DD Hong Kong take-away

Early Learning Early Learning General Discussions
1

Just attended the talk by DD, ended about 2 hours ago. Hmmm The Graduate is on …

Lets see what’s to take away from the talk … Great, Dissapointment, Relief, Confused, hmmm how about a little of all of it.

Great - nice to meet him in person, lots of virgin parents, enthusiastic response, and a few hard core misconstrued fans ( i guess you will always get some of those who worships everyword he says without qn.)

Dissapointment - Quite commercial like, territorial, ask you to get their latest book and read it, and best to get all his books, from the original publisher. If you say your not sure if your doing it right, he says get his books, get the latest edition as there are updates, read it first, and he left your qns unanswered. If you have other problems, he says did you read this book or that book, did you try it out the physical book etc.

Relief - that i got the gees of what he is trying to say, though he didn’t say it directly, and i know i am doing the right thing

Confused - in the sense he says they are not promoting Flash Card, IAHP is not about flash cards, its about bits of information, clear, honest, facts. And he took up a white card with the big red letters spelling some word. (I am not sure, but a baby by any other name is still a baby isn’t it?)

2

Some qns gathered on the forum by several forumers and i got some of the answers …

  1. Why do my child point to both cards in Problem solving session “which is”?
  • They don’t like testing and that is how they show their frustration. Therefore stop testing. (hmm if they are doing it its called problem solving, if your doing it it’s called testing?)
  1. Will flashing at too young a age cause short-sightedness? Can it be prevented?
  • Hmm he says something about focusing, a baby (and human baiscally) can’t focus clearly, if you put your finger out and try to focus on the thing your pointing you will see 2 fingers pointing at it, and if you focus on your finger you will see 2 of the things your pointing at. So being a baby, its important to provide a large enough, clear enough, straight forward, bits of information (his words), and even if he can’t focus 6/6 on it, at least the baby gets a somewhat view of the Bits of information. Therefore, you have to show the baby large enough word. (Of course again he doesn’t directly answer the qn.)
  1. His view on PC Flashing?
  • He says he doesn’t support flash card, IAHP is about bits of information, if so regardless of medium of delivery, its what your showing, how your showing and not on what your showing. They have CD-rom for flashing, in 5 languages, though he recommends after teaching reading, maths and EK.
  1. Do all child develops the same regardless of ability?
  • His moe of the nurture guy then the nature guy. So the more you nurture, the better.
  1. Do we let the child read out when flashing?
  • A video he shows (which is on IAHP website) shows the mother encouraging it. (But if your talking about rightmind development and its specialy ability try shichida.)
  1. Benefits of GD on delayed children?
  • Its designed for brain injured children.
  1. How to teach a 4 yr old to read?
  • Get his books. (but i can tell you what it says, teaching 1 yr old is better than 2, 2 better than 3, 3 better than 4, 4 better than 5 etc … start as young as possible. But his book also mention, if the child likes train focus on train and expand from there. It will build his interest and vocab.)

Hope it helps, he doesn’t really answer the qns directly, if you have further query about what he says, he refers you back to his books. And query you back to see if you have read his book. hmmmmmm

3

It sounds like it was a bit of a dissapointment. :frowning:

4

Basically his message is about the same, same old lecture same as in the book, not much new insight. Oh yeah he wrote a new book took him 8 yrs to write it, it’s about how to teach your baby to swim. (But teaching baby’s to swim was so 1980s/90s especially in the UK, why did he take 8 yrs to find out about its benefits it was already written so many times over?)

Get your kids to do more exercise, improves breathing, therefore less respiratory illnesses, good breath good bigger upper chest and therefore speech. Deep breathing allows more oxygen into the chest, and oxygen is the food for the brain… therefore, crawl and swim more, then creep more, then walk more, then run more … breath more, more oxygen and thus more brain matter … (hm i think dah… is an understatement).

