Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy How to Hothouse Your Kid

I'm a K-2 math/science teacher with a son who began reading simple paragraphs at age 2. He just turned 3 and is gaining fluency. On rare occasions he'll read to others, at which point I inevitably hear, "She's a teacher, so I'm sure she works with him all the time."

Now, if I could teach 2 and 3 year olds to read, I would be demanding a dramatic increase in my salary... But such comments do lead me to wonder, "Can you seriously hothouse a toddler into reading?" I suspect you could teach them a few words, as a lot of kids this age begin to recognize some environmental print, but whole sentences and paragraphs? Really?

Maybe there are parents who successfully hothouse. If so, what in the world are they doing? Not that I'm advocating for it, I'm just curious about the mechanics and the rate of success.

With DS at that age I couldn't get him to wear clothes that he didn't pick out himself. We had to pin him to the floor by sitting on him just to brush his teeth. Encouraging him to try new foods was always a battle, one of his daycare workers photocopied a whole chapter of one of her textbooks labels "Finicky Eaters" and gave it to us at pick up one day. Forcing him to read against his will - ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Getting him to do ANYTHING that he wasn't 100% invested in - ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Ditto chay's points. I could more easily move my condo a few inches to the left than have DS2 learn something he didn't already intend to do. Children can only learn when their brains are ready to learn.

Case in point: he pronounces piano as "py-ano" despite numerous corrections and my never having pronounced the word that way.

I think it would be difficult to do with a preshooler who is "average" but probably more kids could be taught to read earlier than they are in school if the parents put more effort into it. I tutored reading last year (grades 1-3) and the kids I worked with were probably average IQ, (and just below target for reading fluency) but clearly didn't learn how to read the same way my own two did. They had to read the same passages over and over and over before they became fluent, and every time they made an error I corrected it and made them read the sentence over again. At times I felt like pulling out my hair. These kids who were 8-9 years old were struggling more than my own kids did at age 4. So if someone had tried to "hothouse" them in preschool, they would have given up after about 1 day--it would have been way too frustrating and impossible for the kids. I do think a kid needs to be above average IQ to learn reading in preschool but probably not "gifted". My SIL is a teacher and thinks her own child is brilliant because he started to read before kindergarten. She spent tons of time talking about letters, letter sounds, etc. I would guess he's above average but not gifted (I refuse to use the term hothouse in her case since it sounds so negative--I don't think there's anything wrong with what she was doing and save the term for clearly pushy parents who are trying way too hard with a kid who isn't ready).

The Teach Your Baby To Read people reckon you can. I see no reason to doubt it - babies and toddlers learn much harder things, like spoken language. I considered, before DS was born, whether to go that way, read up on all sides of the argument, and decided it wasn't a good idea, better to leave teaching reading to schools. Then I had DS, who taught himself to read starting from before he could talk...

I don't know how anyone could teach a 2 year old to read if they weren't ready. Most 2 year olds don't even know their letters and the letter sounds. One of my DS's taught himself to read at that age, and started reading books to us by 3.5. He was able to learn to read fluently because he would ASK me to help him with certain words or sounds, though, not because I tried to teach him.

His twin brother (also gifted) on the other hand, wouldn't let me teach him how to write letters as a toddler/preschooler. Teaching him to read was never even a consideration, although he was taught letters and sounds. When he decided he wanted to read at age 5, the summer before K, he taught himself. He wouldn't accept any help at all. (If I even DARED to help him sound out a word; that was it for reading - the book was slammed shut.) His K teacher would often talk about how we "made" him such a good reader by working with him so much, which always gave me a good laugh. I tried to tell her that I didn't "teach" him anything, but she never believed me. I know she thought he was "hothoused" until she saw how quickly he progressed through the reading levels.

People want to believe that kids who learn to read very early were drilled by their parents and "hothoused" because it is alarming to them to see a child so far ahead of their own, as it makes them doubt their own child's progress and whether or not they have done enough. I can remember that I never told any of my friends or acquaintances that my DS could read at three because I knew they would think I was "pushing" him. I didn't even tell my sister.

At age four, he went through a stage of reading everything out-loud (signs, papers from school, etc.) so it wasn't something I could hide even if I wanted to do so. By that point, I think most of the people who knew him knew that he was "different" (ie- gifted) so it was more acceptable. He was one of those preschoolers that would elicit "He is so smart" comments every where we went because he spoke very well about complicated topics and had an extensive vocabulary for a preschooler. If his twin brother, who seemed more "typical" at that age, had also been reading, I would have been accused of "pushing/hothousing."

The science appears to back this up. A friend who is a childhood literacy specialist says that some children will learn to read on their own when developmentally ready; and some children have to be taught; but the age at which they are developmentally ready varies hugely, and that this capacity "clicks on" when the brain is ready.

Assuming my friend is correct, I don't see any point in pressuring toddlers to read.

DeeDee

I get the same thing--I taught high school English, not elementary, but people always asked me what I did to get my daughter reading. Well I read books to her. She was frustrated she couldn't read before she was talking much. After she had a huge language explosion at one, she started reading words too. She asked lots of questions and I answered. I let her play some starfall. And she was reading pretty well when two; fluent when three.

I sometimes do suddenly wonder if people assume she's where she is because if my hot housing her. But I just let her drag me along, and I like to think I'm pretty adept at providing an enriching environment, between both parents being in early childhood ed and DD being interested in many areas of my strength. Mostly when folks comment I just joke about her attending English class in the womb.

My first son didn't sit still for an entire book for a long time. A page here or there and then he was off to explore. I would just keep reading and pointing things out to him and laughing at funny things, or acting surprised or whatever (which would make him come over to see what all my emoting was about). I had a lot of children's music on tapes and cd's (which is funny because he absolutely HATES any kind of music now) which I think replaced a lot of the lap time reading because he could move around. Eventually, reading to him became so important to both of us and I remember he went from non-reader to fluent reader over spring break of K....and then progressed rapidly thereafter. I call it the 0 to 60 miles an hour plan. His K teacher was instrumental in providing the foundation (he already knew all his letter sounds) but the explosion I believe was that over Spring Break he just "got it" and when he put it all together it was like late 2nd grade level immediately. I do think that was just when he was ready developmentally to put it all together and crack the code.

I am an ESL teacher and have heard people say things like: You are a teacher, so you know how to teach reading. So I feel where you are coming from.

I met a mom in the school yard who said she had purchased your baby can read for her son. The directions stated that you should play two half hour videos for your baby a day - one in the morning and one in the afternoon. She said that she didn't find it helped her son learn to read in any way.

I think it is possible to hot house things like letter sounds. However, I think getting preschoolers to apply that knowledge when encountering new words so that they are be able to sound out words and blend phonemes would be difficult.

DH made the point last night that we push DD and lecture her about cleaning up all the time and she hasn't taken to that at all. If there is a method to Hot House picking up Lego, I will be the first to sign up. On the other hand I've never had to drill or lecture about reading.