From birth to five years old, babies are learning language at an amazing rate. This includes any language. It can be spoken language, sign language and even written language.
Babies are able to learn to read effortlessly and easily from birth through 3 years old using the whole word method. Not only are they able to learn to read, they learn to read intuitively as opposed to those of us who learn to read much later by learning the rules of the language.
This means that babies absorb language in the written form and the brain figures out the rules on its own. The incredible thing about teaching babies to read using the whole word method is that they learn the rules on their own and are able to use them to read words they have never seen.
When you teach a baby to read, you don’t need to spend a lot of time teaching, they learn at lightening speed and they are able to read fluently almost overnight. They are able to read well and they generally are able to read more quickly and with a higher level of comprehension than children taught at an older age.
Babies that are taught to read develop a love of reading that lasts a lifetime. When they are being inquisitive and want to know that answers to many things, we can point out the books that will give them those answers. We teach them from a young age to find information from books, giving them the ability to learn for a lifetime.