Where do I begin for a 7 mo old baby??

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Of course you can begin by using the software Little Reader and Little Math. Specifically it depends on what you want to teach your baby. If you want to teach to read, here are a few other things you can do. My son is older but we use letter refrigerator magnets which are awesome because we are in the kitchen often and every time we go to the refrigerator I point out some letters and make a word or two with him. We just started this and it seems he already knows a lot of the letter sounds (I don’t tell him the name of the letter, just the sound).

Some other ideas I have found useful from other parents on this site are to label items in your house and periodically take your baby around and show the labels. Carry a magna doodle around with you and periodically write out words you are using with your baby. For example, today at lunch I showed him eat, spinach, milk, spoon, Elmo (we were reading an Elmo book and he seemed to recognize the word which was very exciting for me!), and all done.

I got the magna doodle idea from another mom on this site and it instantly made sense to me because this was how I was teaching my baby sign language (and spoken language for that matter). It gives context to the baby and I think that helps a lot. It also stimulates his desire to write. I read an article once of a mom who did this and eventually her son asked to write the words himself. It seems to be true with my son too. Yesterday he took the magna doodle from me, scribbled on it and then told me “sun” in sign language. We were playing with a puzzle that had a sun and I had written “sun” for him. I was a very proud mommy at that moment!

Other than that there are a lot of great books to read. You can check out the books by Glen Doman. I also recommend “The Read Aloud Handbook” and “Meaningful Differences in the Everyday Lives of American Children”. In a nutshell these two books say read, read, read to your kids and talk, talk, talk to your kids. I think even if you aren’t able to do anything else do that and you baby will benefit tremendously. Browse old forum posts and you will get many more ideas.

Happy teaching!

How do I thank you for such useful info…I talk a lot to my DD…in fact often take pics of everyday object on the iPad and show them like flash cards…I think she already knows light,Ganesha idol in the living room, tv and painting as she moves her eyes in that direction with a smile:)) I think she recently started recognizing Dora…she sure does love her rhymes…but it was a systematic approach that I wanted to follow…I think I m gonna try the magna doodle…sure sounds fun… Thanx a tonn again…

I am happy I could help. :slight_smile: If you are looking for a systematic approach I definitely recommend the brillkids software LR and LM. They have the lessons for each day pre-built and all you have to do is push play! You can download a free trial on this site. I would also recommend reading the books by Glenn Doman which will give you a systematic approach to teaching reading, math, etc.

Little Reader is a great program, definitely try it. If your baby likes to watch TV, check out some of the early reading videos by MonkiSee or Your Baby Can Read. These are entertaining and also teach babies to read at the same time. Flash cards are a fun, fast and easy way to teach babies to read. You can literally teach a baby to read with flash cards in 90 seconds a day. Books are a great way also. Read to your baby and point out the words. Brillkids and MonkiSee have books that are specifically designed to teach babies to read. They keep the text separate from the pictures so the child’s attention is naturally drawn to the words. Play games with words too. Get magnets for the fridge, write on a dry erase board and the magndoodle. Regular exposure to written language is what teaches babies to read. But most of all, have fun with it. :slight_smile:

I was gonna ask the exact same question for my daughter who is about 4 months old ! So thank you for posting !

I would love to use LR and LM but we can’t afford it at the moment. I was doing flashcards with her (black and white shapes) but I would like to start introducing colors and everyday life pictures as well as words.

How do flashcards work? How long should she be looking at them and how many times a day?

I feel lost ! And overwhelmed !

Please help :slight_smile:

See this post to learn more about teaching babies to read with flash cards.

http://www.monkisee.com/teaching_babies_with_flashcards.html