What methods are there for teaching babies?
Before you can decide what to teach your child, you need to know what's out there. This used to involve trawling the internet and/or library, but not anymore!
The team at BrillBaby has done the work for you and collected together information on all the best teaching programs available!
Here's a summary of what's on offer...
Glenn Doman Method
A physical therapist, Glenn Doman is the founder of the Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential (IAHP), a nonprofit organization that teaches parents how to maximize the potential of their brain-damaged or normal child. The Doman program for normal children covers everything from reading, math and encyclopedic knowledge to physical excellence. Lessons are presented at speed using flash cards to facilitate right-brain learning. Following the program takes commitment, as some subjects require repetitions of six times per day. More information can be found on BrillBaby and through Doman's books, which are available from the Gentle Revolution Press.
Shichida Method
Makoto Shichida is a veteran researcher of preschool education methods, and another proponent of right-brain learning. The Shichida Method of accelerated learning for young children is available through special schools in Japan, Malaysia and Singapore. Outside the Shichida schools, specific details of the program are hard to come by. It is expensive to attend a Shichida school, and waiting lists are long.
Signing Time and Baby Signing Time
The TV program Signing Time (ST) offers what is probably the easiest way to teach your child American Sign Language (ASL). With its high production values, wonderful original music and engaging host (Rachel Coleman), ST makes learning to sign fun for preverbal babies and children of all abilities – as well as their parents. ST is designed for kids aged one and up, with Baby Signing Time designed for babies aged zero to three. For more on the benefits of signing with your baby, go to the Signing article on BrillBaby.
Your Baby Can Read
Infant researcher Robert Titzer taught his daughters to read as babies using personalized books and videos. His success led him to create the Your Baby Can Read (YBCR) DVD series that teaches babies aged three months and up to read dozens of whole words. Although YBCR does not teach phonics, Titzer says his elder daughter intuited the rules of phonics by herself by around 18 months, simply through sufficient exposure to the written word.
TweedleWink
Produced by Right Brain Kids, TweedleWink is a comprehensive program of right-brain learning targeted at children between ages zero and six. Subjects include classical music, math, science, reading, poetry and perfect pitch. Flash cards, DVDs and CDs are available for purchase from the Right Brain Kids website.
The Little Reader Learning System
Ideal for babies and young children, Little Reader is the most effective learning system for teaching your child to read. Suitable for children aged three months and up, Little Reader will guide your child over the course of 1 year from reading single words to complete stories. The system comes with a daily curriculum for 12 months - including over 3,000 words in 180 categories, with over 3,000 pictures, 6,000 sound files, and 460 videos.
Native Reading
Computational biologist Timothy Kailing's book, Native Reading, describes how to teach children aged one to three to read. The method involves making clear the correlations between the written and spoken forms of language. Kailing thinks this is not so much teaching as facilitating the natural learning process, and says that children learning to read at this age do so nearly subconsciously.
The Little Math Learning System
Produced by BrillKids, Little Math enables you to deliver flash card-style math lessons on your home computer. Very young children have the innate ability to perceive quantity – that is, to see instantly that there are 56 triangles (and not 55), or 99 squares (not 100) being shown. By tapping into this natural ability at a young age (starting before age two and a half), your child can learn to perform instant mental calculations and become a confident mathematician for life.
If you're using a teaching system that you think should be on our list, email us.