Kyler’s Reading Journey
admin • January 28, 2024
Kyler’s reading journey began before his first birthday. I had been speaking to him in English ever since he was born, but when he was 8 months old, I started introducing him to the written word. At first, I used available products to do so, but soon after, I decided to create a product specially for me to use with Kyler that would meet our needs better.
I wanted to teach him words in a systematic way early on. The first reason was that I wanted to expand his vocabulary so that he would be able to understand what we were saying more easily. Secondly, by teaching him the vocabulary using the written word instead of just saying out the words to him, I believed that it would not only help him remember the word more easily, but also lay the foundation for learning to read later on.
In the beginning, I taught him single words. This included family members like ‘Mommy’ and ‘Daddy’, parts of the body like ‘hair’ and ‘nose’, and action words like ‘sit’ and ‘laugh’. One important thing to note is that for each of these words, I would take a video myself to illustrate the word. So when teaching him the word ‘orange’, I would take a video of us in the supermarket, with me holding an orange in front of him, and when we went to the zoo, I would take videos of the animals there (with him in it) to teach him words like ‘tiger’. In that way, he only learned words that he came across in real life, and in learning those words, he would be seeing pictures and videos of people and things that he was familiar with from his daily life, including himself. I would teach him once or twice a day, for about five to ten minutes each time.
For the first few months, I could not be sure how much he was learning, as he could not speak much. But what was very clear was that he loved his lessons. He would often show me he wanted to have his lessons, and when I stopped the lessons, he would often motion to me he wanted more. Four months later, at twelve months, he started to show that he could understand many words when he heard them. For example, when we said, “How do you laugh?” he would laugh out loud. One month later at thirteen months, he was able to recognize many words such as ‘Daddy’, “star”, “nod”, “cry”, either by speaking out the word, or by acting out the word (for example, pointing with his finger when we saw the word ‘point’). You can see him doing this in videos we took of him at twelve and thirteen months.
His reading lessons continued, and his interest only grew and grew, along with his reading abilities. You can see his progress from videos of him at various stages, such as:
At 17 months – reading couplets such as ‘orange car’ and ‘steering wheel’;
At 20 months – reading short phrases such as ‘make the astronaut fly’
At 24 months – reading full sentences like, ‘The Velociraptor is biting Daddy’s head.’
See Kyler at 12-26 Months video
From two years old, he started reading story books more and more. I regularly bought simple story books for him, and so far he has read well over a hundred books already.
Naturally, he is most interested in books that relate to his particular interests. For example, during the time he was very interested in dinosaurs, he would be reading dinosaur-related books, and could read all the dinosaur names like, ‘Triceratops’ and ‘Pachycephalosaurus’. Shortly before turning three, he was engrossed in the world of Pokemon, so he would read many Pokemon books to learn as much as possible about all the hundreds of different Pokemons. Now, at three and a half, he is most interested in Plants Vs. Zombies, and his favorite book is a Plants Vs. Zombies comic book.
We have developed a habit where almost every day, we would read between one or more short story books together after dinner, spending about 15-20 minutes each time. He would read out each sentence first, then I would read it again after he does, especially if he needs help with any of the words.
The benefits of having started reading early have been many. By being able to read independently, Kyler has been able to read books relating to his own interests by himself. Often, when we think he was playing in his playroom, we find that he has been spending time with books instead. He is also able to satisfy his curiosity of the world more whenever he goes out, where he would often read signs and ask me, for example, “Daddy, why does it say “Caution: Slippery Floor”?”
But most of all, Kyler’s reading journey with me has allowed me to bond very deeply with him. Because Kyler loves to learn and associates learning with me, we have developed a very special bond. His mother and I often tell others that although Kyler will always want Mommy when he goes to bed, during the day, Kyler would usually come to me the most instead.
Our aim for Kyler is for him to continue to enjoy learning and exploring the world, and for him to be able to learn independently, especially through reading. So far, we believe he is well on his way!