Whilst we’ve been having quite an easy time teaching the little boy many things, we find that it’s rather difficult to get him to un-learn and re-teach him things that we’ve previously taught him. So we’ve learned the hard way that whatever we say and do, we need to make sure we do it right the first time round.
So far we haven’t had much luck in re-teaching him a few things. For example, he refers to trucks and lorries on the road as buses and thinks they are one and the same. Maybe he’s unable to see the difference in these vehicles yet, recognising them only because they are bigger in size than cars. He also refers to watches as clocks. This happened when he saw some Nixon watches in a shop and he said clocks but we didn’t correct him right away. He’s also finding it hard to readjust saying good night. He’s saying night-night instead, and no matter how much we get him to say good night, at the most he says good night-night. He just has to repeat the word ‘night’!
Facing such a difficult situation to retrain, we’re wondering how we can successfully do this. Anyone has any idea how to retrain a young child?
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Seriously? Don’t worry about these minor things! He’ll learn soon enough the right words for things. When my daughter was little, she always said “ca-buzz” for “because”. I didn’t bother correcting her because A) it was cute, and B) I knew she’d self-correct over time. Which is exactly what happened.
Focus instead on things that are bigger and more important – safety rules, for instance (he should always know to Stop! when you say so – sometime it might mean the difference between running into the road and getting hit by a car, or… not), and things like that.
Just advice from an older mom (my daughter’s nearly 21 now!).
Cheers!
Wow, very experienced mother indeed!
I guess being first time parents, we’re just a bit overly paranoid about everything and anything. I totally agree with you on the safety rules. My son just fell from his crib because be was crawling out of it! I think I hurt more and longer than him!