Preschool: Teaching Baby to Read

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Good for the Ego. Early reading has its defenders. Dr. Abram Blau, head of child psychiatry at Manhattan's Mt. Sinai Hospital, contends that "teaching young children anything that enlarges their ego is good for them," and "any activity that demonstrates a mother's emotional interest in her child is very important for a three-year-old." Many experts also applaud the games, art, musical records and picture books that help prepare a child for school but do not pressure him to read.

The controversy will rage until educators produce reliable studies of the long-range effects of parental preschool teaching. No one knows whether a grasp of algebra at five makes a boy a sharper mathematician at 25. Meanwhile, all the experts urge caution—and even Doman and the Engelmanns concede that impatient parents, who tense up when Timmy says "saw" as he looks at the word was, ought to forget the whole thing.