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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Read to your child every day and talk to her like she's not a child, so she picks up words that expand her vocabulary.  Encourage her to explore the world around her, do field trips to interesting places.  (do what 11:51 says.)  Work on numbers and counting, addition and subtraction when she's ready.[/quote]

This, but also remember that she IS a child.  Many kids who read early and have great vocabularies and who are talked to like adults are often expected to think, behave, and have the emotions of adults - - they don't. So grow the vocabulary and the mind, but remember that the emotions and the frontal lobe lag way behind. I would add to the above great suggestions: answer questions with questions sometimes, admit when you don't know an answer then work together to try to find one -- if there isn't a "right" answer, allow for that and make it the most interesting point. Point out patterns and similarities and differences; make up stories together; lay in the grass and look at clouds; stay up late one night and bundle up in blankets to look at stars -- note patterns up there and wonder aloud what's up there? Play what makes 40? (get 40 of something and see how many different ways you can group them and still have 40). Read the names of all the colors on the giant box of crayons, then make up your own names. Find unexpected uses for everyday objects. Count to the "really big numbers." Instead of teaching -- expose; put things in the child's environment for her to discover herself.

Another book suggestion:  Jane Healy, "Your Child's Growing Mind." My favorite image from there is the description of two children building block towers.  One has a mother show her how to do it correctly, ands she does it right the first time and then repeats it. Child looks to adult for approval and is praised for doing it right. The other is left alone with no guidance and makes a gazillion failed attempts to build a tower, the blocks falling all over the place. Finally he gets it to stand, albeit a little crooked. Then he knocks it down and makes something totally different. The author asks:  Which child has learned more? (about gravity, physics, balance, frustration, perseverance, self, etc.) I also had early readers and really appreciated her section on how the brain reads.[/quote]

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