On our drive from Texas to Colorado, we had some DVDs that had been converted from video tapes from when Andy was little and we popped them into the player in the car. We had no idea what was on them, but soon saw him reciting his ABCs and counting to 20 and higher. He couldn't have been more than two and a half in these videos/DVDs and definitely wasn't over three. By the time he was three he was practically ready for Kindergarten.
Switch gears to Amanda. When she started potty training, which was just over a year ago, we decided we would teach her the ABCs while washing her hands. Charlie and I had both read articles and heard in every child forum known to man that when you teach children to wash their hands you sing a little song that is at least 15 second long so they are sure to wash their hands long enough to get them clean. What better song than the alphabet? We would kill two birds with one stone, she'd be clean and would know all her letters. She had just turned two, but there was no reason she couldn't learn it if she was singing it on a daily basis and if Andy could do it, so could she.
Except she couldn't. Or better yet, she wouldn't. She had no interest in learning that song. So much so that I gave up early. Charlie would still sing it with her, but months after we started all she would say is, "ABC ABC next time won't you sing with me". If you asked her what came after C, she would just say A. Those were the only three letters she ever mentioned. She didn't get to D for forever.
I pretty much gave up with her learning it at all, and then one day in October Charlie asked her to say her ABCs. "A B C D E F G." She got all the way to G. I was amazed. That was as far as she could go, but still a major improvement.
About two months ago, I took this video. All I said to her before I turned it on was can you sing your ABCs for me. This is what she came up with:
Cute, but not quite there.
Fast forward to this past week. Riza is very well versed in his alphabet and know most if not all of his letters as well. He was playing with the letters on our fridge and when he walked away Amanda began playing with them. So I started asking her if she could name any of the letters. Surprisingly, she knew six or seven of the letters I asked her. Definitely not all of them, but more than zero. I think we may actually be getting our money's worth at that school she goes to, even if she's only there two hours a day twice a week.
At least now I'm a little more confident that she will know her alphabet by the time she goes to Kindergarten.
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