We're still in shock!

[laurasnowbird]

Okay, guys, we have discussed the merits of love and learning on the site more than once. But I have to tell you I have become their BIGGEST fan! We have only used kit #1 so far, but a couple of months ago, I noticed that Ethan was repeating the letters after the cassette tape, after she said "A", then he would say it. At first, he could only say a few letters, but after awhile he was saying all of them well enough that I knew what he meant when he said them.

SOOOOO, yours truly had the brainstorm of buying some flashcards, figuring that now that I know he can say the letters, we would work on letter recognition, teaching him to name the letters as we show them. Okay, so a couple of weeks ago, Ethan holds the box of cards out to me saying "do it, do it" - now mind you, he had never seen the cards before because they were still in the shrink wrap. So I opened them up, and held up the letter A and asked him what it said, and loud and clear he said "A". I was quite surprised, and said, "Okay, little man, I'll give ya that one, but now I'm going to mix them up".

I mixed up the whole pack of cards, and mixed the uppercase and lowercase letters together, and then started to show them to him. HE GOT EVERY LETTER EXCEPT "W'"!!!!!!!!!

Can you believe that? We were totally blown away, and completely overjoyed. I cannot believe he knows all those letters! Since then, he has picked out letters, and pointed to them and indentified them (without being asked) on numerous occasions! Love and Learning ROCKS! The other thing I have to give some credit to is the LeapFrog toys, because L&L only has lowercase letters, and several of his LeapFrog toys have uppercase. That is really the only place I can think of that he would have learned the capital letters.

Makes me wonder what else he knows but is unable to communicate, since his language is not great. I will try not to make the mistake of underestimating him again. I can't help but wonder how long he knew it before he was able to say it.

So, I guess I know the love and learning kits are a little on the expensive side, but I have to think this has been one of the best purchases we have ever made!!!!! I would certainly recommend them to everyone!

[Cathy]

wow..now Iam in shock. WTG Ethan..you are the MAN!!

I think you just inspired me to keep on Katie. She has those Leap Frog refrigerator phonics and loves them. She can recognize her name and say the alphabet with me.. but to tell you the truth., I have never tried her with recognizing the letters. Now I must (bad mom).

Thanks for the inspiraton. YOU ARE MY HERO!

Hugs,

Cathy

PS..will we ever yahoo again?

[Cbean]

Wow! That is such great news. I just learned of Love and Learning and jotted the info down for future use. Thought it looked good but now hearing your fabulous news it looks even better! Way to go Ethan!

Seems like we have a lot of Leap Pad lovers around here. For any of those who have the regular green & blue Leap Pad: last Christmas I purchased the whole set of Phonics books for the system. It's 10 books, with one cartridge that has a dial that you change according to what book you're working with. I purchased it through QVC for $58 - with s/h I think it comes out to about $64. It's almost half of what it would cost if you purchased them all separately. Christmas and other holidays are right around the corner...maybe a good grandparent gift? Ages PreK to 2nd grade. I found it to be a good investment. And now they have Shrek for Leap Pad! Geez, you'd think I'm getting an endorsement! Keep up the great work Ethan! ;D

[Emilysmom]

WTG Ethan!!! Laura, your experience is very similar to ours......we very casually did the Love and Learning program with Emily and she seemed to LOVE it and totally amazed us by what she learned in a short time. I will never forget being in a restaurant when Em was 3 years old and writing the word "UP" on the back of the kids menu and watching my sweet little girl throw both arms in the air and say "UP". It wasn't until then that I knew that she could generalize what she was learning and use it in other settings, in other people's handwriting, etc.
Emily is in the 6th grade now, and we still get comments from the teachers saying they are AMAZED by how well she can read. Emily has a brand new teacher at church, and she commented to me last night that Emily reads amazingly well from the Bible....you KNOW how hard some of those words are!!! Our biggest goal for this year is working on her comprehension of ALL she reads, and she's really making progress in that area too.

I believe the reason the Love and Learning program works so well is that it is SO simple.......nothing to distract the child at all...just big bold printed letters on the page and the pics to follow on the next page. (LOL I was so suspicious that maybe somehow Em could see the pics on the next page that I reinforced each page with a note card.....YES, I totally underestimated her!).

I feel very strongly that the reason Emily LOVES to read now is that she had early success with Love and Learning. She couldn't wait to sit in our laps and read those little books, and to watch the videos. Sigh....she has grown up a lot now and is reading Lizzie Maguire books.

