What are your thoughts on YBCR with regard to the fact that it is a very left-brain approach? I am slightly concerned about the amount of time my DD is spending watching these DVDs (around 30 minutes per day), given what I read about the benefits of right brain learning.
Is it worth continuing to show it? (She is 23 months and we are new to EL)
And if I do continue to show it, should I be doing any particular right brain activities to counteract this?
I don’t have any scientific data to support this, but based on everything I’ve read on right brain education and on my own observations of my daughter, I suspect it can. I started my daughter on YBCR at 3 months, before I knew anything about right brain education, and she completed the entire program and was sightreading at 9 months. I only started Doman dot cards, EK cards, LR/LM, and Tweedlewink at 14-16 months and she was completely uninterested in all of them except for LR. I eventually gave up on the dots and EK cards, but continued showing TW despite her lack of enthusiasm. We have finished all 12 volumes and are now on cycle 3 (with at least a 6-month gap between cycles). She still does not like it much. As early as 2.5 years old, I have noticed her exhibiting a lot of the left brain characteristics described for preschool-aged children on the TW chart. At 3.5 years old, I started Wink with her in addition to TW. If I were to do it all over again, I would probably not use YBCR at all (or maybe since I already have it, use it only much later and I would not follow the prescribed schedule at all - i.e. showing one DVD everyday for 1-2 months) and instead focus on right brain methods (Doman, LR/LM, and TW) during those crucial first 3 years.
I would love to hear other people’s experiences and opinions on this!
We used YBCR for my oldest when she was 2and a half. W watched it once a day upnto the 4th disk then life changed and we didn’t have time to continue. She learnt a few words from it. It obviously did help her, the information was there she just didn’t show me what she knew until school started and other people asked her to show them what she new. She learnt to read (completely!) in less than a year.
Ok will say from my experience YBCR had NO negative impact on her left right brain functions. She is 8 now and still very right brained. YBCR didn’t push her to left brain at all, she was/is very creative…still can’t tell the time very well lol learns quicky, learns it the first time, zones out and still retains what she is told…
I think it is important to remember that the aim of right brain education is to balance out both brains. If you are using LR and twiddle wink or other riht brain programs at the same time as YBCR then I can’t see how it could be damaging. If you have a two year old who spends 30 mins a day learning in a left brain mode then that is also advanced. Reading is a left brained activity, flashing the words is right brained but children using phonics and decoding is left brained…
If you are going to add something else, twiddle wink would make for great insurance, as the whole 8 minute lesson is all right brained. If she likes YBCR then keep watching it. Soon she may be too old to find it intesting.
Mandab,
Actually I have spent a lot of time in the education world and there is definitely a bias against left braining learning. Both left and right brain learning are supremely important tools in the way we learn. It is not so much a question of trying to balance them but in using the tool that is appropriate for the task at hand. Most modern methodology takes the slant that left brain learning is bad, “drill & kill”, destructive of the child’s motivation to learn. They will even say you can do real harm to children by teaching them specific (left brain) skills at an early age. Their fear-mongering is not backed up by any research but is commonly taught and practiced in schools.
My son is 20 months and although we do many other things we did YBCR in Spanish and English. I do not speak any Spanish and my 20 month walks around saying words in Spanish and reading them too. As for English I can never stump him! He can read so well and loves to watch YBCR in either language. There is no way anyone can tell me it was bad for him, just talk to him he talks like he is 3.
Oh! I am not saying that YBCR was bad for Ella - on the contrary, we had tremendous success with it as she was sightreading by 9 months, reading phonetically by 16 months, and now reads at about a 3rd grade level. And I can never be grateful enough to Dr. Titzer for opening up the world of early learning for us. If it were not for him and his product, I would never have learned about baby reading and, eventually, come across this forum. It is just that I think (and this is just my own opinion), that there are other methods for teaching babies to read that will not cause them to bridge over to left brain development earlier than normal and, thus, “shorten that once-in-a-lifetme right brain absorbent window” (as Wennie from rbkids put it) along with its potential for developing right-brain speedreading and photographic memory.
I am also NOT against left brain learning per se. For me, the question is finding and using the appropriate method at the right age and at the right time. After the age of 3-6 years, I think that repetition, memory work, drills, and “left-brain” techniques have their rightful place in a child’s education to ensure that he maximizes the potential of both hemispheres of his brain.
Dr jones I am not clear where we are disagreeing? Are we? I agree there is a bias against left brain learning among right brain advocates ( well some not all!) and I agree education has a left brain bias also. I think you may not have liked my wording lol Te goal of education should be to balance the use of left and right brain. I suppose according to the task at hand but also to adjust tasks for maximum efficiency of each side of the brain. The research into all this is pitifully inadequate! So we are all taking a best guess based on each others past experiences.
The question from seastar is probably more like "is it worth the risk of potentially closing the right brain dominant learning period earlier by regularly allowing her child to watch a repetitive left brain video…even if it is educational? " what are your thoughts on that?
