisitive about their toys and belongings. Hence, parents must develop interesting play activities that will help your child to quench his/her curiosity. Science toys can be a good tool to develop curiosity in the infant brain.

2. Parents should encourage children to explore their natural surroundings. This external exploration paves the way for introspection which in turn inspires curiosity.

3. Children should be encouraged to ask questions. As we all know, having answers to questions is the first step towards satiating the basic thirst for knowledge.

4. Kids should be encouraged to look for answers to their questions. This will give them more confidence and also enhance their understanding of things around them.

5. Parents must teach children to be good observers. Keen observation is the perfect complement for a curious mind. Parents should also help to improve their child’s attention span. Higher level of attention leads to enhanced degrees of curiosity.

It’s good to be curious!

• Curiosity broadens the child’s mind. A broader mind helps in a holistic development of the child.

• A curious child is always actively seeking answers. This curiosity propels them towards unraveling the mysteries of daily life.

• Curiosity makes children good receptors, and capable of grasping new concepts easily. Thus, curiosity enhances a child’s potential to learn.

Curiosity plays a pivotal role in the mental and intellectual improvement of a child. A child’s inquisitiveness leads to valuable exploration, and exploration is the key to learning. Curiosity should never be suppressed or else it can have an adverse impact on a child’s early development. As John Holt says, "Children do not need to be made to learn" since they are already born with what Einstein called "the holy curiosity of inquiry". So encourage the curious side of your children and watch them grow into knowledgeable and mature individuals!

Start your baby really young on languages!

How will my child learn to read?

Learning to read does not happen all at once. It involves a series of stages that lead, over time, to independent reading and to fluency.

The best time for children to start learning to read is when they are very young, usually at the preschool level. This is when they are best able to start developing basic reading skills.

The stages involved in learning to read are listed below.

1. The pre-reader and the beginning reader:

likes to look at books and likes to be read to

likes to behave like a reader – for example, holds books and pretends to read them

learns about words by looking at picture books and playing with blocks that have letters on them, magnetic letters, and so on

learns about words from songs, rhymes, traffic signs, and logos on packages of food

learns how text works – for example, where a story starts and finishes and which way the print proceeds

begins to understand that his or her own thoughts can be put into print

uses pictures and memory to tell and retell a story

2. The emerging reader:

is ready to receive instructions about reading

learns that text is a common way to tell a story or to convey information

begins to match written words to spoken words and to perceive relationships between sounds and letters

begins to experiment with reading, and is willing to try to say words out loud when reading simple texts

finds the pictures helpful in understanding the text, and learns that the words convey a message consistent with the pictures

3. The early reader:

develops more confidence and uses a variety of methods, such as relying on visual cues, to identify words in texts

adapts his or her reading to different kinds of texts

recognizes many words, knows a lot about reading, and is willing to try new texts

4. The fluent reader:

thinks of reading as a good thing and does it automatically

uses a variety of methods to identify words and their meanings

can read various kinds of texts and predict events in a story

relates the meaning of books to his or her own experience and knowledge, and understands what is new

It takes time to pass through each of these stages, and your child will need plenty of attention and support as he or she moves through them. You can play a leading role in helping your child acquire the reading skills he or she needs to succeed!

Tips for Sharing Books With Babies And Toddlers

The first—and best—tip for sharing books with young children is to have fun together. If children are engaged and enjoying themselves, they are learning. When children have positive interactions with books, they are developing good feelings about reading, which will motivate them to continue seeking out books and other literacy materials as they grow.

Here are some other ideas for nurturing early literacy skills in your baby or toddler:

A Few Minutes at a Time is OK. And don't worry if you don't finish the story.
Young children can only sit for a few minutes for a story, but as they grow, they will be able to sit longer. Let your child decide how much (or how little) time you spend reading. And you don't need to read every page. You may find that your child has a favorite page or even a favorite picture. She may want to linger there for a while, and then switch books or activities. Babies may just want to mouth the book! That's okay. When you let your child explore books in the ways that interest her, the reading experience will be more meaningful.

Talk or Sing About the Pictures
You do not have to read the words to tell a story. Try "reading" the pictures in a book for your child sometime. When your child is old enough, ask him to read the pictures to you!

