A really eye-opening and fascinating statement on Facebook from the Your Baby Can Read/Infant Learning Company crew:
http://www.facebook.com/YourBabyCanRead/posts/10151258443336223
I just saw that too! You beat me to it lol
That is so good, good on them for making things clear.
I’m going to work on a little clip of my daughter reading tomorrow and send it to them ASAP,
yay
Ybcr just posted a bunch of interesting studies on their program, check out their facebook page!
Here I have cut and paste it for those that want a quick look (its quite long tho, three parts, part three is still on the facebook page)
Research on “Your Baby Can Readâ€
(Part 1 of 3)
Dear Interested Parties,
As a trained scientist in infant research, I have always encouraged other scientists to study our products or early literacy in general. We also have been open to sharing the results of the studies. Our little company, The Infant Learning Company, had research on its websites back in the early 2000s until we sold the rights to YBCR in 2007. There have now been 14 studies on YBCR, as far as I know, and the 14th study is still ongoing. ILC does not own all of the data and all of the reports, so I am putting abstracts or highlights from the studies here. As with most research, any individual study could be criticized for one reason or another, but all 14 of the studies show positive results and none show negative effects.
In addition to all of the studies on YBCR, there are also studies on early literacy showing the earlier a child is taught to read, the better the child reads – even when controlling for IQ and socio-economic status. Also, I have tested babies informally for more than 20 years with the primary objective of assessing the baby’s individual ability to read, so I could advise the parents about appropriate activities for their babies. These tests have allowed me to repeatedly see that babies can read. Obviously – as far as evidence that the program works – in addition to the following studies – there are also many thousands of babies and toddlers who can read who I have met in person or I have watched in videos.
Briefly, the following 14 studies show that more than 90% of parents who have used the program – even those parents who don’t follow the instructions – when asked “How do think the YBCR program influenced your child’s ability to read?†say that YBCR “helped significantly†or “helped more than any other activity†and none said that it hurt their child’s ability to read. Additionally, when the babies were tested by teams of scientists, the babies who had used YBCR scored significantly higher than control group babies (babies who did not use YBCR) on every single measure: receptive language, expressive language, overall language abilities, and overall cognitive abilities. If you read highlights from studies 10-12, you will see that these are not small differences. Of the babies who consistently used YBCR for at least 7 months only about 15% ended up in the “average†range when tested on a standardized language measure with normative data. The other 85% of babies who used YBCR were in the “high average†(36.4%), “superior†(33.3%), or “very superior†(15.2%) ranges. A same-socio-economic status control group had 76% in the “average†range with 12% of babies in the “low average†range and 9% in the “high average†range and 3% in and the “superior†range. None of the control group babies were in the “very superior†range. Even on tests of overall cognitive ability, the babies who had used the YBCR program consistently for at least 7 months scored significantly higher than a same-socio-economic status control group. The control group had 3% in the “extremely low†range, 13%, in the “borderline†range, 31% in the “low average†range, 50% in the “average†range, and 3% in the “high average†range. The YBCR group had 45% in the “average†range, 19% in the “high average†range, 23% in the “superior†range, and 13% in the “very superior†range.
Dr. Bob Titzer
Research on “Your Baby Can Read†– Studies 1-7
(Part 2 of 3)
- TITZER, R. (1998, April). Case Study of an Infant Exposed to Written Language. Presented at the International Conference on Infant Studies. Atlanta, Georgia.
Case Study of an Infant Exposed to Written Language
PURPOSE
To determine the long-term effects of a baby’s consistent exposure to written language.
METHOD
The participant began the program at age 3 months, 8 days and her progress was followed through six years of age. The baby viewed words on paper plates, word cards, books and a prototype of the “Your Baby Can Read†videotapes using a multisensory, interactive approach. Through these activities, the baby was allowed to see the words, hear the words, see and hear what the words meant, and often perform physical actions related to the words, such as clapping or waving. The baby viewed words daily. She watched the videotape nearly every day for seven months. She watched the tape one to three times a day but she did not watch any entertainment-based television as a baby. The amount of time spent playing with words and looking at words varied from day-to-day based on the baby’s interest and
the researcher’s schedule. On average, she spent about an hour a day watching the videos or looking at words on cards or in books until the age of 12 months.
