Hi,
I am new to right brain learning and feel very disappointed that I didn’t know more about it when my eldest daughter was a baby. She is now 6 and I taught her phonics at 2 and she was reading by 3 and a half. She loves books and is reading approximately 2 years ahead although I am happy for her to read below & above her reading age as our emphasis is upon enjoyment/interet -She is in the upper third of her class but mainly due to the work I do with her as she is ‘easily distracted’ according to her teacher.
I have a 3 year old and a 1 year old and have started little reader, little musician & little Maths with them. My eldest joins in with the music and is getting really good!
My questions are: Is it too late to do right brain education with my 6 year old (she is 7 soon) and which progams would people recommend? She knows number bonmds to 10 and 20 but sums like 16 + 5 she would put 16 in her head & count on using her fingers. I am wondering whether flashing maths facts and learning would be better so if she knows 6 & 5 is 11 she can add on 10. ? What do other people do?
I show little reader etc to my baby in his highchair during meal times or he protests & doesn’t want to know.
However with my 3 year old I printed off the flash cards and I flashed the cards several times, then we played a game where if she could remember the word she got to keep it & if she got it wrong I muddled them up again and she had to find it again.
As I have taught her all initial letter sounds so I thought maybe she was just guessing according to sound and I left the flashcards and we have been carrying on with phonics rather than whole word. I know I will do sight words soon - we’ve been focussing on cvc words, rhyme, blending & hearing sounds which she is very good at. I can sound talk any word & she knows what it is.
I was looking in a box the other day & I found the flash cards that I had made a few weeks ago & showed them to my daughter not expecting her to remember but to my amazement she recalled every word instantly!!! Does that mean my flashing & game was a right brain activity or was the flashing the right brain bit and my game left brain as it kind of involved testing even though it was a game? I am confused but what I do know is she excitedly recalled these words more than when we sound out our phonics! My daughter does not show interst in the computer flashed lr wordsso are actual cards better for some children and should i print them for my baby or is the screen enough? Do other people who have had success use printed cards & the computer> Is there anyone who has had success with just the screen?
Also do people rate the tweedle wink / wink programs? I would love to help my children develop photographic memorie & inbstant recall of maths & any thoughts would be appreciated. I don’t know anyone in England who use right brain education!!! Sorry for typing earrors but In think over-ride is on and I can’t disable!
Many Thanks,
J
Don’t be concerned about being too late with your six year old. You have done a great job accelerating her so far!
Some children do prefer printed flash cards. Some actually prefer the computer screen. My son didn’t recall many words until we started using the iPad. He also can learn words from my laptop in Kindy with the other children but doesn’t even look at the laptop when I try it at home…unless it’s a lesson all about dinosaurs or trucks! Or countries of the world,I have never printed a flash card for him.
I use little musician for my older two (9,7) and myself! We are learning at lightning speed, they are better than me at guessing the pitch. I need more practice! lol It’s a perfect program for many ages.
To include right brain education in your six year olds life I would recommend memory magic as a quick and cheap solution. They have some computer games but grab their iPad apps too if you have one. My kids use them quite a bit. The computer games include silly sentences which are a favourite with my girls. All my kids can recall 100 objects in sequence, it takes surprisingly little practice to master. This is something you can use also. Beyond that I would include some mandala work and consider the entire Wink program from rightbrainedkids. It’s expensive but includes all you need. Those of us that do right brained education swear by it’s effectiveness and try to devote as much time to it as we do to the actual study stuff. It truly enhances the results overall. We also keep running out of activites to use! There just isn’t a lot out there.
The best place to learn all about it is to Read through Shenlis Blog She has done all the research already and it’s well done too. :yes: http://www.figur8.net/category/programs/
As to the flashing…well I flash to my kids. My theory ( unproven) is that if you can turn on your kids right brain then they can assimilate knowledge in a right brained fashion. Rapid flashing stimulates the right brain so flash fast. Also you can play right brained Alpha music while she studies or for a ffew minutes before she starts. This music certainly works in my kids and I can feel it thumping/ pressing inside my brain when it’s playing. so I am convinced it does something. In fact I have felt it playing once when the volume was so low I couldn’t hear it and one of the kids had hit play on the iPod!
Thank you so much for your ideas - I will definately look into them. I am so busy as my husband is in the airforce and works away a lot therefore I never seem to get 5mins to research this kind of stuff. I definately want to tap into the right brain learning more and it is much better to go on recommendation I feel.
I, like you, am learning as much as the children when it comes to little musician!! My children like the music program the best so I think playing music in the background would work for them.