Let Children Turn the Pages
Babies cannot yet turn pages on their own, but an 18-month-old will want to give it a try, and a three-year-old can certainly do it alone. Remember, it's OK to skip pages!

Show Children the Cover Page
Explain what the story is about. If you have an older toddler, ask them to guess what the story might be about.

Show Children the Words
Run your finger along the words as you read them, from left to right.

Make the Story Come Alive
Create voices for the story characters and use your body to tell the story.

Make It Personal
Talk about your own family, pets, or community when you are reading about others in a story.

Ask Questions About the Story, and Let Children Ask Questions Too!
Use the story to have a back-and-forth conversation with your child. Talk about familiar activities and objects you see in the illustrations or read about in the story.

Let Children Tell The Story
Children as young as three years old can memorize a story, and many children love to be creative through storytelling.

Create Books Together
Make photo books of family members. Cut pictures out of magazines or catalogs to make word books. Make a color book by having fun with crayons, markers, and paints. As your child gets older, have him or her dictate a story to you and then draw pictures to go with the words.

Make Books a Part of Your Daily Routine
The more that books are woven into children's everyday lives, the more likely they will be to see reading as a pleasure and a gift.

At Meal Times
Sing or read a story during a moment of quiet nursing or to gather the kids around the noisy breakfast table.


In the Car or On the Bus
Keep a few books in the car or in your diaper bag to keep your little ones quiet and busy.


At Child Care Drop Off
Calm a crying child at good-bye time with a favorite story or lullaby. Leave a photo book with pictures of loved family members at child care so your child can flip through it when she is missing you.


At the Doctor's Office
Read or tell a soothing story to your little one in the waiting room and sing or talk through the scary parts of the visit. Before the visit, read books about going to the doctor so your child knows what to expect.


At the Grocery Store
Put a few board books in the shopping cart or tie a cloth book to the shopping cart so you're not cleaning up books from the floor as you go!


At Nap Time
Familiar routines always help babies calm down. Use books and stories to quietly ease your baby to sleep.


At Day's End
You are exhausted, the baby is fussy. Lie down on the floor surrounded by books. Play a book on tape for your baby. Sing a song together while you all try to relax a bit.


At Bath Time
Plastic bath time books are great fun and may help a fussy baby enjoy the tub a little more.


At Bed Time
Soothing books and stories can work magic with babies who fight sleep!

Try this in your child! --- Don't Eat Your Marshmallow,Yet!

Law of Diminishing Ability

Intelligence: Nature Vs Nurture

A person's learning and ability derives from a combination of genetics and environment. Nature may include some form of cognitive inherits from parents, and nurture includes the process of inferential and experiential learning that registers in the brain.

There are many components to intelligence. Memory, comparative behaviour, planning behaviour, classification, choice of inputs and outputs, language etc.

One important element is the use of time, not only "quality" but quantity time. Intelligence involves elements of knowing what is right or neccessary, but without proper guidance or mentoring, this intelligence is applied " selectively" in the face of benefits and threats. Thus, it is important to guide the children in coupling intelligence with values and applications for a healthy individuals, and not intelligence as a unit only.

Song for MUMS

Genius Starts from 0 age!

 

10 Reasons To Read To Your Child!!

We all know that learning to read is important, but as parents what do we do to facilitate this milestone?

Reading to your child has many benefits one of which is simply having time to snuggle together.

Here are 10 reasons to read to your child.

1.When you read to your child, he/she will learn that reading is important to you, therefore reading will become important to him/her.

2.The more your child hears sounds, the better he/she will process these sounds into words. When a child is preschool/kindergarten age the listening word starts to become the written word.

3.Reading has a calming effect on a restless or fussy baby. Who doesn’t want an easy way to calm a fussy baby?

4.Reading is a wonderful before bed routine. Studies have shown that a child will thrive in an atmosphere in which routines are present.

5.Reading will help to develop your child’s imagination. Have you ever gotten lost in a good book? Your child can do the same while you are reading to him/her.

6.Reading will foster your child’s ability to listen and pay attention. With all the problems we here about concerning attention spans this is a great way to avoid that.

7.Reading to a young child will teach him/her the correct way to hold a book and turn the pages.

