Do you want your kids to learn their letters and words?
Be prepared… its a lot of work… ready? Put in this DVD! (No, seriously!)
This is almost too easy to admit, because I was a teacher, but it works. This is the easiest and best way that I have found! They are FANTASTIC! All of our kids have learned their letters within about a week watching The Letter Factory (before 2 1/2 years old) while riding in the car!
This is not to say that you don’t need to keep practicing and supplementing the DVD with flashcards, games or books, but this will teach your child their letters and sounds.
Here is what I do:
1. Rent the movie (our library carries these) or buy The Letter Factory (we have two copies – one for the house, one for the car). You can even download it onto a Leapster Explorer.
2. Once I had it, I put it in our car and turned it on whenever we were going anywhere. We went on a road-trip to PA and our son knew his letters by the time that the trip was over. It was a 6 hour trip, so instead of putting on cartoons or kid-shows, I stuck with The Letter Factory (he loved it… they all do!) If you have a DVD player in your car- this is the easy way to go. They are riding along anyway, so why not teach them! Plus, our kids and I sang the songs so loud when they came on, during our trip (each letter sings a song) and they LOVED that!
If you have a leapster explorer, download the movie for a few dollars. If you are just watching it at home, put it on twice a day (its only 30 minutes). Try this for a week. In the meantime, sing the song to them “The A says a… every letter makes a sound, the A says a”.
3. Use everything as a learning opportunity. If you have on a t-shirt with letters, ask them the letters & sounds. Tell them the answers (repeat after them if they get it right or help them if they miss it).
They will learn them quickly.
4. After they know the letters, make sure that you either put it on occasionally or really work at trying at least a few times a week to work on letters. I buy the magnetic letters in the dollar section of wal-mart and keep them in a baggie in my “learning organizer” (over the door holder). I use them on a cookie sheet (magnetic). I will post a video on teaching your child to make words on this soon.
5. When they have mastered this without a mistake, move onto The Talking Word Factory and Word Caper. We wait almost a year to do this (our kids learned their letters at two, so we stared this next movie around 3 or 3 1/2) and they loved it!
They even have math ones that our kids like (Math Circus).
Our kids have leapster explores and they still use them daily (I bought each of them one when the turned two- so its been years). They keep them in the car and use them when we go anywhere. (They won’t get lost and they are an easy way to keep them busy and learning in the car)
Other Leapfrog movies that we have: The Letter Factory, Talking Words Factory, Word Caper, Lets Go To School, Math Circus. I would at least get the first two, without hesitation. You can find them pretty cheap on Amazon.