I agree with aangeles to a degree. I had tremendous success with YBCR. I started it at 3 months Miss S could differentiate words at 6 months sight reading a huge amount of words by 9 months.I then found out about right brain education and started with Little MAth (which she hated) and started with EK which she has a tendency to enjoy one minute and hate the next.
At the moment Miss S has gone ight back to the RB and completely engages in a huge amount of pretend play not interested in doing workbooks or anything that requires a lot of attention but it was only a few months ago that we were doing 4 different workbooks a day. So I do not think YBCR will destroy any RB learning at all. I personally think it boils down to the personality and dominant learning style of the child,you work with what is best for your child, and that is the beauty of educating early you have the freedom to whatever suits you best.
I did the tweedlewink course by Right Brain Kids and she said that no matter what you do there are just some children who are more inclined to the left brain and for whatever reason they are more LB dominant or RB dominant that is fine. It helps an engineer to be left brain dominant an interior designer is probably more RB dominant.
I think YBCR is a wonderful product and it lead me to this wonderful forum full of wonderful people and their amazing children, keep going with YBCR but add tweedlewink to or make your own. Do what suits you and let your child amaze you.
I think for best results you need to do both activities
Your replies have all been very interesting.
I suppose my concern is that 30 minutes a day is a lot of time watching TV (she never watched any until I started YBCR a month ago), especially as I would like to introduce some language, maths & science DVDs (on alternate days). I am actually very impressed with the results other parents have reported from using YBCR so I know it is a good programme, it’s just that I would like to know if it’s the best thing we could be doing with our time (I know, it’s a tall order). I guess I just want the time she spends watching TV to be really worth it, if you know what I mean.
We are also working on phonics using readingbear, which is again quite left-brain in approach.
I am awaiting delivery of the TW DVD package and I am really excited about using this as I am incredibly impressed by the possibility of speed reading and photographic memory.
Interestingly, before I found this forum, I read the Doman reading books & I tried some large flashcards in red print - well, she learned those words within one day, and I have yet to see any results from YBCR. Maybe I need to put the YBCR words in large red print…
This is they way I am leaning also. What kind of schedule do you think would be better?
Yes, that is exactly what I meant - thank you for putting it more succintly!
well since we have the right question…
maybe use YBCR until tweedle wink turns up then use tweedle wink and other word flash cards, and reading bear for phonics. Then start YBCR at maybe age 3 or 4? it would depend on progress though, If your child is reading by 3 it may be a waste of time to show it at all 
Oh you could also just run the YBCR dvd for 10 minutes only a day that way it would be flash cards and less repetitive… mostly my son will only watch them for 10-15 mins anyway, and he likes different disks each day (unforrtunately our number 3 disk has decintergrated from old age).
The YBCR were the first thing I bought for my dd as I read good review about the program. When she was little and couldn’t say what she thought about it she watched - usually with me but never really liked it. We never followed the schedule even I tried but she just refused to watch it. If I played her the same dvd again she would not watch it again. She is very RB oriented and it just was too slow. I didn’t feel comfortable letting her watch it becouse of the left brain approach and we did other activities that would stimulate the left brain anyway. I usually split it to let her watch 5-7 min.
I think if you won’t use this program you won’t miss anything. If I could take the time back and knew what I learnt now I wouldn’t let her watch it. She loves the flashcards thoug and we play a lot with them.
Now when older we started to watch YCCR and she loves that one, it isn’t that slow and nicely made.
Well, if you already have LR and are using reading bear, then I don’t think you’re going to miss anything by not using YBCR. If you don’t have any other videos you would like to show her, then watching it once a week or broken up into 10-minute segments would probably not hurt. But, I am guessing you are still trying to limit her screen time at this age (as I am) so you would probably want to make better use of the limited TV time you have. Oh, I should also let you know that Little Pim (which I used for teaching French and Spanish) is also very left-brain oriented, so you might want to consider other language learning DVDs if you are planning to teach these languages.
Yes Little Pim is great and we also like Me on TV , you can watch the whole alphabeth on youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_64QQ-zG6I
My grandson did YBCR and his parents are enthusiastic about it. We bought the program used and the flashcards separately. I also made some words with a red marker. He did YBCR starting at 2 months and the Doman dots starting at 4 months. He also did flashcards with music composers and geography. He picked up on the reading, and was reading HOP ON POP by age 2 and 2 months. Since his first language is German,he seemed to have no problem teaching himself to read German. By age 2 and a half. He could sound out words like the planets on a picture of the solar system. He could read little articles from the German newspaper. He also goes to Japanese school, so I hope that he will read Japanese too. He knows the names of the Japanese provinces. He loves music, and watches various clips from youtube of violins, cellos, harps, organs, etc. mostly classical music. To watch him on Youtube, search in Youtube for Cederic conducts Carmen, and you can see him conducting the Opera Carmen. Then if you go to ALL videos, you can see him reading in his second language, English, and singing in his third language, Japanese. I don’t understand how YBCR would have a negative effect. I obviously have a lot to learn about early learning.