8.Reading to your child will develop in him/her the desire to become a reader.

9.Teachers will thank you

10.When a child is read a personalized story book, he/she will be able to recognize his/her name in print at an early age.

Isn’t it exciting to think that you can have such an effect on your child’s ability to read just by reading to him/her? You have the power to develop a life long joy of reading and learning in your child. WOW! Just read.

How To Read Aloud to Your Child from Young

When you read aloud to your child, is it a rewarding experience or an exercise in frustration? Here are some ways to help ensure an enjoyable experience for both of you when you read aloud, with children's books that make great read alouds and effective reading aloud techniques.

You don't have to wait for your baby to get to a certain age to begin reading children's books to him. Start now!

Continue reading aloud to your child until he is at least 10 years old. Children continue to benefit from listening to others read long after they themselves have learned to read children's books.

For young children, children's books with rhyme, rhythm and repetition are excellent.

Be consistent about reading aloud to your child. Do it daily and, if possible, about the same time every day. Reading children's books right before bedtime often works well.

If you have several small children, you can read to them together. Picture books work well for this.

Don't be surprised if your children want to hear a favorite children's book again and again. That's fine. As they get to really know the story well, have them fill in words for you.

Try to choose children's books that are above your child's reading level but at the child's interest level.

Some children love reading about the same characters. If that's what your child likes, choose several short books in a series or a longer chapter book. Reading a chapter a night works well.

If your children are several years apart you will need to read to them individually as they get older to ensure that each children's book you choose is at the appropriate reading and interest level for each child.

As your child gets older and gains in reading ability, occasionally pick a book right at her reading level and take turns reading to one another.

Tips:
When reading a chapter of a children's book each night, always review what happened in the previous night's chapter before starting a new chapter.
When you begin reading aloud to a baby, you will only be able to keep your baby's attention for a few minutes. That's to be expected.
As children mature, so do their attention spans.

Importance of Reading to Baby!

Remember how you felt the first time your secret crush looked at you? That is nothing compared to your baby’s gaze at you. He looks at you in the eyes and you feel like you’re in heaven. You are then compelled to talk to him. It’s an automatic reaction. It is as if the baby is expecting you to interact with him. The truth is, your baby is really expecting something with that eye-contact!

In these moments, your “cootsie-coo” or the cute but utterly senseless “dah-dah-dah-dah,baby?” or “ ah- ba-ba-ba-ba...” babble, wouldn’t be enough. Of course, another way would be to make your baby giggle endlessly with your “peek-a-boo” However, you’re not waiting till your baby turns blue before you stop, are you?

The totally senseless sounds you make just to entertain your bundle of joy could only go on if you don’t mind being totally senseless for a longer period. Usually, it is you who gives up first. And the baby looks at you as if telling you not to stop. This is the time when you usually start talking to your baby with real words -- This is where the story-telling comes in handy.

.... and then you read to your baby.

If you have been talking to your baby while he was still inside his mother’s womb, unbeknown to you, something almost magical is unfolding with this first time face-to-face talking and reading to your baby.

He remembers your voice!

According to the latest scientific findings, a developing fetus can hiccup and actually reacts to loud noises as early as on its ninth week. Your baby dreams, can taste the food that the mother eats, and he actually starts hearing by the end of the second trimester. In fact, he can distinguish the voices of his Mom from another person.

Research shows that a fetus’ heart rate slows down when his mother is speaking – this means he is calmed by the mother’s voice. Furthermore, the fetus responds to a familiar story (a story that has been repeatedly read to him while he’s inside the womb) and he prefers to listen to it over a new story read to him after birth.

Although there are no scientific findings to show that the baby appreciates the story that you read, reading to your baby (especially if you start while he is still inside his mother’s womb) becomes his first social encounter with you – this is your first bonding. Your voice becomes one of the first stimuli that he can identify with and connect to you. It would then become very important for the Mom to read aloud to the baby while he is inside the womb. Well, you can just talk but it would appear crazy, right? Besides, if you just ramble on, you might forget yourself and you might end up talking about something that pisses you off.

