5 ways to advance your preschooler's potential

Early phonics is the key to helping your child be all he can be. 

Prevention and phonics are the keys to your child's potential. In medicine, the Chinese focus on prevention while we westerners focus on treatment.

 

Unfortunately we focus on learning problems the same way. Prevention is possible and so much more effective than treatment. (For a more in-depth discussion of causes and preventions, see volume 2 of It's Not Rocket Surgery! )

 

Reading opens a child’s imagination and knowledge. Imagination and knowledge beget wonder.

 

“The capacity for wonder has been called our most pregnant human faculty, for in it are born our art, our science, our religion.” ~ Ralph Washington Sockman

 

• Begin phonemic awareness with your child from infancy on.
• Read to your child daily.
• Ask simple questions about the pictures and story.
• Show a love of books – get caught reading yourself, whether with books, Readers’ Digest and other magazine articles, comic books, cook books, anything to encourage your child by example.
• Always read to your child every day, such as at bedtime.

 

A Pretty Girl Was Alpha Bette is a perfect book for this. Stories and picture-letter phonics at bedtime, or any time, give your child the two most important things he needs in life: parent-time and reading skills.

 

The easiest, most effective way to prevent permanent speech problems and dyslexia is to teach early reading the right way, phonics one-on-one with The Godfrey Method lesson plans and picture-letters. These are discussed in volume 2, all the chapters’ HELPS, and the appendix.

 

But what if your child is older and already has problems? One-on-one phonics will help, Dr. Glen Doman’s methods may help, and if more remediation is required, Dr. Michael Merzenich’s Scientific Learning may help. More on them later. Starting back at the basics with The Godfrey Method will definitely help.

 

Not all diagnosed dyslexia or learning disabilities are truly that. Almost any child can learn if taught the right way.

 

As Direct Instruction proponents say, “If the child hasn’t learned, the teacher hasn’t taught.”

 

Without these preventatives, the cracks in your child may be lack of imagination, low self-esteem, insecurity, low self-confidence, lower IQ, slower learning capacity, caught in the downward educational trend, speech problems, dyslexia, and/or poor decision-making skills. You are the key. It’s not rocket surgery!

http://thegodfreymethod.com/blog/good-foundation-5-ways-advance-your-preschoolers-potential

3 fun ways to stimulate your child's brain

 A young child’s mind needs stimulation of all his or her senses to develop properly: touch, smell, sight and colors, sound, and taste. Positive experiences with each of these are necessary for proper brain neuron-mapping. 

 

Dr. Glen Doman would suggest also exposing young children to flash cards with all kinds of pictures and information on them [but NO sight-words].

 

      It is so important to catch your child’s window of maximum learning from ages two to five years old. Suggestions for doing this are found below. All the benefits will be discussed later, but suffice it to say that knowledge is power.

 

“The larger the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of wonder.” ~Ralph Washington Sockman.

 

      The best way to ensure that your child can develop to his/her full potential is to start early to provide fun learning experiences. Here are some ideas for creating a toddler’s stimulating environment.

 

[As a parent, you can limit the mess without limiting your child's need to explore by providing bottom drawers in the kitchen full of accessible stuff to play with. Clear, plastic tubs can work, too. Children usually prefer real-life things over toys, and can tell the difference.]

•       Fill different bottom drawers with dry beans (depending on your child's age), cookie cutters, and measuring scoops. Children love to scoop and pour. If some beans get out of the drawer, they're fairly easy to sweep up and return to the drawer. (Watch the child to make sure she doesn't eat the beans, or else for younger children use something larger.) Cookie cutters are great fun to trace on paper or use with play dough.
•       Provide kitchen water fun by placing large bowls of water on the kitchen table or floor, strip your child down to his diaper or shorts, and give him cups to pour water back and forth, from one cup to the other. Or take it to the back porch or yard.
•      Don’t forget fun music time with your child, but never leave the radio on for hours and hours with young children. It can cause too much sensory (noise) overload. Brite Music is great for kids. So are the 3 B's (Brahms, Bach, Beethoven) and Mozart.

      When is sensory stimulation detrimental? Too much noise and visual stimulation can cause premature releasing of brain chemicals that help the brain differentiate between different signals and stimuli. Then normal development stops short.

 

Some children may be genetically predisposed to this problem, but it’s the constant noise, visual, and outside stimulation that can actually trigger the problem. In this way, autism, attention-deficit, and dyslexia may be related.

 

We will discuss this more in Chapter 2 of It's Not Rocket Surgery!

 

Note: speech problems beyond age three may be an indicator of dyslexia. Not all speech problems are from dyslexia, but most dyslexics had speech problems first. And TGM phonics prevents/cures dyslexia!

 

      Without these preventatives, the cracks in your child may be speech problems, dyslexia, caught in the downward educational trend, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), lack of imagination, lower IQ, slower learning capacity, and/or poor decision-making skills. You are the key. It’s not rocket surgery!

http://thegodfreymethod.com/blog/3-great-ways-stimulate-your-childs-mind