THe whole title of the book is “Einstein Never Used Flashcards: How Our Children Really Learn–and Why They Need to Play More and Memorize Less” by Kathy Hirsh-Pasek.
I haven’t read it yet but I think it promotes a lot of play over trying to teach babies to memorize stuff. We already know that babies need mostly all play and exploration so I don’t think I’m doing anything wrong by spending maybe 10 minutes a day on flashing words.
It still looks really informative though because it explains how a child’s brain actually work and how it learns and I’m interested in learning about that.
The earlier a child understands how things works, the easier it is for him to work problems out. Memory is also greatly improved.
A kid introduced to maths early on would not struggle with multiplication tables, for example, the way I do! same for languages. Try learning a new language at 20 years of age… When you are a tiny child, you learn a second language the way you learn your first, naturally.
i agree w/ hypatia…plus, from much of what I’ve read, infants and toddlers have a window of opportunity to learn before they offically start school. I don’t think flashcards are a bad thing, if you think about it, what we find on flash cards can be found in everyday life – pictures of objects, quantities of objects, etc. Flash cards are a great convenience, thank goodness!
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with teaching babies so young, besides they absolutely love learning anyway. It’s like exercising their brain and it just makes them brighter, more confident adolescents and adult.
If the book exhorts parents to encourage more natural play, there is no contradiction.
After all, how many minutes in a day of the child do we take for flashcards/ency. bits …: hardly 15 mins.
That still leaves plenty of time for ‘natural play’.
Isn’t it more fashionable to scoff at the idea…
If there are some genuine concerns leading to -ve results from flashcards, we’d be interested in knowing.
And flash cards are a good alternative to books with little children. My baby does not concentrate with a book, she’ll try to grab it, turn the pages (but closing it), wriggle on my lap etc. She only time she’ll really pay attention for about a minute is when there is something in her hands, a dummy in her mouth and she is really really tired. In which case she does not pay much attention anyway.