RESULTS
3 to 7 months
No indication that she recognized any of the words; however she enjoyed the interactive activities. New words were generally added a few times a week
7 ½ months
First demonstrated that she recognized a word – she touched her foot when she saw (but did not hear) the word “footâ€
9 months
Demonstrated that she recognized 30 consecutive words by saying the word or performing an appropriate physical activity for each word
10 months
Consistently recognized more than 100 words visually
12 months
Consistently recognized more than 400 words visually, showed some generalizability of learning by flipping novel word cards from upside-down to up-right positions
14 months
New words were learned quickly by the parents simultaneously pointing and saying words in books, reading Go Dog, Go! By Dr. Seuss, favorite books – Word Bird ™series by Moncure, books with Tweety ™
18 months
Could phonetically read most words (including nonsense words), read first grade level books from the library that she had never seen, often generalized lower case learning
19 months
Used character voices when reading stories
24 months
Read an average of around 20 books per day – favorites included The Ladybug and Other Insects™ , The Earth and Sky™, and the Frog and Toad™ series
3 years
Preferred non-fiction books about dinosaurs, archeology, and geography; Read the 314 page The World of Pooh book by A.A. Milne in less than 2 hours
4 years
Continued interest in non-fiction books – mostly science related topics; Favorite series – The Magic School Bus, also had a high interest in fiction
4 years, 15 days
Was tested by an independent clinical psychologist using the following tests with the following results:
Woodcock-Johnson –Revised Tests of Achievement (for reading skills)
Test Grade Level Percentile
Letter-word Identification 5.8 Above 99.9
Word Attack 11.9 Above 99.9
Passage Comprehension 4.2 Above 99.9
Comments: (She) demonstrated very unusual skills for a child her age in phonics, and she was very capable in decoding a variety of nonsense words that were shown to her. She also did very well on the Letter-Word Identification subtest, for which she was asked to read actual words. Similarly, her score on the Passage Comprehension task was very outstanding for a child her age.
4 years, 15 days
Received a perfect score on a standardized IQ test administered by an Independent psychologist. The probability of receiving this score was 0.00003 or 1 out of 33,333.
5 years
Preferred fiction, especially mysteries and Winnie-the-Pooh stories
6 years
Preferred mysteries, fantasies and classics
DISCUSSION
This study detailed the remarkable progress of a baby who was allowed to see the language from the age of 3 months, 8 days onward. This illustrates that it is possible for babies to learn to read at high levels at the same time they are learning to understand and say words. This exposure appears to have enhanced her overall language mastery as was evident in the testing.
- TITZER, R. (1998, April). Evidence that 2- and 3-Year-Old Babies and Toddlers Can Visually Discriminate Written Words. Presented at the International Conference on Infant Studies. Atlanta, Georgia.
Evidence that 2- and 3-Year-Old Babies and Toddlers Can Visually Discriminate Written Words
PURPOSE
This study investigates 2- and 3- year old babies’ and toddlers’ abilities to visually discriminate written words.
METHOD
Thirty-two children (ages 24 to 40 months, 18 African-American and 14 Caucasian) participated in this double-blind study. Half of the children viewed an interactive videotaped segment from the “Your Baby Can Read†video which displayed six words and video images representing those words for two minutes prior to beginning the test. First, the children viewed the word. An arrow moved from left to right under each word as the word was verbalized. Next they viewed images that represented the meaning of the word. The following target words were used: crawling, eyes, ears, smiling, clap, and gorilla.
The other half of the participants did not view the “Your Baby Can Read†videotape prior to being tested.
During the test, children viewed the target word and a novel word that were presented simultaneously. The target was either above or below the novel word in one test, and to the left or right in the other test. Children were asked to point to the target words. The children were tested two times on each word. The order of the positioning of the target words (right or left, up or down) was counterbalanced. For the first three words, the target word was displayed on the TV monitor while the child was tested. For the final three words, the monitor was turned off before the test words were presented.
RESULTS
The control group of 16 children did not recognize the correct words above chance. Both the two-year-old and three-year-old participants in the experimental group could recognize the written words above chance p < .05). This was true even when the TV monitor was turned off.
DISCUSSION
Children are able to visually discriminate words much earlier than what is currently accepted. This study suggests that 2- and 3-year-old babies and toddlers are capable of visually recognizing words. This is an age range that is about 3 or 4 years younger than the current age at which reading is taught in the U.S.
Other studies support that very young infants may have the perceptual abilities to recognize written words and that exposure to language while the brain is rapidly developing may influence the effectiveness of brain connections.
There is much evidence that acquiring language skills in early childhood affects the long range performance of those skills. For instance, syntax ability (Coppieters, 1987), grammatical ability (Johnson & Newport, 1991), speech production (Oyama, 1976) and sentence processing skills (Mayberry, 1993) are better when learned in early childhood rather than in adolescence. Children who learned to read at age 3 and 4 read a couple of grades above same-IQ children who learned to read at later stages – this advantage continued throughout childhood (Durkin, 1970). In contrast, language deprivation during early childhood has lasting negative effects (Curtiss, 1977).
- TITZER, R. (1995). Pilot study to determine if other infants could learn to recognize written words from a video and to determine an optimal pace for the video. (Unpublished pilot study).