Here are some simple tips for reading to your baby:

• Pick a book that will become your baby’s favourite. Don’t worry if you find your baby prefers one single book read to him over and over. Don’t insist on introducing new ones if it is not welcomed. Babies learn by repetition. They may not even understand anything about it – they just love to hear the sound of your voice, and the familiarity of the words read to him. Pick a book that has simple, repetitive words. It would be better if the words rhyme, so you can read it in a sing-song voice.

• Pick a book with simple and large pictures of familiar objects against solid backgrounds. It would also help if it is one of those board books that could survive the baby’s hands, spit, and bites. You would also want to make sure it is always clean as the baby would always want to put it in his mouth.

• When reading, you don’t need to always start from the first page. You can immediately go to the baby’s favourite page (it might be because of the picture, or it might be because it is the part where your reading becomes very expressive – read with exaggerated voice expression; use different voices for different story characters; make animal sounds, or say “chug-chug-chug...tooot! toot!” when you’re reading about a train. You don’t have to finish the book in every sitting, too. Remember, the baby still does not understand the story.


• When reading, you don’t have to totally leave everything to what the author has written. You may interrupt the story every now and then to interact with the baby (this is specially so if the baby can already respond or point), e.g., “See? There’s goes the baby duck...Where’s the baby duck? Yes...that’s the baby duck. It goes, ‘quack! Quack’. What’s the sound of the duck?” Or point at the drawings or pictures and say, “This is the house. It is a red house...” etc.

The first five years of a human being’s life are a time of incredible growth and learning. Reading to your child gives him his first encounter with words, colors, numbers, letters and shapes. Constantly reading to your baby imprints these concepts in their minds. Reading becomes a part of your baby’s life. As months pass, notice how your baby behaves when he sees you holding his favourite book. He may even try to grab it from you, may help you flip the pages, point at objects, or he may even surprise you with a “Quack! Quack!” when he sees the duck.

Are you the tyical asian parents?

Baby reading at 12mth old. So when can I start for my child?

It was a battle between nurture and nature. Does the brain develop according to a set of defined limits set by the genes or does intellectual stimulation affect the development and growth of the brain. The studies are still going on but since Beth Lucy Wellman’s* time in 1940’s, there have been more and more studies to support the theories that it is intellectual stimulation that ‘Turns on” the synapses in the brain. Once ‘on’, these pathways or synapses continue to work and get stronger throughout a lifetime. It is also assumed that these synapses if not ‘turned on’, are eliminated. Basically, the brain operates on a use it or lose it basis.
It is pretty complicated how it all works in the brains but to simplify it. The brain is made up of neurons, or brain cells, which connect to one another through synapses. when the brain is developing, the millions of neurons are ‘switched on’ by individual electrical currents. If two neurons are coupled, but they are not electrically active together, then those synapses are pruned or lost*. This is how experience literally wires the brain.

What does that mean for parents?

It means that the former years of life are very important for getting the brain set up for learning. Many experts believe that the most important years of a child’s development are those before school age. Fifty percent of the ability to learn is developed in the first four years of a child’s life and another thirty percent by the age of eight. There is a lot of emphasis placed on parents to talk and read to their children. Equally important is that the children are provided with different learning experiences each time. Information and the method of delivery should be tailored to the needs of the child with visual, verbal and written information available to be absorbed

Baby can Read?

Quiz: Are you teaching your child to love reading?

Children who enjoy books make better readers and better overall students. Take our quiz to learn whether you're doing all you can to raise a book lover.

1. How many books are in your child's room?
a. Less than the number of shoes in my closet.
b. None; books are shelved in the family library.
c. Approaching the number in our public library's children's section.


1. The best answer is c. Your should immerse your child in books and have a variety at hand for whenever he's in the mood to read. Keeping books in your child's room, along with toys and games, will reinforce reading as a fun activity. If you don't want to spend money on new books, shop at used-book stores or stock up weekly at the library.

2. What do you usually do when your child has free time?
a. Read together for a while, then have him read or flip through books alone.
b. Encourage him to go play alone so you can have some time to yourself.
c. Suggest that he watch a video.


2. The best answer is a. Encourage your child to read whenever he has some downtime or is bored. You may face some tough competition from the television set, but try at least to set aside some time every evening for books. Reading with your child is a great way to share a fun experience and to introduce your child to more challenging material. Try to spend part of the time reading to your child, and if he's able, also encourage him to read alone.

