Developing the Early Learner details
Developing the Early Learner Update - The Record Sheet on the back cover of books 2-4 does not match the skills worked on in the book. There are other discrepancies including an extra row titled "Comprehension/Categories" that does not match any of the book content. Since we do not publish this book, we are unable to offer any corrections. (8.2.07)
Customer comments: Developing the Early Learner will give you very little in the way of numbers, letters, time, etc. What it will give you is exercises in fine motor, in visual memory and discrimination, in audio memory and discrimination, and in general cognitive skills. It helps children develop the skills they need to learn other things, but is totally non-academic.
They are designed as consumable workbooks (child writes in them). Because of their high cost, I unbound them and put them in plastic sheet protectors and had my children use wipe-off crayons so that I wasn't putting up $35 a year for 3 years. I definitely think my children benefitted from them.
The fine motor section has things like copying shapes, mazes, staying in the lines as you follow a spiral. The auditory preception has activities where you'll say 2 words that are close and the child has to decide whether they're the same or not the same. The most challenging part to my daughter was the auditory memory part. They'll have a picture of 4 items, and you'll read them a list of instructions "Color the horse red, make a green X on the tree, make a blue line over the flower", and then they have to WAIT 2 minutes before starting to do what you tole them. I noticed a lot of improvement with my dd in being able to follow directions around the house after we'd started this type of exercise.
I haven't really found another series that even touches on all of the concepts in DEL. The DEL series has things in it that we didn't even touch on in my college education theory courses, but I was amazed at how quickly my daughter improved in a number of areas.