Teaching languages - E-mail from Doman's Institute

Early Learning Teaching Your Child - Signing, Speaking, Languages
1

As some of you already know we are teaching my daughter English adn Spanish, but would like to introduce her to Mandarin adn German also. I sent a question regarding the matter in the Institutes website and this was the information I got:

[b][i]Thank you for your interest in our methods. I am assuming that you have a bi-lingual home, which makes teaching the programs in 2 languages easier. It is a good idea to let the child hear the two languages as part of his/her everyday existence. Then you would do the readign program the same for either language.

Keep the two languages separate. Consistency is important. You do not want to teach a reading program in English or Spanish every other week. So you can decide. You can show 3 sets of English words 2 or 3 times a day and 2 or 3 sets of Spanish words 2 or 3 times a day. The program is very workable. You can make your own schedule for this.

We have the Pictute Dictionary CD Roms where you can show the word followed by a picture. You can choose to show it in English and Spanish. Depending on the age of the child, you can see if your child needs a break between the languages or if your child can happily go from seeing the words in English and then seeing them in Soanish. [/i] [/b]

Then I e-mailed her back with these questions (this is part of the e-mail):

[i]We do have a bilingual home and we try to expose her to both languages. It is great that you can do it at the same time. Would you recommend doing the same categories in both languages the same day? Or do you think it is better to do dome categories in English and some different ones in Spanish?

Also, we would like to expose her to Mandarin and German. Do you have a recommendation on how to introduce these two languages since neither of us speak the languages?[/i]

And this was her response:

[b][i]Do what makes sense to you. Right now, just for the beginning of a bi-lingual program, it is a good idea to use the same categories. After a while it will not be necessary. Use the Picture Dictionary CD Roms. It has the same words in 5 different languages.

To make your child familiar with other languages, they have to hear them. You can try the Muzzy tapes for children. you can find them on the internet. You can play folk songs from other countries and even movies.[/i][/b]

Unfortunately in our case the CD’s do not have Germand and Mandarin, so I don;t think we will be getting any right now.

Hope this gives a little bit of light to those who are teaching otehr languages to their children :slight_smile:

2

Thank you for sharing! I was glad to have everything spelled out for me!

3

Yah, me too.great share Joha.Beside, I’m trying to teach my little one with Arabic and Japanese.

4

Thank you so much for sharing this information. It clears my doubts.

Did the Doman’s Institute reply for e-mails fast?

By the way, I want to teach my daughter German, too :).

5

Actually they did. I would say it took them around 24 hours.

Great! Maybe we could change websites and interesting info we find. :yes:

6
You can play folk songs from other countries and even movies.

This is a big question of me. We are monolingual family in a monolingual environment. But we use to watch movies in English and Russian, sometimes also in Swedish and German.
My daughter prefers some animation movies, and mostly they are in English. But the language in these movies is very fast, and I am not sure if she can distinguish words. Some movies we are watching sometimes in English, sometimes in Latvian (our language), and Latvian version keeps her attention better. Usually I also comment what is happening on a screen.
(we don’t watch these movies every day but sometmes.)

This week I got Finnish animation movies about Moomin. They are so nice! And heroes speak in a very slow and clear language. I and my husband, we are fans of Finnish, but we know just few words.

Is it possible that a child learns a language from movies? At least something?

7

Awesome!!Thanks Joha for sharing such an imporant tip with us. I was having the same question on my head, we want to introduce my daughter mandarin as well as a third language.
karma 2 you.

8

I think that the main idea of exposing our children to languages that we do not speak is getting their ear use to the language and the accent. I’m not sure if they would learn a language from movies, but it will definetly facilitate the learning if they want to learn the language later. Also, I read somewhere (I don’t remebre where) it will help them with their accent, meaning they will have more of a native accent.

I’m not sue if my answer helps at all :blush:

9

Thaks for sharing.My son know’s 5language out of which 3 are international languages and 2 languageare mother toungue. i have succeed in teaching languages and it’s really easy to teach.

Sapna

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Dear Sapna, I would love to hear how you taught the 3 international languages. Just a quick summary of what you do? And, how often do you use (review) each language? Thanks! :slight_smile:

11

Thanks Joha, you really helped me!

I also found a very useful article
http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/Pubs/linebarger.html

“Young children, language and television. Dr Deborah Linebarger of the University of Pennsylvania discusses her research on the potential language benefits of children’s television programmes for infants and toddlers.”

12

Thank you for sharing it, very helpful!

I started using songs in different languages. (Right now in Mandarin and in Russian). To get my daughter’s ear used to the language. One thing I notice, that sinse songs have catchy melodies, and are fun, it is easier to use them in a way. Great way to expose your child to the sound and accent, while having fun.

We usually dance, or have some other activity while the songs are playing. And she loves it and looking forward to the song time.

13

Frukc,

I’m glad the e-mail helped you. Thank you for sharing this article, very interesting… :slight_smile:

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Yes,Please!

15

Joha, Thanks for sharing the e-mail from Doman’institute. I am teaching my daughter English and Spanish so your e-mail gives me some answers.
Fruck, thanks for the article.

16

i think the article below will help explain why some of the children’s tv programs have a negative effect specially on infants. http://www.livescience.com/culture/090601-infants-television.html

17

Thanks for sharing this as currently I teach her two language at the same time. Then, I will do it separately.

Once thanks again :slight_smile:

18

Hi Joha, :wink:
This is pertaining to the email from IAHP, what exactly is meant by this??

Keep the two languages separate. Consistency is important. You do not want to teach a reading program in English or Spanish every other week. :unsure:

P.S.> How are you showing it???

Thanks!
Autumn :slight_smile:

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seems like Joha is helps us to guide for teaching multi language for our baby,That’s great!Well,I want to know it too :biggrin:

thanks a lot!

20

hi autumn,maybe you can read this thread…i just found it…

http://forum.brillkids.com/teaching-your-child-signing-speaking-foreign-languages/does-anyone-know-what-flash-card-method-to-use-when-teaching-two-languages/