i spent 2 days to go through the programs/methods on early learning for babies… the world is really changing, in the past kids only learn during pre-sch. now we start educate our newborn babies…
i intend to introduce 4 programs to my 4 months old baby. on one hand, i would love my baby to learn earlier and stimulate her potential; on the other hand i ask myself, am i adding too much stress on my baby?
Nana17,
My son is almost 7 months and all of the early learning I do with him are fun activities for both of us. If he looks away or fusses I stop and we do something else. No pressure, no expcetations just fun playing and learning. He loves Little reader (LR) and crawls over to me when I’m on the laptop knowing I will stop what I am doing and play with him using LR. He loves the DVDs I show him ( Baby Signing Time and LIttle Pim (French and Spanish) and will add Baby Bit soon. Stress is not a factor because he is playing while he learns. I noticed he gets cranky and stressed when I leave the TV on with regular programs on. I limit my shows to when he is not around and play classical music for background noise. Just do the activites you both enjoy and try the others in a week or a month. Things change fast in just a month, my son wouldn’t look at LR when he was 4 months and now he can’t get enough. Good luck
I really believe the key to success and stress free early education is to be sure you’re not results orientated.
If you go in wanting your child to be reading this well by this age and so on you will stress both of you out.
However, if your approach is to show your child wonderful and exciting things in a fun and loving way the choice to absorb the material is theirs and children being children they tend to choose to learn.
It also helps to remember that the aim of early education is to make later learning easier, to form pathways in the brain that allow this learning to take place more easily in the future - it is not to create a child who can read Wuthering Heights at four or do calculus at three - although this can happen it is not the aim.
Just enjoy the process and revel in the bonding that it will bring any thing on top of that is a bonus.
I started math with my son when he was 4 months old. Now he is 13 months, we continue math and other and there has never been any stress. I just show my slideshows, in the same way I show new toys or anything else in our room. I never tried to test him. We just have fun. If he is not watching, I stop showing. He likes math and paintings.
I think labelling is the problem here and posibly also the high structure you are possibly imagining. Your baby is learning all the time - I see it in my own nearly 3 week old child who loves to stare at my face and her fingers. Basically you need to learn the signs of an over stimulated baby and know to stop if it happens (look it up on google - niggling and crying are preceded by more subtle signs)
As the others said - keep it fun and be willing to adjust - if your baby doesn’t like it there is always next month or the month after to try again - and what they like now will definitely change as they grow older and you will have to adjust all the time. Think of all the things you showed your child at one or two months of age and all the new experiences they had - I am sure that didn’t worry you even though there was a high sensory load - you are now just adding to that - expanding their horizons basically and as long as you don’t force or insist a baby does what it does not want to do, you will be doing the right thing.