Should he know this? ABC's

[anewvance]

I am not bragging, my dh and I just really want to know if he should know this. I don't remember with my girls but I don't think it was this soon. My son turned 2 last week and he got a Leapfrog Magnet ABC set. He's bringing me all the letters and he knows all of his ABC's by sight. I'm shocked!

 

[tnkbl]

Yea, for him! That is probally not typical. Can he recognize them out of order or in another format? It won't be long and he will!
The Leap Frog products are great. The videos are great also. My DD is 4 and she can read and sound word out.

BTW go ahead and brag!!!!

 

[Beth76]

My son will be two next week and he barely talks. So, I would say he's doing a pretty good job. I know with my older son he was reading numbers by 2-1/2. He knew a few letters at that time, but took him a little longer to learn all of them plus the different cases.

 

[dznymom3]

That's really impressive!!

 

[taximomfor4]

That does seem early. With the Leapfrog ABC's, though, I guess it's not shocking. Sorry, I cannot tell you how normal or not it is....

When they could recognize letters, my kids were : 16 months (she is freaky smart, though -- we videotaped her that day, we were so shocked), almost 2, almost 3, and "Sometime Before 3." (Bad mommy, don't remember on that one!) None of them had talking alphabet/letters toys and none were in daycares at all.

Here is a funny for you: My son (who was almost 3 when we tried his letters with him, and he knew them) was only 16 mos old when he saw the back of my magazine cover's tiny Mastercard Logo. He pointed,and yelled "Mama, MONEY!"

No, we had NO major credit cards back then!

 

[golfgal]

Our oldest was about 18 months when he could recognize all the letters of the alphabet randomly (like on people's clothing). He was an early crawler, walker, talker, etc. He his also my most challenging when it comes to schoolwork, doesn't want to put any time or effort into doing anything. Our twins may have known their letters earlier but since they weren't talking in any language we could understand until they were over 2, we don't know. DS11 (one of the twins) is exceptionally bright, 99 percentile in all the standardized testing, etc. and the latest to show an interest in learning letters, etc (but he could put together puzzles, the 25 piece boxed ones) with the gray side up, not the pictures showing at 18 months).

It is nice that your DS can do this and no, a lot of kids can't do this yet, but every child develops differently so he may be ahead of the game in this area and behind others in different areas. It does give them a nice head start for school when they do know these things though. Just wait until he starts reading out of the blue some day. That really blows your mind.

 

[auntpolly]

My DD was an early talker and knew her ABCs when she was 2 -- she was reading in preschool, blah, blah, blah (shameless mom brag) -- she's bright but wasn't one of those kids that ended up going to Harvard or Yale.

The only reason I'm telling you this is that she is still very strong in the "language skills" -- scored very high on that writing part of the SATs and has always been praised for her writing -- editor for HS and college paper (blah blah blah brag brag brag ) and sooooo, I'm just big on, when you see a strength like the one your son obviously has, run with it! Start showing him to read and write now. Gently, and only as long as it's fun for him, but it will pay off, I bet.

 

[AC7179]

Wow, what a smart little boy!

My daughter will be two in September and we are way impressed that she can recgonzie all of her colors (when we ask her, she can point to them). All she will say outloud is red, blue, yellow, and pink. Her favorite color is pink and so she will tell you things are pink when they are not.

She can recognize letters and numbers as being letters and numbers, but she calls them all two.

I think it's amazing your son knows these!

 

[Chilehead Too]

Not typical, but soo awesome YAY him!!!!

 

[MosMom]

My son was just under 2 when he could name most of the alphabet by sight and just after two got the rest. He also could name colors and shapes at that age then as well. He is turning 4 next weekend and can read quite a few common words and still asks me constantly what different words say.

 

[Christine]

Gosh, I wish I could remember. He was in preschool 5 days a week then so I want to say "probably."

What impressed me the most was that one day when my son was a bit over 2 years old, we were all sitting around and he was playing with one of those shape sorters. He picked up a shape, looked at it, and said "pentagon." We all were like "WOW" because I had never named the shapes for him. They obviously showed them shapes at preschool and told them names. I still thought that was good for a 2 year old.

 

[KarenC]

My daughter got a chalk board for her 2nd birthday. When she opened it up, she drew the letter A. She was an early talker and an early reader. She's now a senior in college. She's done very well in school but, like Aunt Polly's daughter, wasn't at the very top. What surprised me about her is that her math and logic skills are much stronger than her verbal skills. She picks up foreign languages well, but her English volcabulary and reading comprehension aren't off the charts the way I expected them to be when she was 2 years old. But the decoding part of her brain works very well.

 

[anewvance]

Yes, he knows them out of order. He'll bring me one of the magnets from the fridge and say look, letter U or look, letter R.

Taximom, it's funny the recognition kids have. My ds was looking in a magazine and saw an ad for Volkswagon. He saw the symbol for it and said look Poppy. My grandfather drives a Volkswagon Passat. I thought it was a fluke but then he got the volkswagon from the Happy Meal toys and it had the symbol on front and he said look poppy. It's not like he drives in my grandfathers car that often, but he knew that that symbol meant poppy and the car he drove. It's so funny!

Oh, talking we could go into a whole other thread. This kid is talking like a 4 year old. He has a word for EVERYTHING. It's insane what words he knows. And he's been speaking 5 or 6 word sentences for at least 6 months now. Everywhere we go people comment on his vocabulary. We attribute it to his big sisters, they are competative with each other and he's competative with both of them... lol

 

[AnaheimGirl]

Sorry, I know you are a proud mama, and you have every right to be, but I don't think it's all that unusual for a 2yo with a lot of exposure to letters to learn them fairly quickly.

Little children are sponges, they soak it all in. My 2 girls both knew their letters/numbers/colors/shapes at 2, because we have a bunch of puzzles that contain those items and they both love(d) playing with them. Now, my 8yo is pretty bright and does well in school, but not exceptionally so. The other is just 3, so hasn't progressed too much farther yet.

Oh yea, and we have a United States puzzle that my older dd used to learn every state, it's location and it's capital when she was 4, but then after we stopped playing with it a lot, she forgot them all.

 

[redshoes]

I think that is wonderful! I love the Leapfrog products, we have the letter factory DVD and both my boys (4 and 2) now know their letters and the letter sounds.

 

[anewvance]

Thanks for all the input... i'm a proud mama but also glad to hear that it's a good normal thing for him to know. It's funny that it's only been a few years since my girls were this age but I can't remember when they did this and that... lol.