Mama Eve Blog

This morning my husband flipped through television channels and paused on the infomercial for “Your Baby Can Read!”. I’d seen parts of this infomercial before, but have to admit I’ve never watched the whole thing. What I know about the product is it’s a series of videos designed to help young children learn to read. It’s popular because it purports to take advantage of a small window of superlearning that babies have, and teach them language skills before this window of opportunity closes forever. It was created by a child development specialist because he wanted his children to have wholesome television to watch while they were in daycare. The half-hour long infomercial has endorsements from multiple teachers, and shows clips of children as young as nine months recognizing words written on flashcards and pointing to corresponding objects around the room. The images are compelling; it’s pretty amazing to see a baby reading, and it’s intriguing to think that we can purchase a product or use a technique that unlocks some extraordinary potential in our child and set up for success in life. But there’s something about the pitch that bothers me. Read the rest of this entry »