I have been a subscriber for more than a year now. I have a stack of wonderful flashcards that I have stored in a bag to protect, I also now have a collection of books in English/French or as we would say if we were mixing English and Spanish Spanglish. I took three years of French in high school and one semester in College and love to keep up with French. This subscription is geared towards kids, but since I am not fluent it is also perfect for me. I love that I can understand the stories, engage in the activities they offer and can even listen to the stories. I recommend this subscription for adults and children learning and practicing French.
It is never too early to start teaching your young one another language. I am so determined about raising a bilingual kid that I have devoted my time to create resources that will help him. He loves animals and kids often do, the first essential words are given to him in both languages, and I started adding animals as a plus. By essential words I mean words like the following: Milk, water, more, cookie, mom, dad, hunger, outside and our names of course. My kid is about to be two and is now a pro at animals sounds and animal names in English and Spanish. I have created a set of flashcards that will help me add on to the list of animals he knows. We started with the farm animals since there are tons of videos that can help you reference these animals, but I want him to extend to that long list. The flashcards I created include animals like owls, hippos, rhinos, butterfly, alligator etc.
I have also created colorful and cheerful flashcards to continue extending his vocabulary as he gets older. The following set is for kids that are a bit older, but I like to be prepared and have printed and laminated these to start demonstrating them to my kid. These are also available for purchase through Etsy, Descendencia latina and TPT. Note if you purchase the TPT cards they will be digitally and not a finished product.
The U.S. holds low expectation when it comes to bilingual proficiency. Too MANY Americans accept the claim that foreign language instruction is a dismal failure, that a large percentage of students will never become fluent (Snow, 2017). When immigrants enroll their kids to school they believe their kids will become bilingual, but often times they are only becoming proficient in English rather than their native language, because the U.S. holds that mentality of students learning English and often forgetting their first language. If you visit other countries you will often find people speaking English, which is pretty much a commodity for us Americans, but if we reverse the roles they will hardly find anyone in the U.S. that speaks their language. Schools in other countries like Scandinavian countries, and European strongly believing in raising bilingual, and trilingual students; often English being one of the languages.
Determining the difference between Native vs. Heritage Speakers.
It is crucial to know how to differentiate between both students, in order to create adequate lessons. I did not know the differences between natives and heritage before taking this course. The school I worked out before titled the class for Heritage Speakers but in reality it was for Native speakers. It is important to understand that Heritage speakers often hear the language and know the culture. Knowing the culture can facilitate learning for students, either heritage or Native. One important statistic I can across throughout my reading was that students lose the language by the 3rd generation (Snow, 2017). In my own words I can say native speakers are those students who have another first language or have spoken the language since childhood. Heritage speakers are those students that are around the culture and the language but do not express themselves in that language or communicate in it.
Before my kid was even born I already knew I wanted him to grow up Bilingual. I grew up speaking English and Spanish my entire life, and I will admit it is the best thing that has ever happened to me. I have numerous stories of how I have been able to help others on the daily. You never know when being bilingual will come in handy: for jobs, when traveling, when helping parents or students, you have twice the TV shows and jokes!
I started creating a list of the things I wanted to make sure I had before my kid arrived. I will share my very short and to the point list, but amazing results it has given me. Some things are as easy as exposing him to music in Spanish, as well as speaking to him in Spanish, but has he grows I want him to visualize the language throughout the entire house. I am a part-time educator and former High school teacher. I am always thinking of ways to teach and engage students. Nothing would make me happier than my little one growing up trilingual!
I have books in Spanish (entirely in Spanish)
I have books that are Bilingual
I have books that are only in English. ~Read my post best books to read to your kids.
Where have I bought these books? For the English books I was enrolled in a subscription called #Lillypost and for the books in Spanish and Bilingual I have ordered online and researched the ones I want in particular. I have even purchased books in Mexico and whatever I cannot find I will create on my own. I have numerous bilingual short stories I have created for my teachers pay teachers page and I plan on using these with my little ones. I have also incorporated many culturally diverse books into my collection. My kid has his own shelf that helps me demonstrate only a selection of books at a time, but let’s say this kid has a huge library! I will be sharing links to my short stories and my culturally diverse books in case you are interested in purchasing them.
I have purchased toys that are bilingual and have recently subscribed to #HolaAmigos to help me have a shorter time planning lessons to teach my kid.
Labels
Something as easy as placing labels throughout the house can help your kid read and memorize new terms.
These labels can be in the target language of your choice, but I have created Spanish ones and are available for purchase. You have the option to printing and pasting or getting premium quality made labels. These labels can easily be removed and are glossy material.
