To successfully sharpen and smarten your baby or toddler’s  brain, you must not believe these lies that are told about your child’s learning.   

Lie 1-You Shouldn’t Teach Your Child Until School   

Lie number one that parents believe is that their baby or toddler cannot and should not be taught to read and do math. Even with pre-schoolers, parents are told that they shouldn’t teach them too much. It is better if they start learning properly when they get to school. Hopefully, if you have read this far, you will know why this is a big lie. Ask yourself how this is working out for the 40% of fourth graders in the USA who have really, really bad reading levels.  Believing this lie will cost you and your child.   

Lie 2-A Baby Can’t Learn To Read Until They Are Around 4  

Lie number two is that a baby or toddler cannot learn to read until he or she has reached around 4 years old.   

This lie has slightly changed over time because of the many testimonies of people teaching their baby/toddler to read. And the videos of babies/toddlers reading/ recognising words posted on You tube. Also, you have seen the videos of my children at 1 and 3 years. So you know this is a lie. However, what the experts are now saying is that these children are not actually reading. They say that they don’t understand what they are reading. Let me show you why this is not true.

Of course, when anyone, even you and I read something, we don’t always understand the meaning of every word that we read.  The level of understanding will depend on the age of the person reading and the type of material they are reading. Take a toddler who is 18 months old. The experts will tell you that if they recognise words or call out words they don’t really understand what they are reading. This is not true, let me explain why. 

Let’s take the word apple. A toddler at 18 months will understand what an apple is. If you put an apple and an orange on a table.  

Then you tell an 18 month old who is used to eating both apples and oranges to go and take the apple. He or she will toddle off and pick up the apple. This shows that they understand what an apple is. Assume the same toddler has learnt to read words like apple, oranges and bananas and they see those three words on a page.  If you asked them to point to the word “apple” and they point to the correct word. How can it be said that when they point to the word “apple” they don’t understand what an actual “apple” is. They will do, because they know the object called an “apple”.    

When my fourth child at two years old would read out aloud the words,  “ The apple is red”. Because he knew at that stage what an “apple” was and understood what  “red” is he understood the meaning of ‘ The apple is red’.  

So don’t believe this lie. Your child can read from the baby/ toddler stage. Their level of understanding of the material they are reading will depend on the type of material they are reading. 

 Lie 3- It is Harmful to Teach Your Child Early   

Lie number three is that it is harmful for you to teach your child as a baby/ toddler. I struggle to understand why the so called experts want you to believe this. How exactly is teaching a child to read and do math and write going to harm a child? They say it puts them off reading later on.  I have found the opposite to be true. This view is mainly a view from Western experts.  

However, go and look at the literacy and numeracy rates in the West, especially the USA, compared with Asian countries. I have already shared statistics with you on how poor the reading levels of elementary school children in the USA are. These people seem to have suffered harm, in my view. And I can assure you that these students were not taught as babies and toddlers. I am yet to meet a parent who taught their baby or toddler to read and do math early who reported that their child suffered harm as a result.  So don’t believe this lie.   

Lie 4- Extra Classes Will Solve The Problem  

Lie number four. If a child falls behind, extra classes, tutoring or enrichment classes will solve the problem.  Extra classes will help but is unlikely to take a child from poor performance to exceptional performance. It is likely to take them to average if anything.  

Is your goal for your child to have average performance at school? If your goal is top performance then extra classes for a child who is already falling behind may not get them there. Also extra classes for a child already falling behind may stress them out.   

Remember also, prevention is better than cure. It is better that your child doesn’t fall behind in the first place.   

Now, when is the best time to start teaching your child. Let’s look at this next so you don’t make the same mistake that I made.   

Chapter 4- When Should I Start?