DS can't recognise colours...

[RunningDay]

He's only 2.5, so perhaps I shouldn't worry yet, but it's a bit strange. He can't even tell the difference between red, blue, and yellow. He knows the names but gets them wrong.

On the other hand, he can recognise all kinds of shapes (oval, square, crescent, circle, star, heart, gets triangle/rectangle confused sometimes though).

Should he be able to tell the difference between basic colours by this stage? I find it odd that his colour and shape recognition seem so out of sync.

He has obviously just learned the shapes first. At this age I definitely wouldn't worry. My little boy knew colours early but not so consistent with shapes.

It will even out by school age.

I don't think it's odd - most preschoolers learn colour at their first year in preschool, so he is not behind, just a little bit ahead maybe on his shapes. But you could play a couple of games to help him along.

Why not get a few different colour pieces of paper and put them on the floor and select some toys that he has to put on the "right" colour? My boys used to love playing this and I think it helped them learn. Also, you could get a load of playballs and get him to throw them to you and you shout the colour (together when he is ready).

Ds1 knew all his colours by the time he was 2. Ds2 on the other hand didn't appear to even be able to differentiate them at 2.5. However just before his third birthday he went from no clue (couldn't find a matching red block for example) to knowing all the basic colours within a week. The key for him was watching the Disney film cars. I started saying lightning red, chick hick green (car name followed by car colour). Suddenly he cared enough to learn them!

Thanks for the responses

Good idea of turning into a game schmee and LittleMissGreen, I tried a bit today but he got bored when he couldn't get the right answers. Maybe it will work better with a transport theme!

Though I do suspect that it was particular iPhone app that made him learn his shapes, rather than any other books/activities we've been doing!

Thomas (the tank engine) is brilliant for this kind of stuff - and later for number recognition. Is he into that at all? We had a book "percy is a green engine, Gordon is a blue engine" etc that was really good. And I bet they have something on their website you could play.

I think with the games, we did the playball one for ages first and it was the fun of throwing something at Mummy that kept their interest

Apparently it's quite common with boys that they're better with movement but not so good with colours and patterns. If you think about it colour blindness also affects more men than women. Not saying your DS is colour blind, just explaining that boys can struggle a bit more with their colours.

DS2 is 2.2 and knows his basic shapes but always gets the colours wrong. It hadn't occurred to me to worry about it, I'm fairly sure he'll get it when he's a bit older. DS1 is 4.5 and still gets purple and brown the wrong way round, but knows the rest of them.

I'd wouldn't worry about it at all, until he reaches school. Boys are late with everything.

DS2 is 2.6 and has known most colours for about 3 months now although he had real issues with red and green (to the point we thought he might be colour-blind) although he seems to have got over that now.

However, he does not know his shapes (apart from the unusual ones like 'star') and he cannot count consistently.

They are all different and develop differently - as a previous poster says, it will all even out by the time they go to school

Can he match colours but just gets the name wrong? Eg. If you have red car, can he put it on the red spot? At ds' 2yr check the hv said a lot of children don't know the names of colours but can still match them.

I was really concerned about my dd1 when she was 2/3 years. All the other children seemed to know their colours and she did not. I tried teaching her/ playing games/ doing 1 colour at a time but nothing worked. She knew shapes/ words/ counting etc just not colours. Eventually she just clicked but I can't remember when. hth

I was sure that dd1 was going to be colourblind. She knew her alphabet upper and lower case and was typing messages on the computer before she recognised any colours.
She was nearly 3 before she properly knew them, but she learnt them all at once, so she would call something turquoise, or maroon or beige as likely as blue or red or brown.
I think it's what interests them. She was interested in letters and not so much in colours.

ds1 suddenly clicked with colours just before 3yo. before then couldn't distinguish red, yellow, green, but ok with pink, purple and brown. still doesn't do the fancy stuff like turquoise!

Thanks for the game suggestions Roo83 and schmee, I'll try those.

And thanks for everyone's comments, I'll stop worrying about it for now. There's plenty of time and hopefully he's not colourblind, but even that's not the end of the world.

I have realised he does know two colours, orange and "chocolate" .

Actually, there's a thought, I could try a food angle .