5

Hi Purple fungi, in a way … but at least i know i am doing more than what he is trying to teach … actually aren’t we all. What i got from him was he is trying to be cautious, would only talk about achievement, and talks about professional mothers, giving their all to their children, and following what is in the book, and he quotes you his latest book, but i got it about more than 1 yr ago, “How smart is your baby” and he asked if you had compared to this so called measurement of development in his book, but it such a huge range spreading as far as 2-9 yrs apart. Its quite … anyway allow me to attach a file of what i did, its a summary of his so called development chart.

You can’t take it as 1 straight line, sometimes it zigs zags across.

Sometimes some child is faster in mobility, others understand what your saying, but not necessarily expressing verbally what they are saying.

6

I like the developmental chart. Thanks!

I guess maybe I was expecting more insight. :slight_smile:

7

So how has the talk affected me and what i am doing?

I am no professional mother or father. I read as much as i can, I seek material to explore, learn them, query them, and weigh its pros and cons, and if its good for my daughter, if it’s doable or teachable by me, if not get professional help. I try to understand her character and temperament, her wants and needs, and i try to guide them channeling her wants into something productive. Finding materials that are or will be useful in her life in the future, and that requires an understanding of futurenomics. Or the essential skills required by her to survive in the future. Also to give her a skill set, to survive, and to pursue a hobby. But as parents aren’t we all doing that.

Basically, i will continue teaching her as i did, giving her more new things to read (poor me more preparation and work needed to get more materials), in big size fonts, exercise will be stepped up, but only because summer is coming so we can swim again. I also believe in multi-teaching aids, be it DVDs, Flash cards that are not “flash cards”, or LR. But also aware that at a young age below three she shouldn’t read small font books, that if she doesn’t want to answer or speak, that i should let it be, and let her surprise me. That i should spend more time playing with her and loving her taking it easy than trying to get her into a pattern of reading and testing, not like i haven’t.

Lately, she did numeral maths 4 step combination equations and answered 3 times continuously correct. I think she was in a better mood yesterday. She was more than willing to sign, signing alot more than i myself can remember. Lately, this 2 week, every morning after milk, she would head into her play room, point to the light and switch, telling us to turnit on, wak to the cd player point to it, telling us to put in the music or a story telling cd, and then went on to pick up a book to look at it. But she is more interested in the pictures than the words. So it is we have succesfully build up a routine for her. She know what to expect each morning and she does it as if its the norm, reading a book becomes a norm. Human is quite a behavioural creature, it can be accustomed.

hmm can’t think anymore its been a long day its coming 3am gotto go sleep.

8

Well said! You get some rest. We’ll talk again later! :slight_smile:

9

Thanks for your feedback on the meeting, very useful :slight_smile:
Unfortunately a lot of good things turn to advertising whatever… :dry:

10

That’s a lot of information trinity papa…thanks for sharing your experince with, I know we know our kids more than anybody else, and for the reason we know their needs and their abilities , so we are the best teachers ever they never will get.

11

Yup you guys are right … you got the point.

After a few hours of sleep, actually culdn’t realy sleep trying to recall and replay the whole event in slow motion in my mind, a few things i miss out.

Key points about teaching your baby:

  1. The bits of information must be clear, honest, and factual bits of information.
    (Simply put, as far as i am concern, It is large, clear no clustering together with other information, like if its a bird, its only a bird not worm no trees etc, honest, meaning straight forward no two ways about it, its not an opinion, its not your view or my view or a biased view, and factual well facts.)

  2. He emphasise - frequency, intensity and duration.
    ( I guess it means do it often, do it with passion and joy with bright red words, and do it breifly)

  3. I did ask him what he thinks about multi-sensory information. There was someone who taught she knew what she was talking about, she says that is what GD is all about, but sorry missy (a 40-50y + woman) we are talking about multi-sensory information and not multi-sensory input. GD talks about multi-sensory input, as in auditory, visual, tactile, smell and taste. Input. That is level 1. I am asking about Level 2, multi-sensory information. There really isn’t level 1 or 2, but kind of like this, level 1 is the basic understanding how babies learn thru his or her 5 senses. Level 2, is more like how to make or making the info more meaningful, more informative, more explanatory, you don’t just see the word and hear the word, you don’t just see the picture and hear the word, you have a video of the object or animal and its use or its movement and its call, you feel it, its awe, its effect, its behaviour, say thru video, aka LR, YBCR etc. It’s 3 dimensional, 4 dimensional, you see a 3D image of the animal, meanng all sides, rather than like a picture (2 dimensional), and 4th dimension time, its movement over time. So you don’t just see it, hear it, but also feel it.

