Elephant

JR came face-to-face with the fishes & the pygmy hippo today. Super-delighted especially with this big puffy fish, the name I failed to catch on any of the signs. It was a really cute fish, but active just like JR, hence the blurry pix. *haha*

We also saw the White Tigers on the way out. I also had quite a fright from a snake that slithered across my path(!!!).

Our main aim in making the trip to the zoo was to once again see the Elephant Bathing/Feeding session which is at 9.15am. And I printed out a very simple book just about that.


Next trip, l should work on a different animal theme. ;-)

Saying it Loud

This is one of the few words he can verbalise for certain right now.

He can only do words that sound like "Ba" or "Ma", so Butterfly would end up like "Ba ba bye" & even Umbrella will still sound like "Ba"! The only word that he can say nicely with 2 syllables is "Ma-my". *hehe*.

And I will find him taking books to "study" too. Our eldest was the same way. The older 2 boys never did this.

The BUSiness Times

JR was digging through his dad's bag and found copies of said Times, and starting pointing and saying "Ba", "Ba", which is how he refers to "Bus". How interesting ...

He managed to isolate a small word from a longer word...hmm..

Simple Readers

Reading from a new set of books. I love these "Wo Hui Du" Readers as they have large words and it helps that the books only have around 10 to 12 pages each. Easy to go thru'.

These books build on the vocabulary he already is familiar with after having gone through the Wink-to-Learn DVD Flashcard programme, just that the same words are presented in phrases & sentences.

He was so super-tickled by the waterfall though! Really funny.

Puzzles

Saw a number of very suitable simple puzzles at a Popular Fair. They came with words which JR is familiar with. So the puzzles are great reinforcement for matching shapes & words.

Of the 3 sets I got (yea S$4.90 each), JR seems to like the shapes set the best:

Ah, JR likes eating the star too! Haha!

JR's also familiar with the words on this "Colours" set, and he did play with it some, but not as much as with the "Shapes" set.


The 3rd set is one on Animals. This set does not have any words on them. There was a set with words but the graphics were tacky to me (*urgh*!), so after much deliberation, I selected this instead. So I "DIY'd".

I came home and did abit of "homework" on it. I used my Dynamo handheld labeller and printed out the words for it, so now it looks like this.

As for storage...I had this brainwave. *haha* I thought the puzzles would be great in those A4-box files, so I rummaged thru' my "store" of used box files. Yah, they are just perfect for the job!

So everything's neat & dandy. Won't lose those bits now.

Reading Chinese

Yes, he can recognise Chinese characters too!

I was sceptical about flashcards, but with the convenience of DVD flashcard programmes these days, it just seemed like it was no harm to try.

I just tested him. Am amazed! Started him with the DVD flashcards at 5mths. He's 11mths now. He's never seen these words before other than on the WinktoLearn DVDs.

After having gone through the "Wink-to-Learn"(WTL) DVDs, I must say that this WTL and the "Your Baby Can Read"(YBCR) series are currently the best in quality of the DVD programmes available in stores now. YBCR has a much longer programme but once the baby is happy with the show, often he gets used to it and love bouncing along with the songs and short phrases. For babies with short attention span, the WTL would be most suitable. Being a "flash" programme, it flashes 10 words in a short 2-minute lesson. Just show that 1 lesson or if your baby has a longer attention span, then 2 lessons each day, and show those same 1 or 2 lessons for 7 days in a row. Very quick and simple process. Then change to another 1 or 2 new lessons for the next 7 days.

For WTL, both the English & Chinese programmes are similar. I took a video of 1 lesson of English while Baby JR was watching it this morning, just so as to time how long 1 lesson is - 2:04min exactly. Most lessons are similar in duration, so if you think it's a drugery to show a DVD flashcard programme, think again!

Bus

Buses sure do grab his attention!


See how excited he is when he sees a bus approach?


And yeah, he recognises the word!

That means I always try to walk past the bus-stop and show him the big "Bus" words on the boards. haha.

Trip to Bank

As part of this morning's "entertainment", JR followed me to the Bank. Along the way, he saw the Tasmanian Devil & Bob the Builder. I'm not sure why he's so fascinated with their faces.





We changed his car seat yesterday (yeah, he's 11mths old...time to upgrade). So far, he's been fairly happy. The new car seat offers him a much better view of his surroundings, and the view outside the car. He just LOVES seeing buses! And yes, he LOVES to study books.

