AIBU RE teaching babies to read

[Graut]

Sparked by a discussion on a FB group I am in for parents of bilingual children.

Someone was talking about how her 20-month-old was reading in two languages and my first instinct was a mixture of a) scepticism and b) feeling sorry for the poor little boy to have been hot-housed in that way.

But some of her arguments reminded me that I've been criticised as a parent for taking our babies to baby swimming (should 'let them be babies' and not try to 'force their development' and what have you). I've always felt that baby swimming is just something that some babies enjoy and if it helps their physical development then all the better (note that the babies in our classes are not actually learning to swim, it's just kind of like baby gym in the water with lots of singing etc). I found it annoying and unjustified when people accused me of being competitive about my kid's development or of pushing them when as I saw it, we were all just having fun.

This mother said her baby enjoyed learning to read and why delay learning for no reason. I still strongly think that earlier is not 'better' when it comes to reading and have no intention of trying to teach my baby (or indeed my 3 yr old) to read, but WIBU to negatively judge the practice of teaching babies to read? Am I just underestimating babies to think that they shouldn't be reading?

Unless the child is speaking coherently in 2 languages, she is talking nonsense! How did she know what/if they are reading?

I don’t believe a 2 year old can read. They may be able to recognise known words that have been drilled into them (flash card style) but that is repetition not reading

Well, she claimed that he has an 'extensive vocabulary' in three languages, actually! But only reading in two, so clearly a bit slow...

Tell her your baby got their 100m badge last week

20 month olds cannot read, she is ridiculous.

My DS is 2.3 and “reads” a couple of his favourite books. What he actually does is knows the story by heart and recognise the picture on each page and recites it. I am under no illusions that he can read or be taught to read at this age.

It’s a fact that bi/multi lingual children acquire language later than those learning one language. Nothing to do with intelligence or good genes - kids learn at their own pace.

My 2 yr old can recognise a few simple words that she sees most often in the books I read to her but I would not describe it as reading, My 7yr old daughter is bilingual and actually attends a school where they don't speak English at all she only started to learn to read in English after Easter, although she had picked up a few words before that by sounding the letters out but nothing formal, she is now reading above her age standard and is flying through the reading system. Bilingual children do benefit from learning two languages and it does improve cognitive processes there is plenty of research on this, I'm not sure how early this would manifest itself though.

I could read at 2. My parents have me on tape. I was enrolled at the library at 2 1/2 and the staff were laughing about it until DM lifted me onto the counter and I read to them. I remember it clearly.
On the other hand, DB had no interest in reading so DM didn't pursue it with him and he learned a lot later.
I tried teaching DS to read at a young age but he wasn't that keen either, however I did notice that he was expert in memorising the books that I read regularly to him, even down to the correct text for each page. He looked like he was reading, but he wasn't.

So, it could be any of the above.

Probably a bit of exaggeration going on, but I applaud her for making the effort. Tbh, I think children benefit when parents try to introduce their kids to reading and writing before starting school. Even if just recognising graphemes and making simple cvc words with them.

Unless the child is speaking coherently in 2 languages, she is talking nonsense!

If the baby is exposed to two languages she probably is talking understandably in both. The reading on the other hand just sounds silly. Way too young! It is possible to teach kids the alphabet etc at that age (although I don't know why you'd want to) but very unlikely they're ready to read sounds like bragging.

Oh dear, competitive mum-upmanship gone bonkers. The child is not "reading" at 20 months. At the most they're parroting by recognition in exactly the same way a parrot would. It's the very beginnings of how we learn to read but it's not reading as such. Don't waste your time getting involved in that type of discussion, it's just a waste of time and brain space and causes parents of completely normal babies to worry for absolutely no reason.

😂😂😂

My brother could read at 2 ish... by 3 he would read to me whilst DM would go for a rest

I have no idea if he was hot housed at that age but DM was very pushy of us our whole childhood. She says we could all read really well (4 kids) before we went to school age 4. We didn't have a tv though...

It’s a fact that bi/multi lingual children acquire language later than those learning one language.

Well, that's not universally true. My eldest acquired both her languages on an entirely typical timeframe. At 20 months she had a lot of words (though I wouldn't say extensive vocabulary! ), comparable to monolingual peers although she mixed her languages a lot at that stage and often spoke the 'wrong' language to people so you could certainly say her language development was different to those learning one language.

But bilingualism/multilingualism is not really what I'm talking about here, that was just a bit of background context! I'm fully in favour of raising children with more than one language, seeing as I'm doing it myself!

Infant literacy was what I was talking about.

"It’s a fact that bi/multi lingual children acquire language later than those learning one language." Is it! No one told my DC ...

I could read at late 2, DS at 3.

I was always interested though, in books, letter formations etc. DS more with numbers. He was recognising numbers at 12 months and at his 12 month check, instead of stacking bricks, read the numbers to the HV first. It was hilarious and not my doing at all I blame the Numberjacks

If a child is interested in something, there's nothing wrong in developing it. Forcing them on the other hand is horrible.

DS has evened out nicely and is slightly higher than his peers, but I can see that becoming equal as he goes to secondary school. Just because a child does something quickly as a baby doesn't mean they'll stay that way.

She is talking shit. She seeks to be one of those mothers that you would say your child can say mama and her child can recite the dictionary. Call her out on it, video proof! Lol x

One of my friends could apparently read before she was 3; she was also very early to speak in full, grammatically correct sentences. She brings this up weirdly often, I think because her parents also still go about it a lot. She's done perfectly fine/pretty well in life, but if I lined up all my friends' CVs and academic qualifications you wouldn't be able to pick her out. It is not a sign of special genius.

What i was trying to say is, it doesn't really matter kids find their pace on learning language, I would suggest unless some one hands the 20 month old a random book and asks her to read it you'll not know if she can or not. I don't think it is healthy to push a child into formal learning they absorb so much just through normal play, so i would feel a little sad for a child so small to be sat down being forced to learn to read if that were the case.

Reading a bit at 2 isn't that unusual - most of it is whole word recognition, but some letter recognition happens too. There's nothing wrong with encouraging it, as long as you're going along with what the child is interested in and not forcing it.

They all tend to catch up by the end of Yr1 anyway.

This child is definitely actively 'taught' to read using a specific programme. It's not a case of just a child having a strong interest in letters and prodigious talent and working it out by themselves.

But if a baby does enjoy being taught to read, is it a bad thing? That was my question, really, because I know I instinctively felt that it was a bad thing to 'push' literacy onto very young children and then began to question if I was BU, if you see what I mean.

I heard a child expert the other day who said he had a child who could read at 8 months, I can't even imagine what that looks like.... he was asked what gifted child had amazed him the most in his line of work. He said reading by 1yr old was also documented many times over (not exactly common, but common in the "prodegy child").

Not common though as it would really need to be accompanied by other forms of communication (or how do you know that the child is reading 'house' or 'cat' unless they can say, point to or act out the word).

Are all these kids who were reading a 2 or 3 world class novelists and rocket scientist types now?

FWIW I couldn't talk until I was two and a half in only one language and now I'm so articulate I've actually run out of words to describe my level of articulacy, despite my articulacy. So I'm like, at metaphysics level of articulate. Despite not starting til late.

It's not a bad thing if they enjoy it. Is it "Your Baby Can Read"?

8 months?