It’s kind of like instead of bringing your kid out to a crowded zoo, you bring the zoo to the baby, thru dvds, videos, national geographic etc. And his response was encouraging. He say to me “Good good, very good, your doing it very well”. But of course this is in response to my child at 15 mths, and i have completed his 2000+ (english) words in “not flash card” flash card bits of information.

12

Finally to conclude. Don’t take every word like a gospel to teaching your children.

GD method, if i break down correctly, its about exposure, exposure, exposure. Expose them to exercise early, expose them to reading (maths, ek, etc) early, expose them to books early. Children are curious animals, the more they move the more they want to know, learning is essential, learning is survival, learning to feed his curiousity, feed it by allowing him more freedom to move and explore. Exercise also builds a healthier child.

Introduce words early, in large, clear, honest factual way, show enthusiasm, and he will show interest, they think the world is about words, they discover words means something, they discover books which will answer their whys why. It doesn’t matter if you show it to them in print or in a screen. It matters the information your showing him. It matters how your showing him, and its important you can stop it before he wants to stop.

He also goes on in praise of his students at IAHP, where the speak multiple language, and do exercises, and plays a musical instrument. Kind of like a boarding school to me, If we have the means, i am sure everybody would like to be a professional parent, and be at IAHP with their child. But lets face it all if not most of us needs to make a living, to pay the bills, and if you have the means you can follow like IAHP pack your kids schedule with music lesson, exercises, maths, languages. Again Exposure to multiples subjects, thru frequency, intensity and duration. IE, teach more, teach often, teach with interest, and teach it longer … i am sure if any of us who are young and our parents have the means, and we are in an envronment where every other individual our friends our classmates are in the same beat, we would just be as talented or gifted as the kids coming out of IAHP. But of course how many of us can afford it, just do the best you can in what means you choose or can afford.

So parents, don’t worry.
Just expose your child. Show them the world. Show them words, best early as they aren’t mobile yet. But don’t irritate them, stop before they want to stop to not kill their interest but do show, show them straight forward info, read often in a playful mood, they think reading is playing, they think reading is fun, when its fun they do more. And doing more in a way is practicing without them knowing.

Hmm if any of you are looking for insight into so called right mind power … GD won’t give you that … it simply explains that the right mind can absorb a large number of materials … make use of it …, and if your exposing her sufficiently your stimulating the brain … and instead of learning how to play all the time … why not learn how to read …

13

Well done!! Thank you so much for your summary! I wish I could attend the talk, but now I feel like I didn’t missed much.

14

My daughter is very active and she does not sit still for anything literally . Is there any suggestions on how to teach her!

15

Thank-you Trinity Papa for your summary.

I am a little disappointed with his answers. The reason why I asked my question about teaching a 4 year old is that the one page explanation in the book is pathetic on teaching older children!! It would be good to get more guidance from their books … or do we have to fly and pay to attend their courses to get that extra bit of information (sorry - being very cynical now)?

Anyhow - I like your conclusions - thanks again for the summary

16

My husband and I were taling about GD method the other day and he said from what he could gather is that all it is, is giving your baby loads and loads of exposure to different things within the world, and I think you trinity papa summed it up very well.

I think GD is very geared towards its professional mom/mums and dads, and I wish I could be one but unfortunately one has to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table. Which is why I think DVDS and LR are great teaching tools for busy parents. It allows you to expose your child to many bits without having to spend huge amounts of time making them.

Mtb999 If you watch the early learning seminar by Dr Titzer of YBCR he does do a short 5 minute segment on teaching older children. I cant remember exactly what he said but I know he mentions it in his talk. I think that would be more useful to your friend than GD.

Thanks for the great summary trinity papa Im sorry that it seemed that it was more advertising than seminar.

17

I think that it all makes sense that lots of joyous and caring time spent with your own little ones focusing on the things that will help them throughout a life time will produce excellent results. Children get excited at whatever you are doing, and they want to participate.

