Study. Babies Can't Learn to Read

The baby media industry has been selling anxious parents, books, DVDs, flashcards and other products that claim to teach very young children to learn to read. A new study from New York University's education school shows there's good reason to be skeptical of baby media. The researchers worked with 117 children aged 10 to 18 months in their families. Some of the babies were given the Your Baby Can Read program, while the rest received no intervention. At the end of the experiment, one thing was clear. Babies did not learn toread. This doesn't mean parents should do nothing to encourage their baby's development, of course. There are some psychological developmental capabilities that children are just not learning to