My son is 15 months old and I was wondering what I can do and/or buy to help him to start learning his colors, numbers, letters, etc. (or is it too early?). He also likes to watch tv but I'd rather have him watch something educational. Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
Try puzzles with alphabet and colors. And defiantly invest in books that have a lot of different things that you are looking for. They are never too young to want or start to learn.
Colors yes, numbers and letters he is too young. Start with a color he likes like "red" but don't be suprised or frustrated that he thinks everything is red. That is very normal. You can use a lot of things in his everyday life for colors. Also feel free to visit my website www.discoverytoyslink.com/gsnyder The giant pegboard is great for colors and shapes (when he is older). Or if you are interested in a catalog show I would be happy to get a packet out to you.
We have the fridge magnets that you put in a machine on the fridge and it tells you the name of the letter and how to say it. They have them with the alphabet, animals where you put two parts of an animal together, vehicles that kids love, i'm not sure if there's others or not. My daughter just turned 2 in January and has been playing with them for over a year now. She absolutely loves them. She can sing the alphabet and tell you what each letter is when you point to it. This is a gift I give to everyone I know that doesn't already have them.
She also loves reading the books that have animals and colors and such in them. We enjoy watching shows together on channel 11 and has learned a lot from the shows. I understand a lot of people are against tv for kids, but to me if I sit with her and we interact with the show together, she's learning that there are things to learn. She especially loves word world, blue's clues, sesame street and sid the science kid.
BTW, there's no such thing as too early if you're not forcing it on them. If you simply tell them what things are and repeat it often they eventually pick up on it. Repetition is how kids learn.
PBS and Nick Jr. have great shows that are really educationally based. As long as you limit the number of shows/day, you should be OK.
But, 15 month is young to expect them to understand what you're teaching - not that you shouldn't do it. Just set your expectations realistically.
We have some books at home (board books) that have the colors listed on pages that are fun for the kids, but honestly, you can use anything you're doing to teach colors. Pick-up a toy and say, "blue block", "red car", "white milk", "pink pants"
Our daughter is 22 months, and it's just been the past few weeks that she's really verbalized her colors (maybe 8-10 weeks) - I know they work on them at Day Care.
Don't be surprised if everything is a certain color for a while. For our son, everything was blue. For our daughter, everything was pink.
Here's a link to a site from the American Academy of Pediatrics on parenting that has some milestones for the toddler months:
http://www.healthychildren.org/English/ages-stages/toddle...
I started then with my daughter, and she knew her colors and letters by 18 months. We played with chalk and I bought her a few ABC and color books,as well as an ABC puzzle by Melissa and Doug. I also let her pick the color cup she wanted to use at each meal.
And please, do not have your 15 month old watch TV. The evidence is that TV inhibits vocabulary acquisition and language development, thus why the APA recommends no TV before 2.
It is never too early to expose them to books, crayons, big foam numbers and shapes and animals. Spending time with him with those kinds of activities goes a big way, and you can ask while you're doing routine things, what color is that? What is this, while pointing out things at the grocery store, or other places. Before long, he'll love this game and start telling you the colors and shapes without prompting.
I have found that you can't go wrong with Leapfrog toys. They are educational, and made for babies on up. I don't know what their latest toys for that age are, but both of my girls liked this ABC ball that spins and sings the alphabet. Between that and "Fridge Phonics", that is how they learned their ABCs. there's also a cute little steering wheel toy that does stuff with letters and numbers. You can go to toysrus.com and look under Leapfrog to get an idea of what they have, or take your son to the store and see what he seems interested in.
Both my boys really enjoyed Thomas The Tank Engine around that age (maybe a bit older). The engines all have different colors and Thomas and some of his friends have numbers, too. There are also special books (we had pop up books) for recognizing colors and for counting. My boys loved these, too. But I think the most important thing is to talk to your child while you two are together; point out how white the snow is, the color of his shirt, count how many red cars he has, etc. There are learning possibilities everywhere...
One activity that I've found to be very simple, yet beneficial, is to get a set of those foam letter/numbers for the bathtub. My daughter and I have fun talking about the different letters, numbers, and colors every night as she takes her bath. You can find them for only a few dollars at Target, Walmart, Babies r Us, etc.
