Introduce a language

[Anonymous]

I want to introduce a language (Chinese) to my 4 year old DD. I can speak/write Chinese, but I don't know how to start to teach it. She only can understand/speak/read English, and she is not interested in learning Chinese. How do your kids learn/pick up a foreign language? I feel sad because she is the only chinese kids among my friends that does not understand/speak Chinese. My husband can speak really limited Chinese. Should I use exercise book, cartoon, story books, videotapes or anything? Anything helpful tips?

[Anonymous]

Where do you live? I know that there are weekend Chinese schools in Fairfax County that teach the language and culture. FCPS has a series of school with language immersion opportunities, although not Chinese, that might be an option for you.

If you want your daughter to learn Chinese, speak to her in Chinese and don't respond to anything that is not in Chinese if you know that she knows the word. But good luck with it if she is not interested. Trying to get and keep her attention if she is not interested is going to be a challenge.

[Anonymous]

You don't need to formally start 'teaching' it. No whiteboard or textbooks needed. You just need to speak it.

Start singing Chinese lullabies to her. Teach her Chinese games (ie my kids enjoy playing hide and seek in my DH's native language).

Just start introducing her to words. Ie: do you see the red ball? In Chinese we say, [the red ball in Chinese]. Keep doing that until you can start dropping the English translation. After a few days of introducing the same word ask her to try and say it herself. Just keep exposing her to the language and slowing helping her understand an increasing amount. Listen to Chinese songs in the car, get cartoons in Chinese, bring her to cultural events where she hears the language, etc.

[Anonymous]

I would start with simple phrases like Put on your shoes, it’s time for dinner, Go wash your hands.

[Anonymous]

Agree with all of the above. Speak, sing, count, read books, even offer TV in Chinese (if you offer at all). My daughter goes to a Chinese immersion school and in PK the teachers speak 100% in Chinese to help with immersion. It is amazing how much their brains are able to absorb at that age!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I want to introduce a language (Chinese) to my 4 year old DD. I can speak/write Chinese, but I don't know how to start to teach it. She only can understand/speak/read English, and she is not interested in learning Chinese. How do your kids learn/pick up a foreign language? I feel sad because she is the only chinese kids among my friends that does not understand/speak Chinese. My husband can speak really limited Chinese. Should I use exercise book, cartoon, story books, videotapes or anything? Anything helpful tips?

Can you speak only Chinese to her? Dad can speak English? That is what my friends have done and it worked.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I want to introduce a language (Chinese) to my 4 year old DD. I can speak/write Chinese, but I don't know how to start to teach it. She only can understand/speak/read English, and she is not interested in learning Chinese. How do your kids learn/pick up a foreign language? I feel sad because she is the only chinese kids among my friends that does not understand/speak Chinese. My husband can speak really limited Chinese. Should I use exercise book, cartoon, story books, videotapes or anything? Anything helpful tips?

Only you know your kid. It seems like tough-love, speaking only Chinese to her and only responding when she speaks Chinese back to you would work with some kids, but by 4, it's understandable that she'd be resistant to that approach. I would recommend speaking only Chinese to her, unless there is something involves safety, etc... and otherwise trying to make it fun--TV, videos, books, songs. I would NOT recommend workbooks unless she otherwise loves workbooks. Oral fluency is a big enough goal at this point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You don't need to formally start 'teaching' it. No whiteboard or textbooks needed. You just need to speak it.

Start singing Chinese lullabies to her. Teach her Chinese games (ie my kids enjoy playing hide and seek in my DH's native language).

Just start introducing her to words. Ie: do you see the red ball? In Chinese we say, [the red ball in Chinese]. Keep doing that until you can start dropping the English translation. After a few days of introducing the same word ask her to try and say it herself. Just keep exposing her to the language and slowing helping her understand an increasing amount. Listen to Chinese songs in the car, get cartoons in Chinese, bring her to cultural events where she hears the language, etc.

This. I do this with my 2 y.o. and DC is great at the second language!

[Anonymous]

Where do you live? There's Chinese school every Saturday here. I'm surprised she isn't already fluent if you speak it yourself. No school will teach her better than you. I speak to my children in my language (Cantonese) at home since birth, never in English. They speak my dialect, DH language and English, fluently. They learned english later in Preschool, and then ES. Never had any issues. 4 is not too late, their brains are like a sponge, they can learn quickly.

[Anonymous]

S/O for Cantonese-speaking mom: do you know of any online resources or streaming services that have kids’ videos in Cantonese? I don’t speak it and DH doesn’t read characters so we’re struggling to find resources to make learning Cantonese fun for DD. Saturday schools near us are Mandarin-only and DH refuses to speak Cantonese at home, although grandparents cooperate.

[Anonymous]

You just need to speak to her in chinese.

[Anonymous]

Do you use any childcare? We hire only nannies/sitters who are willing to only speak the language we want our kids to speak. They are not allowed to speak English. It has worked really well but we start from infancy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you use any childcare? We hire only nannies/sitters who are willing to only speak the language we want our kids to speak. They are not allowed to speak English. It has worked really well but we start from infancy.

I think that this is key. All the people who say, just speak Chinese to her are forgetting that the kid is 4. While her brain is definitely still plastic and it will be easy for her to learn a new language, she is also old enough to resist, so OP needs to balance being firm with turning this into a huge fight with the end result being that the kid just refusing to speak Chinese. It is likely that even if she refuses to speak, she will learn to understand a lot by hearing you speak to her. Then, the trick would be to get her into situations where she's motivated to speak Chinese--Chinese school where other kids are actually enjoying themselves, play group where all of the kids speak Chinese, etc...

[Anonymous]

OP here, agree with this. My kid is old enough to resist to learn Chinese, and all I can do is sometimes I ask her to repeat some phrases word by word.

When she was a baby/toddler, my Chinese-speaking parents took care of her. Unfortunately, she did not learn any Chinese from them, and she did not talk at all (but understand Chinese back then), not even a single word at 2.5 years old. I was so worried about her speech, and I immediately placed her in a daycare with all English environment. In a few months, she started talking nonstop in English. I still don't get it why she did not talk at all under my parents' care but started talking once we put her in daycare environment.

Anyways, I will try some chinese school. I hear about that, but I am told that mostly kids speak English at the class. Unfortunately my friends' kids can speak both English & Chinese, so I need to make some mom friends with kids that only know how to speak Chinese or likes to speak Chinese a lot. Thank you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:S/O for Cantonese-speaking mom: do you know of any online resources or streaming services that have kids’ videos in Cantonese? I don’t speak it and DH doesn’t read characters so we’re struggling to find resources to make learning Cantonese fun for DD. Saturday schools near us are Mandarin-only and DH refuses to speak Cantonese at home, although grandparents cooperate.

YouTube?