You might change your profile to allow e-mail. I wanted to say that I also put a sign on the lower wall, with a huge arrow pointing to a space on the rug , saying “your shoes go here”. Just improvise using those basic sight words and have some meaningful purpose for using the words, so your child can have some help in memorizing them.

One lady who wrote on Yahoo answers taught her 18 month old to read. I kept that response if you want to see it.

Are you English? Becasue in the US we don’t say “learnt”, just “learned”.

There’s a book, TEach Your Preschooler to Read” by Donald Emory (or Emery) who was at one time superintendent of schools in New York or Pennsylvania or somehwere like that, that I think is currently out of print. In it he gives the reasons for teaching the average 4 year old to read. Also, a Montessori teacher told me 3 1/2 is the earliest she has ever taught a child to read.

I also haven’t had a tv for 20 years. My house is deliberately boring and no videogames either. My kids read just for pure entertainment, being that there wasn’t anything to do when hanging around at home, except when we took the usual trips out of the house, etc. I never heard, I’m bored. I have 7 kids, 5 in 5 years, and the oldest went to the park for 5 hrs, then home and read and did puzzles, etc. An old fashioned childhood without tv or other media–well we did occasionally listen to music. I recommend that kind of childhood. Just quiet and real. With Bach music playing in the background.

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My daughter was reading by the time she was 4. She is never, ever without a book in her hand, her pocket, or purse. She is now 21. As a teacher, I can tell you that children learn to read at different levels however, their first push or encouragement into reading must come from the parents. I have found in the 10 years that I have taught, that if the parents don’t read – their children will most likely not want to read or enjoy reading. This is an effort that must begin at home with your child and you reading together and then allowing the child to read independantly. Remember that children copy what they ‘see’ as examples.

My oldest was diagnosed with LD and didn’t start reading until he was 7 1/2. He is 16 now, reads at the “proficient” level for quite some time now and receives excellent grades. He is strong in Math and Science and plans to go into engineering.

Just threw that extra info in there because too many ASSUME they know a kid’s future by how well they read or how well they learn as younger children.

My other son learned to read at age 6 and has always done well with reading and other schoolwork.

Every child learns reading differently. I have to say the key is to read read read to them from infancy. My daughter began reading at around 5 1/2 and son began reading at 4. I realized that the reason my son could read much earlier was that he was a whole word reader or decoder, meaning that he literally memorized a word or could recognize certain letters or look at the picture and conclude what the word was. He just turned 6 and reads on a second grade level but he is still learning to sound words out. My daughter on the other hand is a more traditional reader and sound letters.

I had three boys who all learned to read at approximately the same age. One was reading at about 5 years and 7 months. One was reading at 5 years and 3 months and the last one read at 5 years and 1 month.

I read to all three constantly and made no special effort to “teach” reading. I did point out letters in environmental print, showed them their names, and pointed out simple sight words like STOP, EXIT, Cheerios, etc. I did explain to them that letters make sounds and taught them the sounds just using initial word sounds and pointing out the letters.

I don’t think children need to be “pushed” to read at an early age. Most will pick it up on their own with a few simple pointers. A few do need extra help though. (I know this because I ran a school age day care group for years and tutored a lot of the children in my care.)

every child will be different in their path to read….some begin very early (2 of mine were reading by 3 1/2) and others much later or very few never do….but just being able to read is not the only part of the process….children need to be able to follow patterns and be able to comprehend what they read and what is read to them…

and children need to learn to both love and appreciate reading in all forms….if no one reads to them and encourages them to read then they may be able to read but will never appreciate the process nor be a very capable reader…

look around you in all that you do one must be able to read…for work, for play, for life….

all children should be read to on a daily basis even when they can read themselves….and they should have access to all types of reading materials(books, newspapers, magazines, ads, mail, posters, etc) and most of all see adults reading and enjoying doing so….

when my son was 3 he went to the highest ranking prescool in preschool hr was in a lvl g he 10 know and my son reads in a lvl z because of the prescool he good at math and acc prep if u break something he could fix it he could make a psp ps3 and more my other son is 5 and he is in lvl j

check out the book Reading Magic by Mem Fox

I have 3 children and they learned to read at differnet ages.