Hi David and everyone,

Sorry, I didn't join here for a several days. I have a concert this month, so I have busy these days.

About this week topic, I don't have a child, but I have taught English to my sister's son for about 2 years. He is in the second year of junior high school student. When he was in the first year of junior high school student, he got 15 on the English test. It was the first semester's exam. I heard it from my sister, and she said "He doesn't understand English at all!". So I decided to teach to him English. (At first, I bought a English textbook which is the same as his)

I make some Japanese sentences with explanation and example sentences, and I send it to him by fax. → He translates these sentences into English, and he send it to me by fax. → I call him and he read them. → If he made a mistake, I point out it.

We have been doing it every day for about 2 years. As you know, I'm not good at English, so it is very tough to keep teaching English to him, but I think it is the opportunity for me to study English again from the beginning. When I make explanation, I use examples from David's books. I read it again and again. Your books are very easy to understand, so if I had not had your books, I would not have taught English to him.

Now, his English grade is good. The other day, he got 95 on the English test! I'm going to keep teaching English to him, so I must more study English!

うまく伝わってるでしょうか？不安なので、一応日本語でも…。
私は甥っ子が学校で使っている教科書と同じものを買って、それに沿って教えています。新しい単元に入るときは、必ず説明文と例文を作り、それを読ませて、いくつかの短い日本語の文を英訳させます。答えはファックスと電話で確認するので、綴りの間違いも発音の間違いもチェックします。問題集などは一切使っていません。一番大変なのは、説明の文を作るとき。自分がきちんと理解していないとうまく説明できないので、何度もDavidの本を読みます。それでもダメなときは、Davidや他のメンバーに直接質問して助けてもらっています。今、彼は私が最も苦手な現在完了形を勉強しています。なので、毎日教科書とにらめっこしながら、問題を作っています。教えているというより、一緒に勉強している感じかな＾＾；

Amica

•  Amica
• 2011年3月 7日 22:34

Hi David and everyone,

I have two children,but sorry to say, I'm afraid I can't be a help.
I didn't teach my sons when they were in school,let alone in kindergarten. I've never tried using English at home with my kids. I helped them when they were in junior or high school,though. It didnt' happen so often,however, when they asked me" 母さん、これってどういうこと？", I just helped them.
Actually, this is the story of 10 or 15 years ago, so I'm not sure about recent situations.

It's not my story, but one of my friend's grandchild learn English using a magazine at home.( He is four years old.)
It has a magazine and other materials depending on each age.( 2 years-3years/ 3years-4years.....)

I'm looking forward to reading Tomo,Fumie and other members methods or stories.
(If my memories serves me correctly, Fumie mentioned she had been teaching English to her children...)

Bye for now,

Anne

•  Anne
• 2011年3月 7日 22:36

Hi David and everyone,

OK, I'm going to write about what I did or have been doing to teach English to my children and my nieces. As I mentioned before, I've been trying to use English at home. When my children were small, I didn't "teach" English. I just talked to them in English a little every day. My English was very poor when I started doing this, so I had to study hard. I used to watch the program on NHK educational channel called "eigo de asobo" with my children every day. I bought some textbooks and CDs from the program, and I often sang the songs with them and sometimes read stories for them in English. The program is still on, but it has changed a lot, and I prefer old versions.(Actually, I learned a lot from this program!) My children liked Disney movies, so we often watched Peter Pan, Toy Story, or Buzz Lightyear both in English and Japanese. If your children are very small, they don't understand even their own language, so the language doesn't really matter. As you know, there are lots of materials to teach English to your children at home(which are usually quite expensive), but I didn't buy anything like those. I just tried to talked to my children in English every day even if it was just simple conversation. Of course, my English(including my pronunciation) is not perfect, but I think it has a good effect on listening skill as well because my son is good at listening tests.(His writing is terrible, though!)

上に書いた通り、子供たちが小さい頃は、特に「教える」ではなくて、日常の生活や遊びの中に英語を少しずつ混ぜる、ということをしていました。　一緒に歌を歌ったり、本を読んだり、テレビ・ビデオを見たり、塗り絵をしたり、工作をしたり、お母さんがよく子供と一緒にすることや、毎日子供に言うことの中に英語も混ぜるといった感じです。　息子や姪が中学に上がる少し前から時間を決めて教えるようになりましたが、それはまたあとで書きます。

Tomo

•  Tomo
• 2011年3月 8日 00:17

Hi Amica,

Glad to hear that my books are useful for you :-)

•  David
• 2011年3月 8日 13:17

Hi, everyone,

This is really an exciting topic.
My son is 19 and he is now fluent in English.
Proof?
He joined a year ago Kokusai-Kyoyo-Gakubu (FLA) of Sophia University where the common language is English.