Eleven parents were given one VHS “Your Baby Can Read†pilot video and detailed instructions. The infants’ ages varied from 8 months of age to 12 months of age at the beginning of the study. The pace of the video varied from relatively slow to relatively fast. According to the parents’ reports, the fast paced parts of the video held the infants’ attention better than the slow-paced parts. The parent instructions appeared to be too complicated. In order to follow the instructions, parents had to rewind the VHS video to a particular point on the video and stop the video at a different point. The starting and ending points changed as the babies were supposed to have new words on the video introduced weekly. Most of the parents did not follow the instructions. All four parents who followed the instructions reported that their babies could “act out†at least one word when they saw, but did not hear, the words within three months. This study showed how important it is to make a program that is easy for the parents to use. It also verified that it is possible for babies to learn to read words from watching a video. - TITZER, R. (1997). Case Study of a Second Infant Learning Written Language. (Unpublished study on Keelin Titzer). Keelin began viewing her reading video on June 15, 1994 at the age of two months, 0 days. On average, she watched the video for about 45 minutes per day. Keelin did not watch any other TV programs or videos in early infancy. Keelin could demonstrate the meanings of seven consecutive written words without hearing them when she turned 8 months of age when given recall tests. In other words, when the word “clap†was shown to her – she consistently would clap. When she saw the word “wave†she would wave her hand. By 12.5 months of age, Keelin would generally turn her head upside down when shown a long word (five or more letters) that was upside down. This appeared to demonstrate that she had learned a general pattern of what words look like and she recognized when the individual or groups of letters in a long word did not fit that pattern. Keelin became skilled at matching toys or objects with the written words that represented the toys or objects. By 15 months of age, when four words were scattered on the floor where she could see them and she was handed a small toy/object that matched one of the words, she would take the object and place it on or next to the corresponding word. By 18 months of age, when Keelin was given two novel written words – for example “newspaper†and “computer†– she would consistently point to the word that was spoken. This appeared to show that Keelin had learned some phonetic patterns by 18 months of age.
TITZER, R. (1998, April). Infants’ and Toddlers’ Abilities to Visually Discriminate Written Words. Presented at the International Conference on Infant Studies, Atlanta, Georgia.
Infants’ and Toddlers’ Abilities to Visually Discriminate Written Words
Robert C. Titzer, PhD.
Department of Kinesiology, Southeastern Louisiana University, Hammond, LA 70403 U.S.A.
Presented at the International Conference on Infant Studies, April 2-5, 1998, in Atlanta, Georgia
Converging evidence in the areas of reading education, language acquisition, brain development and infant research indicates that most of our nation’s reading problems could be prevented by teaching reading during the window of opportunity for learning language. Developmentalists have discovered that young infants have remarkable perceptual abilities (e.g., Baillargeon, 1986, 1991). In these studies, infants as young as 3.5 months old visually perceived differences in complex events. Additionally, infants can also perceive figure-ground relationships (e.g., Bertenthal, 1993; Craton & Yonas, 1990). In a related area of study, neurobiologists have revealed that infants’ brains develop differently based on the age at which they learn a second language (Posner, 1997). Children’s brains were able to adapt and become more efficient when they learned the language before the age of four compared with learning later in life. Moreover, other studies suggest that infants learn language faster than older children (e.g., fast mapping).
Combined, all of this work suggests that infants are capable of learning to visually discriminate written language much earlier than age six and that learning to recognize written language during infancy may allow their brains to develop more efficiently for recognizing written words.
Two studies will investigate infants’ abilities to visually differentiate words.
OVERALL CONCLUSION
Study One demonstrated that children are capable of visually differentiating written words several years earlier than school age.
Study Two suggests that babies and toddlers who are frequently exposed to written language may learn this aspect of language at the same time as they learn auditory and spoken language. This study indicates that it is possible for an 18-month-old infant to read at a level that is higher than the average seven year old American. Neuroplasticity in Broca’s area appears more efficient when the child learns language skills in the first four years of life compared to age five or later (Hirsch, 1997). It is possible that the baby in the case study similarly developed efficient pathways for reading because she learned to read as an infant. Rather than utilizing a separate area of the brain for reading, it is possible that babies develop more efficient pathways more closely connected to spoken and receptive language areas.
- TITZER, R. (1999). Five-month-old infants’ abilities to discriminate written language. Invited guest speaker. Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA.
This study used common looking time measures to determine if 5 month-old infants could visually differentiate written words. Twenty-eight 5-month-old infants were habituated to written words. A double-blind procedure was used to investigate whether 5-month-old infants could visually differentiate the word “clapping†from the word “wave.†Looking times decreased over trials, then leveled off, for the word “clapping.†When the novel word “wave†was introduced, looking times increased significantly indicating that the babies could visually differentiate those written words.
Completely independent
6) In 2002, a master’s thesis by Eileen Downey (a student I did not know) was completed and published as a thesis using part of the YBCR system to successfully teach children with autism language skills. She found that YBCR worked about as well as an individual therapist to help children with autism do certain physical skills.
Completely independent
7) In 2009, Annette Perkins, a student (whom I did not know at the time), conducted unpublished work using YBCR and reported success when parents used the program consistently. The parents who used the program had babies, toddlers, and preschoolers who were reading words.
Good for them! It is a great program. This was the first early reading program we used and my daughter loved it.
I am so glad that they are fighting back. I was looking into that program prior to choosing the little reader program. I think that it is a great start to learning. I hope they are successful in their fight!