I love this Maxi-Cosi carseat. It has very thoughtfully-placed clips at the side of the seat for us to hang the baby's toys. Ah, and I succumbed to buying that small hungry caterpillar (Eric Carle) book sometime back bc JR simply LOVES it!

After dropping by the bank, we went to the supermarket and visited loads of apples. Gee, there were South African APPLES (yeah, the word "APPLES" are so clearly printed on the packages), Fiji Apples, Japanese Apples, and I don't know whatever other country. Hey, it's sure cosmopolitan in that supermart! PINK apples...ever seen them? Actually their colouration is more like Rainbow Mangoes. I'm so unexciting. I simply grabbed a tray of organic Gala Apples.

Organic Apples are really tasty, and these were so soft that all I needed to do was cut them into smaller sizes and JR could chew them up himself. He's got 8 teeth and another 2 more on the way. Hai, I didn't even realise he was teething until he went around biting every one of us this afternoon, then I pried his mouth apart to check. *haha*.

Card Game II

Ah, now apart from "Hi", he can definitely pick out several other words.

Where's Baby?


Where's Dog?

I did not use flashcards to manually work on this word recognition - all this while, have been relying only on FlashCard Video Programmes. We started off with ">Your Baby Can Read Videos and English & Chinese Wink-to-Learn Videos.

He is now 11-months-old. We started showing him these videos from around 5 months.

Words in Print

This kept JR occupied a good part of the time in church today.

Words that I wrote on the printed page. Words that he recognises.

Did He Do That?

Coincidence or Reality?

He has been able to recognise that "Hi" word for quite a while now, and will even try to verbalise it with a screeching "hi" sound. I already thot he was quite "slow" since the girl in the video could point and act out the words from like 8 or 9 months old! JR is almost 11mths old! He has not been able to point or gesture to various parts of his body or at things. Only perhaps to raise his hands to ask me to carry him. Or to close/open his palms when he hears the "Twinkle" song, and raise his arms to show "Hurray" as in the "If you're happy" song. But then again, it does say that baby can recognise words if he just focuses his attention on certain words when you read them out, and JR does do that.

I'd made a little cardholder of words that he has come across in the videos that he has been watching since 5mths' old. This morning, while going thru it, he of course said "Hi" at the 1st word as usual, and when he saw "Head", he patted his head....then he saw "Ears" and he said out "ea" ...and then he saw "Mouth" and said "Mao". Was I dreaming that he did that? Was it coincidental or intentional? Couldn't get him to do it again, but well, the sounds WERE different, unlike his usual "do-it-all" "BABABABA or MAMAMAMAMA or DADADAA" sounds.

And when I walked into the store at the petrol station today, he excitedly went "Ba ba ba" when the door to the store opened and he saw the array of Bananas there....Hmm....oh well, he said the same thing when he saw the word "Ball"....

Card Game

Convincing, eh?

www.babycanread.com
www.winktolearn.com

Auto-Turn

Can't fool the kid, huh?


Then I tried to *test* him with words only, so had the idea of printing out the words and putting it in a photo album. ...Words only. And he turns that around too.

Ah, but that photo album is too flimsy. What other medium could I use....Hmm....

Pipa Rabbit

JR loves to read..and to be read to. This is one of his favourite books.


And...Mommy! Don't disturb - I'm reading!

English Flashcards

JR started this programme with the Chinese DVDs. This shows him with the new English Set

www.winktolearn.com

Storytime II

The excitement - oh my! He loves being read to.

Chinese FlashCards

Another video - a longer one that shows how JR just concentrates when this is put on. He loves it!

www.winktolearn.com

Here's JR watching the English DVDs.

More FlashCards!

Baby LOVES watching his flashcard vids. It's the "Your Baby Can Read" series and the "Wink-to-Learn" series. I'm amazed at his attention span with these. We started showing these to him when he was 5 months' old.


And this morning, I took out some of the kids' old Barney CDs ....JR didn't give the shows any attention! But was happy when I changed to this....Chinese flashcards - again:

Strange Kid!

Story Time

This boy loves books! Look at him trying to choose:


And he picks one! And then another...and another....


And Big Gor-gor reads to him. He's very attentive!

Bookish Diversion

On one of those nightmarish trips, after all the song & dance didn't work anymore...I passed JR this book I had in the car.

This little boy sure likes studying the images or prints in books/clothes. The bawling was diverted for most of the rest of the trip. Whew!