Now how did I turn my completely Japanese son to a bilingual kid? I would say the earlier you start the better the results.

I remember I spoke to my son in English when he was a baby but never used those Disney materials or any Eigo-Kyozai that were popular among young moms.

Being bilingual myself, this was possible, I admit.

But the key I think is the immersion. You expose your child to English whenver possible.
Since I listen to news in English, and I am sure this helped my son to pick up the sound. As he grew up, he started showing interest in Thomas the Tank Engine. So I bought a few English versions of the videos and showed them to him. Kids, especially when they are small, don't seem to mind that the video is played in English as long as they can watch their favorite characters. They seem to understand and absorb it.

I never taught him ABC...

So in his case, I would say the sound came first.
When you have enough input of the sound, then you can speak exactly the same way you hear.

•  Nicky
• 2011年3月 8日 14:13

Hi Nicky,

Thanks for that. Can you explain a bit more about why you are bilingual? Are you Japanese? (I can't tell from your name.) Did you live in another country when you were a child?

And by the way, I agree with you 100% about learning the sounds first. I learnt how to sing songs in Japanese before I understood what any of the words meant, so I had to rely completely on my ears. I think it gave me a big head start when I actually began studying the language.

•  David
• 2011年3月 8日 15:04

Hi David,
I wrote long comments before but it was rejected and all gone. So sad.

You are doing an exchange, piano and English. That is a great idea. I have been looking for an exchange, hopefully with a native English speaker who lives near to my house. But I don’t have anything to teach except for mediocre Japanese.
You seem to be mesmerized by the piano teacher’s daughter. We might see your comments boasting about your own children here in a few years.

As for the topic, yes, I have been teaching English to my children. I have to admit that I have been doing unsuccessfully. Please don’t expect getting something from my story.
There are two cases we can think of : teaching English to children when they are little while they are learning Japanese too and helping them with their English study at school when they get older.
As a matter of fact, I started giving English environment when I was pregnant with my first child, you know as 胎教. I talked to or sung English lullabies to the baby in my stomach.(only several times a day) And after my first son was born, I sung English lullabies and children’s songs in English until he falls asleep. Then when he started to speak a little bit of Japanese, I really wanted him to become bilingual. So I taught him some English words using picture cards. I made them because I like drawing. We did playing card. カルタ取り　When I said certain word and he took the card. I talked to him in simple English. I didn’t know expressions relate to child rearing, so I learned from the book. 起きてから寝るまで、子育て編　by ALC. It’s a really useful book. We watched English videos for children and I read him a little bit of children’s books. During those days, about 15 years ago, we couldn’t get good English materials easily.
Anyway through those efforts, he started speak a few English words. For example, when we looked up the sky and pointed at the star he said star. When he had fish at dinner he said fish. You may think I did well BUT then what happened?? I made him to watch cartoons in English though he switched it into Japanese. And he said “I don’t like English!” That’s it!. I might push him too hard to learn English. It’s not that he wanted to learn English but I wanted him to learn English. Since then I go with the flow. For my middle son and the third son I just sung English songs when they were babies. Recently my youngest asks me how do you say ~ in English so I teach him some English words.
I gave up teaching English to my children , so I decided to do to other people’s children.
For me it is easier. Some students are very good. The younger they start, the better their pronunciations become. But some students are difficult, especially younger boys. They are too energetic. They prefer running around to studying. I didn’t teach them strictly but through songs and games.
And now I help my eldest with his English study at high school. He doesn’t concentrate on it, that’s annoying me. He does reluctantly. So his English score isn’t good. I don’t know my effort which I had given him when he was little, affect his English ability or not. I just hope them by seeing me studying hard motivates them to learn by themselves. 親の背中を見て子供は育つ。英語に限らず、親が頑張っている姿を見て、自分も頑張らなぁと思ってくれたらなぁと願います。It may just an excuse of me not good at child rearing.

At yesterday’s Paul’s blog he wrote “There must be an understanding that leaning is up to individual and the training is there to assist you along your path. This applies to all types of training and education.”

Sorry, I wrote too long.
Talk to you later. Fumie

•  Fumie
• 2011年3月 8日 21:18

Hi David,

Sorry I don’t have any children, so I can’t answer your question.
I should take a rest and just read other members comment this week.

good night and sweet dreams,
amo

•  amo
• 2011年3月 8日 21:51

Hi Amo,

How about your nieces and nephews? Do you ever help them with their English studies?

•  David
• 2011年3月 8日 23:57

Hi David

Thank you for taking topics for me.
I was very interesting for all comments!

