Thursday, April 8, 2021

Speaking Chinese To Childen and Grandchilden

 

I have been reading a book called Raising a bilingual child. You can tell it is American because it says raising. In Britain I would have said Brigning up a bilingual Child, which is alliterative.

Interestingly it give you a chart you can fill in. This seems to be the modern way. You can make a chart of anything, from your waking times and bedtimes, to the number of times you greet strangers, or watch TV.

You list the languages of the parents, the grandparents, schools, surroundings, books, TV and films (movies).

Children aged 0 to 5 and 10-15 have different interests. Starting with Lullabies, and children's TV programmes such as Sesame Street which you can watch in Spanish and other languages. Then you can have books or movies in other languages. Or use other languages at mealtimes.

You can set up a system, such as speak the local language touside the home. Speak another language to parents, a third language to grandparents. 

If parents are from different backgrounds, you could speak English to father, and French to mother. Or English at breakfast but French at dinner.

Useful Resources

Raising a Bilingual Child by Barbara Zurer Pearlson Ph D. Living Language, a Random House Company, New York.

Language & Literacy in Bilingual Children


About the Author

Angela Lansbury is a British author who has lived in the USA, Spain and Singapore. Her 20 books include Wedding Speeches & Toasts, and Quick Quotations.

She has lived in the USA, Spain and Singapore. She is a travel writer and photographer.

Angela Lansbury is a teacher of English (advanced and English as a Second Language or English as a Foreign Language, French and other languages, aspiring polyglot.

Angela Lansbury is also a speaker. Member of many toastmasters -  speaker training clubs - and a speaking contest judge.
She is VP PR for Braddell Heights Advanced toastmasters club which meets online the first Wednesday evening of the month at 7 pm Singapore time; then the third Saturday afternoon at 2 pm Singapore time. Please come along. Open to Toastmasters and guests. In April and possibly longer BHA will be on bha/learncool.sg
Next meetings are Saturday April 17th, Wed May 5th, Sat May 15th, Wed June 2nd and Sat June 19th.


She  has several blogs and writes daily on at least two of the following:
Please share links to your favourite posts.




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