Question: Do you let them touch the flashcards/books?

I'm referring to babies or very young children below the age of 3 years old.

I have seen and heard of parents reading to their children but not allowing them to touch the books/flashcards for fear they might damage them. Yes, babies and toddlers are not exactly kind with their touch and yes the books and flashcards are very expensive. But I have given them a lot of freedom to touch all our books (including the "non board books") and flash cards in our home, since they were a baby. We have a box with books that they know it as the "book bin" where books and flashcards are available to them at any time, with or without supervision. Sometimes we have torn pages/cards and other times, we have wet pages/cards after some tasting session (but thank god the tasting sessions have stopped). I try to let them know the consequence of handling the books and cards too rough every time such accidents occur and I will tape the torn pages back together with them. Many times, they were as upset as me when the pages or cards tear.

They like to play with their flash cards and I don't quite understand why. They can just march and walk around with their flash cards when they were much younger. These days, they will run to us with a card and read the word to us. K likes to go through his action cards and do the actions to the words. I love to see that.

When they were 1 year old, the book bin contains mostly board books and only a few books that are more delicate. And now, at 21 months I can leave any books/cards there, regardless of the thickness of the paper. They are able to handle them well and I'm very pleased. The improved motor skills at 21 months contributed to this of course.

I'm glad I gave them this freedom to explore their books/cards. There were times when I'm so upset when they accidentally damage the books/cards. Come to think of it, they seldom damage the book/card when they were reading by themselves. The damaged book/card is usually the result of a fight. But children learn from experience. And seeing them taking a book from the book bin and flipping the pages or going through their cards by themselves just make me very happy. I hope they will grow up to love books and love to read.

Whats's your experience with giving your baby and young children the freedom to access the cards and books in your home freely?

K, reading his book by himself at 14 months

Say No to Flash Cards?

From what I've been reading, it seems like Play and Learn does not go hand in hand with Flash Cards. Or rather advocates of Play and Learn do not approve of Flash Cards.

I embrace the Play and Learn philosophy but I've also been doing Glenn Doman inspired flash card programme since they were 5 months old. I wasn't very consistent though, I tried to do thrice daily but was only able to do at most twice daily, usually taking a break during the weekends. And I improvised the way the cards were flashed from the original programme. I used lesser cards. And I never test. My intention of showing the flash cards is to expose them to words, just like the way we expose them to images.

I used the flash cards in 2 ways:

Rapid flashing of word cards. 
I start with 10 cards, adding 1 new card each day up to a maximum of 25 cards and I will retire the cards that have been flashed 15 times or when I think they are starting to get bored with the cards. I was having problem keeping track of the cards with the original GD programme, so I simplify it to what I feel I can keep up with. I'm not sure if the programme is still effective this way but it's alright for me since my intention is to expose to words, not so much of memory training.

Flash cards with pictures
I also show them flash cards with pictures. I will usually show the side with the words first, then the side with the picture. If it's an action word, we'll do the action and I will sing a song/rhyme if there's any relating to the word.

Now that they are older, I'm thinking of doing away with the rapid flashing and focus on utilizing the flash cards in other ways. Some of which are what I'm already doing:

• Labels for things around the house (inspired by Native Reading Method)

• Word cards to be used together for words/object introduction

• Words cards to be pinned on wall for words introduced for the week

• Matching Games - Match the correct word card to the picture card.

• Labelling Games - Get your children involved in the labelling after introducing the word.

• Make your own cards (not the type and print kind) - Older children who can draw can make their own cards. For younger children, making the cards together with them would be good. (unless your children are like my boys who wouldn't stop snatching the marker from you.)

I think Flash Cards is a good learning tool and can be incorporated into Play and Learn. I'm still looking for more interesting ways to use Flash Cards.