Hi everyone!
はじめまして。ピアノ教師のmahoです。皆さんのご意見、大変参考になりました。読むのはだいたい大丈夫ですが、英語で書くのにものすごく時間がかかりますので、取り急ぎ、日本語で御礼をと思いまして・・・。
少しずつ、英語で私も仲間に入れていただければと思います。よろしくお願い致します。

•  maho
• 2011年3月 9日 06:54

Hi David

Thank you for taking topics for me.
I was very interesting for all comments!

Hi everyone!
はじめまして。ピアノ教師のmahoです。皆さんのご意見、大変参考になりました。読むのはだいたい大丈夫ですが、英語で書くのにものすごく時間がかかりますので、取り急ぎ、日本語で御礼をと思いまして・・・。
少しずつ、英語で私も仲間に入れていただければと思います。よろしくお願い致します。

•  maho
• 2011年3月 9日 06:54

Hi Maho,
Thanks for joining us!

I'll post another comment later.

•  Tomo
• 2011年3月 9日 07:53

Hi maho,
はじめまして。
mahoさんのおかげで、私も、皆さんがどのようにお子さんと英語に関わっているのか聞く事が出来ました。

ピアノと英語のexchangeいいですね！

Anne

•  Anne
• 2011年3月 9日 08:10

Hi maho,

はじめまして。ピアノと声楽を教えているAmicaです。素敵な話題を提供してくれて、ありがとうございます。最近サボり気味だったのですが、久々にコメントを書くことができました。これからも、どうぞよろしくお願いします。

Amica

•  Amica
• 2011年3月 9日 09:41

Hi David and everyone,

As I said, I started teaching English to my oldest son and my niece before they entered junior high school. First of all, I taught them how to say the names of the English letters and what sound each letter has(phonics). I made cards of A to Z both in capital and small letters, and we played with this cards like "karuta" in two ways; ABC karuta and phonics karuta. Spread the cards on the floor, and I give them a question like "/ei/", "/bi:/", "/si:/ or "/a/", "/b/", "/k/", and then they pick up the right cards. We played this game a lot until they remembered all the letters and the sounds. After they remembered them all, I taught them more about phonics like blend sounds(ck, ch, oo, th, etc); long vowels; and silent e, b, k, and etc. When I was in school, I didn't know about phonics at all. I happened to find a book about phonics at the library, and I really wished that I had known this when I was in school. I wanted to teach phonics to my son and my niece before they started to study English in junior high school, so I read some books and studied it myself.

At first, I was teaching my son and my niece together once a week for a while, but my son is one year older than my niece. It was getting difficult for her to keep up, so I decided to teach them one to one. I started to teach them like this because I wanted to help them with their English study at school, so I taught them along with their textbooks, but I also used some other books including David's ones.(I often tell them the stories from David's books or the things I learned on this blog to motivate them to study.) I teach things they are going to learn in the classes in advance, and I make some worksheets using expressions and structures they need to learn. When I see them having trouble using new expressions, I give them more example sentences, and they practice until they can say them smoothly. English study at junior high school now focuses on speaking, and they don't really teach grammar things to students, but I think they need to learn basic grammar as well. I taught my son and my niece things they didn't learn at school including some grammar things, and I also taught them how to read phonetic symbols because I didn't want them to use "katakana". I'm not sure if they remember them, though.

When they have tests, I make them read out the textbook, and I check if they understand the meaning of each sentence. And then I read out the textbook, and they write down what they hear in their notebook or handouts. If there are any words they can't spell, they practice writing them several times. My son doesn't like writing even in Japanese, so it's a bit difficult to motivate him to do this, but I tell him that I can help him with his English study, but I can not practice instead of him.

Anyway, before I started teaching my son and my niece, I was not sure if I could do it or how to do it, but I think it's going well so far. Their junior high school marks students' grades on a scale 1 to 5.(1 is the worst, and 5 is the best.) Each subject has several check points, and the points are marked A to C.(A is the best.) English has four points like communication skill including attitude, speaking and writing, listening and reading, and understanding of the cultural differences. My son got all 5s and As for three years in junior high school, and my niece's English grades are also perfect so far.(I'm looking forward to seeing her last grades in junior high.) I'm sorry if I sound like I'm bragging, but I think they did a great job and it would be fair to say I did a good job too!(笑)

Now I'm teaching my second son who is in the fifth grade and my other niece who is in the sixth grade. I'm teaching them together once a week now, but my niece will be in junior high this April, so I think it will be difficult for my son to keep up. If it gets difficult for him, I'll start to teach them one to one.

My youngest daughter, who is in the first grade, asked me to give her English lessons like her big brothers and her cousins, so I started to teach her too, but I'm just playing with her using English as we do some games, color pictures, or sing songs. I think it's enough for her for the time being. There are lots of materials that you can use for free on the Internet now, so I don't need to buy anything to do this.

