The book presents interesting ideas around early-age reading developments for babies.

Physical activity

• Crawling (with tummy on floor) and creeping (on just four limbs) are both important for the brain development of the baby.
• A playpen restricts a child’s ability to learn about the world. If small, it restricts crawling and creeping, which further restricts brain development, vision, and hand-eye coordination.
• The child appears hyperactive. In reality, he is using his five senses to learn about the world.

Learning

• Toddlers have a natural desire to learn. They can learn repeated messages in commercials much more easily than Mickey Mouse cartoons, though.
• Between 9 months and 4 years, a baby has an unparalleled ability to absorb new information.
• Kids 12 months or younger are the best to start reading.
• Years one to five are best for learning as many languages as possible.
• Any misinformation that enters a child’s mind in the first six years is very difficult to remove later.
• Children as young as 2-3 years old are always reading and learning. You can only control what they read. And not whether they read.

Reading vs spelling

• His vocabulary limits a man’s thinking sophistication. To form a more complicated thought, he has to develop the corresponding vocabulary.
• Reading like hearing is not a school subject. It is a brain function. Spelling, on the other hand, is a set of rules that is meant to be taught as a school subject.
• You can read but might not be able to spell a word. The reverse never happens.

How to teach reading

• Only teach a child when both you and the child are in a good mood. A sleepy, hungry, or crying child will not learn.
• Better to go fast and risk boring the child.
• Do not start teaching the alphabet; it is too abstract for a child to learn. Start with words directly.
• Teach 5 sets of 5 words three times a day. Thus, each word is shown thrice for one second each time. Retire one word per set per day. So, 5 new words are added every day.
• Use large (5" tall, 3/4" thick to begin with) lowercase letters written in red color for teaching words. The immature visual pathway cannot focus on small letters. Slowly reduce the size as the visual pathways improve.
• The first set of words is a reference to the family and body parts.
• Once the child has learnt basic words, go to couplets, e.g., “red truck”, “orange juice”, and then to more concepts like “full cup”, “little chair”, etc.
• After couplets, go to three-word sentences, e.g., “daddy is sleeping”, “mommy is eating”, etc.
• Next step is the books. Good books to start after that (from the same publisher) are Enough, Inigo, enough and Nose is not toes.
• Reading aloud is a bad idea for children. It slows down reading, which slows down comprehension. The schools do it to test a child’s ability to read.
• Never test your child’s reading ability. Children hate testing.