This is slightly off-topic, but according to thisstudy, just having lots of books in the home has a large positive effect on the level of education a child will attain. Take from that what you will. I use it as justification for buying more books: “I’m doing it for the children!!” 
I’ve seen that before, and I think it is an excellent example of the conflation of correlation and causation that I’m talking about. It’s hard for me to imagine that anyone thinks that if you donated a truckload of free books to every home that didn’t have many, it would actually increase children’s achievement in those homes. Seems so obvious to me that they are not causing each other but are both results of the same cause: the parents are bookish people. Bookish people tend to have books, and bookish people tend to have bookish children.
Like I said, my fifth grader, who has been pegging the STAR scale at 12.9 for a good year now, didn’t read a lick until she was taught in kindergarten and first grade. But while you don’t need to read early to be smart and a strong reader later, I find it hard to imagine that people who read really early ever regress to the mean or worse without some kind of TBI or illness.
I agree, and I enjoy doing this with TV shows. In this golden era of complex, novelistic TV that we live in, I think it works quite well.
And yet Mister Rogers had puppet segments, too.
And the crayon factory segment also appeared on Sesame Street (sans narration).
That and this guy is so brilliant that he taught himself how to read at two years old but still dismisses data in the face of his stupid fucking opinion. I blame myself for reading threads like these.
But even better is to actually go to that crayon factory, which you can do if you are near Eastern Pennsylvania. Quite fun.
I’m not up on current research, but I recall seeing some that said there wasn’t that great a correlation between age of beginning to read and reading later in life. Kids read when they are ready to.
I did not teach myself to read; Sesame Street did. I am quite sure I would not have known how to read until first grade had I not watched that show.
Three responses to that one:
**(1) **This is IMHO, right? Just checking to make sure it is still a board dedicated to the expression of one’s opinion.
**(2) **Here are some excerpts of my responses in this thread. I wonder if a reasonable person would say I simply “dismissed data”, as opposed to engaging with it, acknowledging some points, asking for further evidence about others, while also laying out logical reasons one might doubt the validity of inferences made:
(3) In re your bilious characterisation of my position as my “stupid fucking opinion”: I have very often over the years found myself the target of similarly vituperative and vulgar insults hurled in online discussions and debates. Yet I almost *never *direct the same kind of abuse at my antagonists–and I say “almost” only because it’s possible that it has happened, and I should not rule it out although I don’t remember ever doing it. At minimum, the ratio must be thousands to one.
I wonder what that says about you, and all the others who continually stoop to this kind of crass rhetoric. I mean, is that all you’ve got? Strikes me as unfortunate that more people can’t “disagree without being disagreeable”, and remain civil even when expressing their strenuous objections on one topic or another. In any event, I intend to remain on the high road no matter how many times people try to drag me into the muck. So: I bid you good day, ma’am. (I said good day!)
Do you ever ask yourself, what’s the common denominator in these exchanges and what can I reasonably gleen about either causation or correlation of such exchanges?
.
:smack:
Carry on.
I believe what you are getting at here is what would be known as “blaming the victim”, except that I do not consider myself a victim — I am a big boy who can take care of myself (as I believe I have amply demonstrated). Still, I raise an eyebrow at your impression that when I conduct myself civilly in exchanges with others, but they do not so conduct themselves with me, it must be I who is to blame for the incivility. ORLY?
Oh, about the factoid re Head Start benefits …
Again there are other ways to get there than sitting and reading to your child but sitting and reading will do it, hits many developmental needs all at once and evens out standard language exposure to those with other than standard language spoken in the home. Those who read raising good readers clearly (see the adoption studies) is not genetic proclivity alone.
The thing is, reading involves a multitude of discrete skills, ranging from figuring out the correct orientation for holding a book, through learning the most common sounds associated with letters, through recognizing sight words, through recognizing common spelling patterns, through analyzing literature for elements like character, setting, and plot. Just like any other skill, these skills need to be learned, and one of the best ways for someone to learn a skill is to interact with a master of the skill who models it, asks the learner to practice it, and gives the learner feedback on the practice.
Reading aloud to a child provides an excellent opportunity to engage in all these behaviors. Obviously it’s not the only way for someone to learn the skills, any more than weekly lessons ar ethe only way for someone to learn to play the violin; equally obviously, not everyone who engages in such practice is going to take to the skill, any more than every child enrolled in Suzuki classes will become Itzak Perlman.
But it would be absolutely remarkable if the skills of reading were unique among human skills in not being effectively taught by having a master of the skill interact with a student of the skill.
Never would have guessed you’d play the victim card. :rolleyes:
I can’s speak for others but I get the distinct impression that you’re the sort of person who would argue with a stump over the most trite detail of the least controversial subject.
i.e. reading to kids.
Look, nobody is forcing you to read to your kid. We all get that you’re a special snowflake who is bored by children’s books and that reading them makes your throat all scratchy. (And no, nobody wants to have a thread about why it hurts your throat - drink some water, okay?)
But since you brought up the fact that people tend to lose patience and civility with you in these kinds of conversations, a more self aware person may spend a moment or two reflecting on why random people he’s never met get irritated with him on such a frequent basis. But not you. You play the (not) victim card and try to stake the high ground with the whole, “who? me?? why I never!”, act. So if you’re about to get the vapours, someone will fetch you the fainting sofa and the smelling salts. When you come to, try to reflect a little.
…And, no, you still don’t have to read to your kid.
What part of “I do not consider myself a victim” did you not get?
I obviously don’t agree with the “stump” or “trite” digs. However, if you were to accuse me of taking particular delight in finding an opportunity to challenge conventional wisdom (only when it is sincere, mind you–I don’t play devil’s advocate for its own sake), to defend a contrarian position? I’d happily cop to it. There are far too many unchallenged shibboleths out there that need a bit of puncturing or at least examination under new light.
What do you think about iPad apps? It’s early days, but my daughter (who just turned four) sure seems to have learned a lot from hers.
The part where you were the first to use the word and characterize yourself in those terms.
That you think reading to kids is one of the “unchallenged shibboleths” that needs challenging is what’s leading me to my humble opinion that you spend far too much time majoring in minor things, BECAUSE what you call “examination under new light” is nothing more than personal anecdotal argument.
Well, fuck you and your idiotic opinion. 
:sigh:
On the other hands, some things aren’t worth reading. Get a room, guys.
I definitely think that good ones have a place: in my very limited experience (using my iPad with my own preschooler), they’re great at familiarizing kids with letter shapes and sounds and sight words, for example. As you say, though, it’s early days, and I don’t know how they compare to the integrated experience of a read-aloud, in which a lot of skills are modeled and practiced simultaneously.
My daughter is obsessed with Redwall, and she also uses the books during read-alouds to practice sight words: “Daddy, does that say ‘the’?” But we also practice predictions, and ascribing character traits, and visualization, and emoting, and fluency, and a host of higher-order skills during these read-alouds.
I don’t think read-aloud is the only way to teach. I do think, however, its’a very, very valuable tool in a parent’s toolkit, and for most kids, it’s gonna be one of the single best things a parent can do to support their kid’s literacy skills.