Worked the same for Latin as well,to a certain point. That point was when I went from the top of the class for reading Latin to almost the bottom, eerrmm…
No idea when exactly. Definitely before kindergarten because mum got in trouble for my brother and I being able to read. She had started studying to be a teacher and yes, we were her little guinea pigs. I do remember, before pre-school age, flashcards at the kitchen table. She had two sets, one she’d ordered from an educational magazine, and one that was made out of purple cardboard that she’d cut with pinking shears. I liked those best. This stuff about reading and learning to read is pretty much it for what I can remember of my early childhood. I don’t remember much else. I didn’t learn to write until kindergarten though because I had fine motor co-ordination problems and had to go to a special school for physical therapy. Now that was fun!
Your mother got in trouble?
I was reading quite well by age 3.
Sources of training:
[ul]
[li]Mother’s lessons[/li][li]Sesame Street[/li][li]Being read to by others[/li][li]My Mother’s old collections of Pogo comic strips. I Go Pogo! :)[/li][/ul]
I was eight, between second and third grades (I’m dyslexic and ADHD, joy). My parents were given a choice after second grade, get me a tutor, or have me held back; they went with the tutor, for which I’ve always been grateful. I can remember my tutor having this book with all the letters in it made from different types of carpeting, and having me feel the shape of the letter; that and her making me write multiple digit numbers from left to right instead of right to left (I’d write the ones, then move to the tens, then the hundreds, and so on.).
The thing that my family remembers is how much I wanted to learn to read, how incredibly frustrating it was for me to know that there was all this knowledge hidden in those shapes, but being able to decipher it. Well, that and how after I learned how began to read like one possessed.
I still have difficulties writing, and nothing intimidates me like the thought of having to write a lengthy report or paper.
My Mom taught me to read when I was 4 or 5. She was a nursery school/kindergarten teacher and had access to all sorts of cool school supplies. I remember vividly coloring pictures (W is for Wasp) and my hand hurting because I wanted the black to be REALLY black. We did this every night before bed. I just hated it when the lessons were over and I had to go to sleep.
I had read all the first grade books before I got to school; I could not believe the other kids couldn’t read!
To some degree, I think I was more wired up for readng than my brother, who was very athletic and not at all interested in studying. He is more like my Mom and reads only what he has to while I am more like Dad and read constantly. My brothet told me once the only book he ever read for pleasure was “The Godfather.” I was stunned.
My mother taught me to read not long after I began to talk. The summer before I started kindergarten, I was at the library with my mom, and I asked her what a word in my book was. She asked me to spell it. This caught the attention of the librarian, who was going to be my Kindergarten teacher. They weren’t prepared to deal with any kids who could already read, write and spell before ever going to school, and boy, was she right! Thus began the long saga of The School Board Who Couldn’t Find Their Asses With An Elecronic Ass Locator.
Well, not a whole lot - she was berated by both our teachers (my brother was a year ahead of me in kindergarten) and evidently told she’d done horrible things to us developmentally by teaching us to read before we were school aged. However, Mum was always pretty assertive about getting us a good education so she probably didn’t take that much to heart.
I was four. I have a vivid memory of being in a T-shirt shop and reading out loud, slowly, “I fixed Farrah’s Fawcett” (this being the early seventies), then wondering why all the adults burst into laughter.
I was two when I started pointing out letters, according to my mom. I think I was two-three-ish when I actually started to read. Of course, reading was all I did; I don’t think I learned to tie my shoes until I was, like, eight.
Incidentally, my sister didn’t learn to read until she was five/six, and it didn’t hurt her at all. She’s just as smart as I am (and way more practical).
My first words were at 9 months - “Hi There” in case you were wondering - scared my mom to death to have this little voice greeting her from the playpen when she came back in the room.
My sister is 5 years older than me so she would teach me what she learned every day when she got home from school. Never remember not being able to read. I was in 1st grade at 5 - I remember very clearly going up to the teacher and asking if I could go to the library. When told to read the books in the room, I said I had. By the end of the week, she had me reading *her * Harlequin Romance novel just to keep me quiet.
But the side effect of this is I have lousy pronounciation and spelling. And although I was writing in cursive in the 1st grade, I didn’t learn how to properly print letters. And I had to have a couple of years of speech therapy.
I also don’t remember not reading. My mother got scolded by the teachers for teaching me to read, since she might have done it “wrong.” All she did was read us stories, and I just followed along. They did not know what to do with me in first grade. Mom tried keeping me home to let the others catch up, but of course all I did when home was to read more. Finally, after (I was told later) a knock-down-drag-out fight with The Authorities, they permitted me to enter second grade after Christmas vacation.