I teach at a university in the education department.

These kinds of programs and these kinds of claims are nothing but detrimental to the development of your child and nothing but a big waste of money.

The best way to develop a life-long love of reading in your child is to read, read, read to him/her as much as possible and to give your child an environment very rich in print material, books, magazines, newspapers.

You can provide your child with many books in the home very inexpensively by going to garage sales and thrift shops for 10 cent or 25 cent books. Take you child to the library often and let her/him pick out several books at a time to take home and enjoy.

Read, read, read, read to your child. And make sure your child observes you reading for pleasure also!

My 3 year old grandaughter can count, knows colors and letters all because of Leapfrog and Sesame Street. We read to her quite a lot, and she likes us to move our finger along the words as we read. She knows some words by sight already. I don't think the My Baby Can Read stuff is such a good thing, at least I don't think it's necessary.

I agree with oatw13. Kids read when ready and how early they start doesn't seem to have an effect on how much they like to read. Out of my four children, the son that was the slowest to learn to read (he left first grade not reading well) tested as reading at the first year of college level by the end of fifth grade.

Read to him a lot, make sure he knows his alphabet. Once he really does, move into sounding out simple words. He'll get there - every kid does.

And make library visits a big treat so he learns to love books. I read constantly and all four of my kids do too.

The name of the game is PHONICS. It has been taught to many of America's most famous people of history. And mostly at home by busy, tired mothers.
Not the method of the year that is being taught and loses the kids' interest in a short time.

I used a book called "Why Johnny Can't Read" which had lots of words to teach and how to teach them. My son could read newspapers at age 4.

Start with writing out lots of AT words and let him put whatever letter he chooses in front of them. That way he will start easily.
For instance, take just plain AT

AT can be RAT
AT and be chased by a CAT
AT which has a HAT
AT and can be hit with a BAT
AT but could not be caught because he SAT

and that went on longer than my own length of concentration.
Families that read will raise kids more likely to read themselves, since they see others they admire doing this.
Learning to read is the basis of all education.

And if possible get a bunch of books called McGruffrey's Readers. They don't bore the kids with all the "Look at Spot" stuff that irritated my own kids, one of whom is now a teacher herself.

Dr Seuse. No Pat, no! Don't sit on that!

And do NOT take to heart any way of teaching that you feel that is not to the child's best interests.

Nothing will replace a parent's influence. Be especially careful with anyone who pushes an expensive whatever, they are mostly out for the money. Teaching a kid to read easy books is nice and fun.
Check out the old fashioned ones by Dr. Seuess. All his books are fun to listen to and finally read by himself. Then it's off to the Bobbsey Twins and then to The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew.
Contrary to what the "Experts" say, most kids do not want to read about other kids just like themselves. They want the magic of seeing and hearing about other kids who overcome great odds and win. Check out the Harry Potter books..lots and lots of publishers refused them on the grounds that they were too long, had too many hard words, were not like most kids lived, and whatever else some of their experts could come up with. I'll bet that lots of heads rolled when it was proved that little kids loved them. And adults, me included.

Save your money. This program basically teaches memorization and not real reading skills. Most kids who work through these memorization type programs have no idea how to take apart a word they have never seen before. I work with K through 4th graders and I can tell you that the best thing to do to teach your son to read is to read with him. You want engaging picture books. Have him tell you about the story as you read. Show him how to track the print with his finger. Have him predict what he thinks will happen next. Since he knows his letters, work on associating the sound with the letter. Since you already have the Leap system, he may already know some of them. Play rhyming games with him. Play sound deletion games with him (say cat, say cat without the c sound (at)). Play sound substitution games with him (say cat, change the c sound to an m sound (mat)). Make reading fun, never a chore.

I have to comment... I'm a teacher and a mom. My kids could both read/write before they started school. I read and read and read to them, usually 10-14 picture books a night for 30-45 minutes. They memorized favorite long books at age three--just from us reading them so often. Then I brought home an old Dick and Jane book--kind of a thicker one. My son was four and was so darned excited to read it to me in one night--took us a while, but he would not have stopped for anything. :lol: My daughter did the same when she was ready. The Dick and Janes give them the confidence they need to move onto other simple titles--just choose the ones they are reading carefully so their confidence soars and read, read, read to them for years and years and years.

:wink:

Some great advice here...save your money and like the majority have said...read, read, read....Make books an adventure, make shopping an adventure (lots of signs and numbers to read), even playing eye spy (I see a car...car starts with the letter "c" etc. etc.). I could read at age 4, and we didn't have any "special programmes, or TV".

I am a Nurse Home Visitor with the Nurse Family Partnership and we tell our young mothers that the time they spend reading to their child and talking to them about what they are doing with and for them throughout the day is much more helpful to the childs development than a purchased program. They not only learn about taking turns (as in a conversation), but also develop socially. That is not supported by being placed in front of a video with no human interaction.