I do think that whilst the children are so young & receptive to facts that I will try and get the basic maths facts internalised. Teachers are tied by the curriculum and have to develop conceptual understanding but sometimes I feel that this is at the expense of KIRFs (key instant recall facts). Some of our local schools are starting to concentrate on KIRFs and I really think it’s a good thing because as the children progress and the maths gets more complicated not knowing these facts will slow everything down. There is something called Conker Maths www.conkermaths.org/ which is based on the English National numeracy strategy and gives lots of free practice games for KIRFs that I will start using.
Since having my own children I have started researching early years and am so disappointed with the early years curriculum here - everything is ‘Play’ centred and has to be the child’s choice!!! Well if I gave my child a choice about cleaning her teeth, eating her veggies etc you can guess what would happen. In reception my child had 100% choice and spent a year either outside or in the roleplay area. Learning was very limited as there were no adults in those areas taking her learning forward ( the adults were in the maths and writing areas) so my daughter became de-skilled by school and I have constantly had to top her up! In my experience maths will not just happen in play as well as it will through carefully prepared activities, with some adult guidance/input. THis is the same for Letters and sounds! There is a letters and sounds program used by schools, which is excellent but it depends how effectively each establishment implements it. It can be found in DFES archives and my daughter loves the activities. The attitude in our local schools is not to ‘pressurise’ young chn. etc etc but I am a big believer that a letter game can be just as much fun if conducted in the right way as any other play activity.
I am excited to look into your suggestions - sometimes I wish I was homeschooling!
Did you use tweedlewink when your children were younger? Would it be necessary to do a course or do you think you can pick it up as you go along?
Just to be sure we are clear…tweedlewink is a set of DVDs used to teach children. Yes I have them yes I use them and yes I love them. Fortunatleymy kids like them to…not every time I suggest watching them but mostly and often enough. :laugh: Even my big kids will watch tweedlewink wink occasionally. Mostly because the alternative is strait to bed but they learn from it too lol
Wink is the program for children who have switched to mostly left brained thinking somewhere between 4 and 8 usually around 4.5 to 5.5 in my experience. Wink is a bunch of games, videos and activities to enhance the use of the right side of the brain. I have some of it and think the activities are great. It is expensive but a great time saver for busy mums. I don’t think you need to do the course. I havnt. I think you would gain alot if you did do the course but before you spend the money check out the book they have for sale on their website and have a good look through any ebooks you can get sent to you from them. I got all the info I needed by reading these. At times I am sure I was reading between the lines but the general gist is there and you will have no trouble.
Basically the games and activities enhance the right brain ability and they connections between left and right. So have a look at the activities read the info on them and have a go. Many can be made for free easily enough if you don’t want to spend a fortune.
Yes definately teach the math facts yourself the schools just don’t teach them at all or well enough.
Hi Thanks for the reply. I had read quite a few posts referring to tweedlewink so had a quick look at the tweedlewink and wink website but there was a lot of references to their courses to implement their programs which is why I asked if that was necessary. I only had a quick look but I will check out their ebooks like you say as I would rather get on with things as time is precious. I also checked out shenlis’ blog which is brilliant. It was reassuring to see that a lot of her book recommendations are books that my own children read and enjoy but she had some great follow-up ideas too. How does she get time to do it all? I haven’t heard about mandalas before so am looking into that and memory magic looks great!
Do your children go to school or do you homeschool as I was wondering how you fitted it all in if they attend school.
You can buy Mandala notebooks online but it’s MUCH easier and cheaper to use an App if you have an iphone or Ipad. Another EL mom recommended this us and it’s very good-- http://www.appexplorer.com/a/523064312/ It has several skill levels and it randomizes the colors, kids then select the correct colors and fill them back in.
Shantih, my kids go to school and I work 5 days but only school hours. My son is in my class ( I teach kindergarten) so it’s easy to make sure he gets a great education :biggrin:
The other two I will admit sometimes we cover everything other times we just can’t fit it all in. This last month the kids havnt touched the piano even once. They have done their math daily and read daily and we always cover some general knowledge each day. Encyclopedic knowledge in this house is now taught by extended on their questions. They always have questions! lol We use non fiction books and revue verbally as we drive around. We spend a lot of time in the car ( to and from school, work and gymnastics) so we use that time to teach history ( story of the world audio) watch videos ( tweedlewink, magic school bus, bill Nye, your child can discover and wink to learn languages) and talk.
They both do gymnastics, piano, little musician, taekwondo, advanced math, reading, history and geography multiple times a week so as you can imagine we are very busy. I am happy to say sometimes we don’t do it all because we can’t fit it all in and still be happy! We set firm prioroities for each of us and make sure that gets done. So one kid has to do math and gymnastics no matter what another has to do math, reading and have quiet time no matter what and my boy has to do some educational apps in the car and Little reader and little musician. Everything else is a bonus
- I will definately look into them. I am so busy as my husband is in the airforce and works away a lot therefore I never seem to get 5mins to research this kind of stuff. I definately want to tap into the right brain learning more and it is much better to go on recommendation I feel.