Education begins at home, or so the old saying goes. But little do people know that education can start even as early as the child’s second year of age. Of course education is a life-long process that begins when the baby sees the light of day until that light begins to fail him in his old age, physically and spiritually. What I’m referring to here is not education in the broad sense of the word, encompassing the teaching of right and wrong and other things, but education as we begin it in our formal schooling.
I first picked this idea of teaching a pre-school kid to read from an article in a leading local, daily last February. Keeping in mind the essential points of the article, I thought it wouldn’t hurt if I began to teach the baby in the house, who at the time was 21 months old, and then make improvisations I thought were applicable. Now, I wouldn’t teach any ordinary kid to read. First, I had to be sure that the child was willing. This is very difficult to find out because pre-school kids have a very short attention span. Moreover, being normal, healthy kids that they are, they can be unmanageable, devilish and impossible at times.
But nobody knows your kids better than you do. Play with them. Catch them in their best mood. Don’t give them the impression that what you are about to do is something formal and serious. Just remember that kids are always interested in something that is fun, to do. Of course this may require you to be an entertainer and all-smiling TV quizmaster at the same time, but the idea is to get him interested. If at first you don’t succeed, try and try again. But never, never ever be pushy. Most of all, consider how the child is feeling at the moment.
If he’s tired, sleepy or sick, if he’s feeling mean, if he didn’t get the right amount of sleep the previous night, or nap during the afternoon, if he’s asking for something else, or if he doesn’t want to pay attention to what you are doing, then just stop it. Wait until he’s more receptive. Or perhaps the child isn’t truly prepared for it yet, whether because he is so young that he can’t even utter any intelligible word, or because the parents are so lazy that they haven’t even taught the kids the proper names of objects and persons.
In our case, our child simply wasn’t ready. Then we ourselves read something else interesting and it forced me to examine our motives. Most parents, the article said, want their child to read at an early age because they (the parents) like to show off. And while this child may be ahead for the first couple of years at school, by 3rd or 4th grade all the other students catch up. It really questioned both the importance and effectiveness of early formal education at home.
Before you decide to teach your two year old to read, perhaps you should ask these questions as well. We’re not saying don’t do it, just decide if it is worth it.