息子の中学校の頃の話は過去で、姪は現在なので、時制がごちゃ混ぜですが。。
時間を決めて教えるときは、主に学校の勉強の手助けをしていますが、日常の中で英語に触れる時間が増えるように、普段の会話に英語を混ぜたり、置き手紙やメールを英語で書いたりもしています。

Tomo

•  Tomo
• 2011年3月 9日 09:59

【訂正】
or "/a/", "/b/", "/k/"　 →　or "/æ/", "/b/", "/k/"

•  Tomo
• 2011年3月 9日 10:04

Hi everyone,

I’ve found an interesting site about the critical period for learning languages. Please refer to www.ted.com/talks/patricia_kuhl_the_linguistic_genius_of_babies.html
and listen to it. VERY interesting!!

•  Jazmín
• 2011年3月 9日 14:38

Hi Jazmin,
Yes! When I listened to this talk last month, I thought it interesting,too!

•  Anne
• 2011年3月 9日 15:44

Hi David,

Yes I have helped them with their studies before term exams (but not so often,) so it’s a part of subjects in school, not English conversation. I just followed the text book. It seemed that they didn’t like study at all. I think they live a good environment for learning English. They have cousins in the USA, so it should be natural for them to be interested in English, but they aren’t. I don’t know why, but they seem to be busy with other things!!
By the way, I remember a friend from junior high school. She liked English very much and listened to NHK radio English programme everyday. I don’t think she did other things. She just listened to NHK and studied by herself. Her English pronunciation was really good. She won an English speech contest when she was in high school.

Hi maho,

welcome to the blog. looking forward to your next comment.

correction

other members comment this week.
>other members comments this week.

bye for now,
amo

•  amo
• 2011年3月 9日 21:59

Hi everyone,

I watched the video Jazmín mentioned. I knew that babies and children are forming hypotheses about how the language works as they listen to us intently, but I didn't know that they are taking statistics like that and it takes human being for them to do this. It was very interesting!

•  Tomo
• 2011年3月10日 12:25

Hi Tomo,
Thank you for the detailed information. You are amazing! Your method is so through? (徹底している）and works very well. Even for professionals (teachers), it's difficult to teach students well and motivate them. You could publish a book telling your method along with how did you become fluent in English without never visited English speaking countries.
I'm wondering that you said your son's and niece's score were excellent, how about their speaking skill?
Are they speak well?

Fumie

•  Fumie
• 2011年3月11日 05:37

Hi Fumie,

Thanks for your nice words:) Unfortunately, my son's and my niece's speaking skills are not good. They can understand simple English and communicate with their ALT, but they still need a lot more speaking practice. As you know, when students learn some new expressions at school, they practice saying them in the classroom with their friends like a real conversation. They can be a good speaker there because they know what to say, but it's different in a real conversation, isn't it? There is another problem is that our brains keep forgetting. We need to keep practicing the same thing again and again to remember it or not to forget it. My son and my niece just practice speaking in the classroom and with me for a short time, so I don't think they have practiced enough to be a good English speaker yet. When I ask something in English to my niece(apart from lessons), she understands what I'm saying, but she answers me in Japanese. My son sometimes answers me in English, but as you know, high school boys don't really talk to their mother much. Here's a conversation my son and I had the other day.

Me: Hi, how was your day?

My son: Tired.

Me: And?

My son: That's it.

And the conversation ends!

覚えたことを普通の会話の中でさっと言えるレベルまで練習してないし、練習が足りないうちにどんどん新しいことを覚えなくちゃいけないし、使わないとすぐに忘れちゃうし…。　特に「喋る・書く」は本人が頑張って練習しないとなのでなかなか難しいですね。

•  Tomo
• 2011年3月11日 12:24

Hi everyone,

If you live in Tokyo and you are okay, please post a comment to let us know. I just had a call from one friend. She said that her ceiling collapsed, but she was okay.

•  David
• 2011年3月11日 20:20

I’d come to give green light with you one this subject. Which is not something I usually do! I love reading a post that will make people think. Also, thanks for allowing me to speak my mind!

•  Alexa Pikkarainen
• 2011年3月17日 12:06

This is a really great blog. Thx to the auther

•  Erma Rosano
• 2011年6月24日 06:17

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•  Salley Orrick
• 2011年6月26日 12:24

Bookmarked!

•  Rosann Hallerman
• 2011年7月13日 00:53

I find it so hard to believe that it was only a month ago that i didn't know how to boil and egg and no i can actually cook dinner for my family instead of my wife always have to do it lol

•  watch movies online
• 2011年10月 7日 02:49