Hi, Alinda!
Sunday May 19 1996 06:49, Alinda Harrison wrote to Donna Ransdell:
AH> My 5 year old's first word was "cat". :) She's learned a few words the 
same
AH> wa y. Also, she learns a few other site words by spelling them. We have
AH> a program, School Mom, that my older girls use as one of the ways to
AH> practice spelling words. Teresa saw this and wanted a list of her own. I
AH> gave her a simple list with her name, family members' names, and words 
like
AH> "mom" and "dad". It works...she now knows those words quite well on site.
My eldest's first word was "bob"...his word for "horse" since his 
grandmother's horse's name was Bob.  My daughter's first word was "eat".  And 
my youngest son's first word was "Jesus"....HONEST.  He said it at church in 
front of alot of other women and he was only six months old.  He didn't say 
another word for over a year.
AH> Also, I create "bat" files to get to favorite games using simple words
AH> as
AH> file names. For example, the lion king game can be accessed by typing
AH> "lionking". Now she knows those two words. Also "math", "aclock" (tried 
o
AH> use just "clock", and it would key a program for the computer's clock!),
AH> ect. You could even try changing the bat file names to match the new 
ords
AH> you want to teach. It's kinda sneaky, but if it works.... :)
When Matthew started Head Start, they had to design a special program for 
him. He had been playing Nintendo since he was about 18 months old and I had 
long since gotten tired of putting in codes and telling him how much money he 
had. So I showed him how to do it himself.  So by age four he could write all 
his alphabet (upper and lower case), could add and subtract up to something 
like 253 (whatever the upper amount of coins is in Zelda), and had learned 
how to cheat at most of the video games we had.   (There are frequently 
creative ways to get around the "rules".  For instance, in the game Wizardry, 
you can't have good and evil characters on the same team.  BUT, if you take a 
good team out in the dungeon and leave them, then go back and get an evil 
team and let them "find" the good team, they can join the same team. 
It got so the Head Start teachers would reward the kids on Friday by having 
me bring my Nintendo and all our Sesame Street games.
                                                          Gwen
... Politicians and diapers need to be changed, often for the same reasons
--- GoldED/386 2.50+
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