18

Actually, I didn’t feel that the seminar was overly ‘advertorial’ at all. In fact, I was surprised that a lot of it sounded as if it may as well have been from IAHP’s 5-day course, with a lot of information. He went into much more detail than I expected especially when talking about the importance of physical development, including crawling and brachiation.

For those who have read the books and watched the DVD’s, there probably was not a lot of new information, but then I’m sure most people there had not read the books or watched the DVDs, so they would have learned a lot. Of course, he did mention the books many times, but I felt that was fair and not overdone, because it’s not reasonable to expect him to go into full detail in a 2 hour seminar (which turned out to be closer to 3 hours including Q&A).

What WAS new to me, was his saying that what they do has got nothing to do with ‘flash cards’. He went on to say (and I quote):

“Flash cards do not work!”
“They are boring!”

That was quite a jaw-dropper. He then held up a (um…) “flash card” (??) and said that these are “bits of information” or “bits of intelligence”. The key is that these things must be “discrete, concise, and unambiguous”.

I suppose what he means is that the point is not whether you use flash cards or not. What you show them, which could be pictures, must be discreet, concise and unambiguous bits of intelligence. He emphasized that in the case of pictures, it must just show that thing you are describing and have nothing else in the picture that may confuse the child. It also ties in with his answer to the question of whether computer learning is OK when he said that what is important is not the medium, but whether it is showing discrete, concise and unambiguous bits of intelligence.

One more thing of note is what he said in answer to someone’s comment that their child had a short attention span. His advice was that the earlier in the day you teach, the easier it usually is, due to children generally being more attentive in the morning. He added that that’s why the institutes are sort of ‘opposed’ to kindergarten cos usually that happens in the morning and so they are not able to be given their (um) bits of intelligence lessons then.

[Edited - he said “discrete”, not “discreet”. Thanks Shuki!]

19

Oh my goodness KL, that’s like “um” so funny! I would have been like, “what the heck too!” :wink:

Yeah, I think that he doesn’t like the whole flash card thing because they have been given a bad rap. It’s like we are from that one movie where the nerdy parent is flashing cards at his kids. I don’t think that the institute wants to be associated with anything like that. Furthermore, when most people think of flashcards they might think of them being cold, insensitive, and something along the line of stuffing information down someone’s throat. That’s why they have to be done with excitement, honesty, and joyfulness.

I have never heard of the kinderkarten thing being said before. That makes sense, though. My sons are great in the morning, but their goodness wears off by 1800 every time.

Three hours is a short period of time to fit in all the information needed. It’s all very interesting stuff, and it’s neat that we are able to hear about it later.

20

I too attended the DD seminar last night and like KL, was surprised at how much information was given. I found it very informative. Much easier to understand than reading the books. He does emphasis on the importance of mothers/fathers teaching the child, and also about teaching in an honest, unambiguous and precise way.

I did ask him about the difference in flashcards & Doman cards and he mentioned that the word ‘flashcards’ is a general term given to any cards any size any picture/word/combo that is used to cram information into children. He said that he used flashcards when he was 14 to learn French and did not do very well! But his ‘bit of intelligence’ cards are honest precise unambiguous. From this answer, what I gathered was that ‘Bit of intelligence’ is a type of flashcards but flashcards are not necessarily ‘bit of intelligence’ cards? Does that make sense??

purplefungi, I don’t think we can ‘send’ our children to the institute to study even if we are loaded, can we? We as parents need to live nearby too and the children are selected based on how committed the parents are. Not sure if this is correct.

To be very fair, I did not expect a 2 hours seminar to be able to answer all my questions and I do know people who have attended the parents course and said good things about it. I guess to really appreciate Doman methods in depth, you really do need to attend the course. However, Philadelphia is really too far for me to travel, but if they really do do one in HK, I might consider.

The bottom line for me is that all so called methods (and everything else) will always have good points and bad points. The important thing to me is to find out and learn about what is available out there and choose the methods which will work best for me and my children. But I think all the ‘experts’ in the world agree on one thing: exposure early in life is the key.