|
 |
Language learning parents? | ||
Share with:
| ||
 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5381 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes  Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 9 of 36 31 March 2010 at 12:17am | IP Logged | |||||
|
Not to mention that just because we find a language important, our kids won't necessarily
agree. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| goosefrabbas Triglot Pro Member United States Joined 6368 days ago 393 posts - 475 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: German, Italian Personal Language Map | Message 10 of 36 31 March 2010 at 1:39am | IP Logged | |||||
Agreed. Professor Arguelles raised his children speaking English and French and understanding Korean. If he could have taught them three languages equally as well, I think he would have. :) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| global_gizzy Senior Member United States maxcollege.blogspot. Joined 5703 days ago 275 posts - 310 votes Studies: Spanish | Message 11 of 36 31 March 2010 at 1:47am | IP Logged | |||||
|
I would love to teach my kids another language, when I get them.
Hopefully by then I will be able to do it the easy way (live in a non-English speaking country!) But its very, very likely that my husband will speak something besides English as his native language, so if we lived in a host country we could do OPOL with the children and they could pick up the language of our host country. Por ejemplo si vivo en France: Hablo ingles, mi esposa habla arabe y la pais habla france a los ninos. For example if I live in France, I speak English, my husband speaks Arabic and the country speaks French to the kids. There you would have 3 languages like that, of course I expect that their French would be strongest after about age 7-9 years old, when they really, really, get involved in School and community but I expect that the kids will have a solid foundation in their home languages because I'd work to make it so, not by giving lessons constantly or anything but by keeping them engaged and talking/reading/singing to them in their home languages on a regular basis. If we live in a country where the community language is English, then I will probably try and speak Spanish or Arabic plus AmSLan to/with them. No matter what language I speak to my kids I want to use signing with them from birth. I probably wont give my children actual lessons in a language until they are 10-12 years old. Before that, there is no need. I will definitely try and teach my children to read in English and Arabic, thought. Even if they never learn the languages particularly well. Edited by global_gizzy on 31 March 2010 at 1:53am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
 LauraM Pro Member United States Joined 5352 days ago 77 posts - 97 votes Studies: German Personal Language Map | Message 12 of 36 31 March 2010 at 7:11am | IP Logged | |||||
|
We use the term "teach" as if we will give our children formal lessons.Is that what we are discussing?
I hesitated to "teach" my kids German until an immersion school opened up here locally to reinforce the learning. When I say "teach" my kids, I merely mean, once I made the decision, I just began talking to them in German one day as if I'd been doing it all along. The one year old speaks mostly German since his vocabulary and exposure to language is so small, and the now-six-year old is about 25% German speaking. We just began about 9 months ago. Even if the German school wasn't teaching German formally, I would not try to so much "teach" the language (at least not anymore than I've "taught" them English by using the language) but simply use it and assume they will learn it. Yes, children can forget a language (I've forgotten most of my Spanish), but that does not mean time was wasted because on some level it's still there and provides building blocks for future learning, I assure you (even outside of language learning). I regret not sticking with the language with my older children who are ages 16-25 years old. My then-15-year old was flabbergasted on day one when he asked, "How do you just wake up one day speaking a foreign language?" He has no recollection of me trying to use it with he and his siblings...*sigh* 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Johntm Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5422 days ago 616 posts - 725 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 13 of 36 31 March 2010 at 7:46am | IP Logged | |||||
Oh well, at the least they'll have English and Spanish. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Levi Pentaglot Senior Member United States Joined 5567 days ago 2268 posts - 3328 votes Speaks: English*, French, Esperanto, German, Spanish Studies: Russian, Dutch, Portuguese, Mandarin, Japanese, Italian | Message 14 of 36 31 March 2010 at 8:55am | IP Logged | |||||
|
My parents never had any interest in languages when I growing up. Nevertheless I developed a passion for them at a young age, for reasons I still don't understand. And recently, I've actually inspired my father to start learning French. He's doing pretty well in it for a beginner.
1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Blunderstein Triglot Pro Member Sweden schackhandeln.se Joined 5418 days ago 60 posts - 82 votes Speaks: Swedish*, EnglishC2, FrenchB2 Studies: German, Esperanto Personal Language Map | Message 15 of 36 31 March 2010 at 10:03am | IP Logged | |||||
|
My son had problems in school with his German, he was way behind in his class. So I gave him the choice of dropping German or doing extra work to catch up, with the intention of becoming good at it. He choose the latter option, and I found a teacher who gives private lessons. I was just starting my studies in German, and took part myself in the lessons. This turned out well: my own studies strengthen his motivation (which was lacking in the beginning), and helped me give him more support.
If I hadn't been studying German myself, it would have been much harder to give him the support he needed. That being said, he doesn't learn German from me, but from his own studies and the private lessons. I still take part in the lessons, but now I'm way behind him :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| numerodix Trilingual Hexaglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 6783 days ago 856 posts - 1226 votes Speaks: EnglishC2*, Norwegian*, Polish*, Italian, Dutch, French Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin | Message 16 of 36 31 March 2010 at 11:13am | IP Logged | |||||
No, I don't mean playing the role of the teacher. To that I'm sure many would say "I'm not a qualified teacher". But what you are "qualified" for is learning by yourself. And that is something you could try to teach your kid. You could tell him that rather than take 2 classes per week at school, he should maybe spend an hour a day learning the language (and you can find suitable materials for him). Of course, it's going to be a time commitment, and it's going to come at the expense of something else. But if you tell him that that's the way to get good at languages, and if you yourself are the proof of that, then he might even believe you :) Basically, I'm aiming for a change of attitude here. Rather than start learning in school with the mindset that "after 5 years I'll know this language quite well" you should do the same thing in a year or two years. Because there's really no point (or need) to work on simple grammar exercises for years and years without really getting anywhere. And anyway, the kids who are going to learn the language well in this school environment are those who are driven to learn after school too. Edited by numerodix on 31 March 2010 at 11:14am 1 person has voted this message useful |
|  | 
Printable version
|
| Copyright 2024 FX Micheloud - All rights reserved No part of this website may be copied by any means without my written authorization. |