Thanks for posting this Laura. I'm really proud of Ethan!!!!

Susan

[meghans_mom]

Laura - that is terrific, WTG Ethan!!!!
I have to say L&L is great...Meghan learned the alphabet 'early' on too...both in sight recognition and in memory (verbally).
Meghan and my mom spend lots of time doings "cards" as Meghan calls them. That's their together time, something just she and her grandma do without Matthew.
Lately we've let L&L fall by the wayside, I really need to get going again...we only have tapes 1 & 2 - but even for matthew i think they'd be good.
again - thanks for sharing the terrific news with us!! GO ETHAN!
laurie

[laurasnowbird]

Laurie,

We only have kits #1 and #2 as well, and we have only done kit #1 so far, but I will be purchasing the rest! That is awesome that Meghan does her "cards" with grandma - the moment that our family heard that Ethan could do this, they all wanted to go out and buy cards. While I was thrilled by their desire to participate (and they have been awesome all along, by the way) I was a little concerned that he might feel like a "trick pony" if we kept trotting him out to perform for everyone. Your post is making me re-think that. Ethan was sooooo thrilled to be doing this, we tried it again later in the day and he did just as well, so after one time through the deck, we said "Great job! Do you want to go outside to play?" (thinking that was a reward) and instead he wanted to do the deck AGAIN. What I took away from that encounter was the sure knowledge that he loved being able to show us what he knows, and that FEELING SUCCESSFUL IS VERY IMPORTANT!!! I will never underestimate that again.

I debated about posting this, because our kids accomplish things on very different timelines, and I certainly didn't want anyone to feel their child was doing "less". While Ethan is doing well with this, there are definitely other areas where he really struggles. But I felt that it was a good reminder not to underestimate our kids, and for us to presume they can do anything until proven otherwise. Even as I was doing the love and learning books it truly never occurred to me that he could do what he just did.

SUSAN: The main reason that I ordered Love and Learning is because some of the moms of older kids on this site (and you were chief among them) were such strong advocates of their program. All I can say at this point is thank you, thank you, thank you. Truly there aren't words in our language strong enough to convey the depths of my gratitude. You guys have not led me astray yet!

I have come here for inspiration since finding this board, and have been motivated to expect more for Ethan by the stories and experiences of the parents of the "older" kids. For the many "lurkers" out there, I'd like to say I hope that you are being inspired by our stories, and I'd like to invite you to post up! I'm certain that you have great experiences to share, and your story may be the one that makes someone else's day.

[momofrussell]

that is WONDERFUL Laura! We have the 1st 3 I think. Russell does love them but wasn't responding like we thought he would... we didn't know all the issues he had at the time so we pulled back a bit on them. But we have pulled them out since then... I need to get a tape player and do it again... Russell IS making sounds better now!

BUT... I have to say the L&L is how REECE learned to talk!!!! she was 1.5 yrs old when we got the first set and man... in a couple months we were AMAZED at the growth in speech and vocabulary.. I think L&L is good for ANY young child.. not just those w/DS!

Give Ethan a HIGH FIVE for me!!!!! WTG Big Guy!!!

A.

[Alice]

I am a VERY BIG fan of Love and Leaning and hope always will be, because this program is amazing.
Luke has finished 4 kits and now we are about to by #5.
People are always shocked when they see how almost non verbal child is reading.
For example, just yesterday Luke took a book by himself and start reading: "Look at the dog" and so on... That was something and even we were thrilled to see that.
He uses signs for some words and some he is saying not very clear of course, but it is obvious that he is reading and he understands what.
WTG, Ethan and good luck to you with all other kits...

[MB]

Excellent Ethan!

You know how I feel about posts regarding the accomplishments of kids with Down syndrome! They are good for everyone! They inspire others to try the method used, give hope to parents of younger children and spread many smiles throughout cyberspace.

What a great thing for all of you and all of us.

MB

[lexybug]

Hi everyone!! What is love and learning?? I must be out of the loop, I've never heard of it. I'm always up for new learning toys, so please let me know. Thanks!!

[Sherri]

Awesome news Laura!!! WTG Mr. Ethan!!!

Thank you for sharing Ethan's wonderful accomplishment!! Can't wait to see what's next

Have a great week!!
Sherri