3. When do you read books?
a. After my child is asleep; it's the only quiet time I have all day.
b. I don't have time to read.
c. In front of my child, whenever I can.


3. The best answer is c. Your child wants to be just like you. If you read in front of him and keep novels and books around the house, your child will want to read too.

4. When was the last time you took your child to the library?
a. It's been so long I can't remember.
b. Last week.
c. Sometime during the last three months or so.


4. The best answer is b. Take regular trips to the library, as often as your child wants to (within reason, of course). It's a good way for him to try out new books and authors, and it's free! If you take regular trips, you can also check bulletin boards for upcoming library events such as story times and book clubs. Make your child feel like a regular, and get him a library card in his own name.

5. If your child only wanted to read or look at comic books, what would you do?
a. Say no and encourage a quality book instead.
b. Say, "Great!" and buy more of them.
c. Agree to a few comic books per week as long as my child reads other books, too.


5. The best answer is c. Your job is to make reading fun and to teach your child to love books. If comic books are doing the trick, by all means encourage them, but continue to offer more challenging reads, too. Eventually you'll hit on something that's as appealing to your child as the comics.

6. What do you do when your child picks out books that are too difficult?
a. Say that the book is too advanced and put it back on the shelf.
b. Read the book quickly to my child, skimming over hard words and advanced concepts, and then move on to easier books.
c. Read the book with my child, explaining the hard words and discussing the story as we go.


6. The best answer is c. Encourage your child to try any book that's interesting, even if it seems too difficult. You can always read these more difficult books to your child. Take the opportunity to introduce new words, and discuss the story as you go to make sure your child comprehends it.

7. If your child wants to hear the same story over and over again and you're losing your mind, what do you do?
a. Pretend to lose the book.
b. Read it as often as my child wants to hear it but suggest other books as well.
c. Tell my child I'll read the book only once a week.


7. The best answer is b. Children who are learning to read like repetition, rhymes, and word patterns, and they love to hear books repeatedly. Indulge them. This repetition helps your child memorize the story, which is an important part of learning to read. Encourage your child to finish some of the sentences in the book or to "read" entire passages from memory.

8. If your child doesn't feel like reading, what do you do?
a. Require at least 30 minutes of reading a night, no matter what.
b. Take my child to the library and bookstore to look for books that appeal to his interests.
c. Let it go and figure the problem will take care of itself.
d. I don't ever have this problem — my child loves to read.


8. The best answer is b. Your child may be avoiding books because he hasn't found any that engage him. Show him that reading can provide information about whatever he's interested in — dinosaurs, cars, fairy godmothers, movie stars, magic tricks — and he'll be turning pages in no time! A child who doesn't love books and reading may have problems in school down the road, so don't ignore his lack of interest. You should also consider having his eyesight checked. Vision problems can make reading frustrating.

9. Which of the following best describes your child's favorite book?
a. It's falling apart because we read it every night.
b. I don't know. My child does most of his reading at school, not at home.
c. It's at the library. I don't want my child to read the same book over and over at home.


9. The best answer is a. If you've been reading to your child since he was a baby, you should have a couple of books that are well worn by now (Eric Carle's Very Hungry Caterpillar, for example, is a favorite of 1-year-olds and kindergartners alike). Because memorization is an important part of learning to read, you should continue to read old favorites until your child says he's had enough.

10. How often do you read with your child?
a. Once a week or less.
b. Wherever and whenever he wants to.
c. One hour every night, whether he wants to or not.


10. The best answer is b. Reading should be part of everyday life, and you should try to make room for it in your child's daily routine with a book or two just before bedtime, say, or right after dinner. But don't force your child to read if he's not in the mood. Reading should be fun, not a chore or assignment.

The first post!

I'm starting this blog to log down all the experiences that I have accumulated over the past decade of my experience as a education consultant.



I am a father to a lively, inquisitive 2 year old toddler. As a parent myself, I want the best for my child and hopes to share my knowledge on how to create a conducive home learning environment that can bring out the best in your child. So lets' start this sharing journey.