Has anyone used the "My baby Can Read" system?

[eda]

Has anyone tried the "My Baby Can Read" stuff they have info-mercials for it. It claims that using there system your child will be able to read before they can even talk. Is it worth trying? The price is $199 for the whole thing. If it works that would be worth the money but, if it's a gimmick I don't want to waste money on it.

[mom2binsd]

Check the Lounge forum, we've talked about it a lot over there-consensus, it's a gimmick, if it's being sold at 1am, not worth it!

[Gena]

It claims that using there system your child will be able to read before they can even talk.

I didn't participate in the recent discussion in the Lounge, but this sentence caught my attention.

I've never seen the infomercial, although I have heard and read many things about this program. Do they really claim the child "will read before they can talk"? If so, I find that strange. That's trait that is usually used to describe Hyperlexia, a language disorder that is associated with high-functioning autism.

My son has high functioning autism with hyperlexia. He could read before he could talk and started reading at age 2 without any type of instruction. We encouraged this because it he understands written language, much better than speech. So we use the written word to teach verbal language. Personally, I feel that while there is no real harm in reading early, it's so much more important at that age to focus on verbal language.

I'm not saying that all early readers have autism or a language problem. Some kids are just precocious readers. But unless your child had a high interest in learning to read early or a problem with understanding verbal language, reading can wait. If your child is a natural early reader, there are better methods to encourage him/her than this program.

[kobie137]

Sorry, but I laughed out loud remembering when I read this question.
My husband told me one morning he couldn't sleep, and was watching TV and saw this great program "my baby can read" and it was only like 15 bucks so shouldn't we get it?
And I said, for 15 bucks, why not...?
Then he looked online and saw the real price and that the 15$ or whatever it was, was only the first payment...
I'm just thrilled he did not get out the credit card at 3am and decided to talk it over with me the next day!