Category: Speaking

No-prep activities for multilingual children

19/8/2022

By Ana Elisa Miranda, Ute Limacher-Riebold and Yoshito Darmon-Shimamori

Whether we are traveling or staying home during school holidays, both are great opportunities to learn something new and to connect with our children.
However, when we are on vacation, we might want to keep things as simple and relaxed as possible.
This Summer, we created a series of videos where we shared the easiest ways to engage our children with our home languages.

In this video I share 3 no-prep activities that support reading skills for toddlers, primary school kids and teenagers. Reading in the home language doesn’t really require a lot of preparation. We hope these activities inspire you!

It might take a while for our children to switch to using our home language more often when daycares and schools (in the other language) are out, but there are many ways to support them in becoming more confident in our home languages.

In this video, Ute shares a few activities that foster speaking skills for toddlers, primary school children and teenagers that do not require any preparation.

Regular practice of reading and writing in the home language is crucial for our children to improve their literacy skills.
Check out Yoshito’s ideas of no-prep writing activities we can do anytime, anywhere:

We also met live and talked about How to make the most of holidays in our home country. The three of us were fortunate enough to be able to visit family in “our countries” or countries where one of our languages are spoken. Watch the recording and see ideas and strategies for all ages!

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Have fun with your languages and find hundreds of activity ideas for your multilingual family on our books:

The Toolbox for Multilingual Families
The Parents’ Guide to Raising Multi-literate Children

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Charades and Gestures in Multilingual Families

25/5/2022

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By Ana Elisa Miranda, Ute Limacher-Riebold and Yoshito Darmon-Shimamori

Gestures and body language are important aspects of communication. Not only for our youngest ones, but also for when we learn a new language and don't know the words yet.

In this video we talk about:

How to play Charades
How to keep the game fun and enjoyable for all players
How the game can help consolidate knowledge of the home language
How to play it using different languages
The importance of gestures for language acquisition and learning
Communication when children are not verbal yet
Gestures across languages and cultures

Watch the video and let us know in the comments:
How do you use gestures and sounds in your family?
Do your children like to play Charades?

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Resources:

Find hundreds of activity ideas for your multilingual family on our books:

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How to help our children with pronunciation in a playful way

3/3/2022

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A Tongue Twister is a sentence that has repeated sounds, which make it difficult to say without stumbling.

Tongue twisters are good for improving pronunciation and speaking skills. They are like physical exercises, as we strengthen and stretch the muscles involved in speech when we try to articulate them. This muscle exercise leads to a clearer pronunciation, to clearer speech patterns and helps to rectify sounds that could be hard for us to articulate.

Tongue twisters challenge our capacity to enunciate the individual sounds in each word so we don't trip up, they force us to pay careful attention to the precise sounds in each word.

They are not only a good exercise for beginners in the target language, but also for those whose articulation is affected, for example by retainers or tooth gaps.
Tongue Twisters are also a great warm up for actors, singers and public speakers!
When playing with Tongue Twisters, the aim is to enunciate the sentence as quickly as possible without making mistakes.

The fun part is that it is a tricky exercise for everyone! Even proficient speakers! So it can help children be less afraid of making mistakes and just give it a go.

Do you play tongue twisters with your children?
Which tongue twisters do you remember from your childhood?
What tongue twisters do you know in your other languages?

In this video we share some easy and fun ways to use tongue twisters with your children in all their languages.

You can find tongue twisters in over 100 languages here:
https://www.tongue-twister.net

Have fun with your languages!

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Multisensory activities in the multilingual home

8/11/2020

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We all learn and remember things in different ways. For some, hearing and seeing something is enough. Others might remember more easily when they do, touch or move. And we’ve all been transported into a memory by a sudden smell or taste…

Multisensory activities engage more than one sense at a time, and with that it creates more brain connections and stronger memory.

Children are curious, playful and active by nature - they will be much more interested and engaged in activities that involve a mix of movement, touch, taste, smell, sight and hearing.

Fun and varied learning will certainly be more memorable - for the kids and for you - than worksheets.

How can you apply multisensory techniques in your multilingual home?

When learning a language we naturally use the listening and speaking skills the most. Try to use the other senses to help your children learn new words. Think cooking together, gardening, going for a walk, doing crafts, listening to music or audiobooks, playing, all while talking about what you’re doing.

Can specific tastes, smells, songs, dances, games or toys be connected to each different language?

When children start learning to read and write, especially in different languages, all their senses can be engaged in developing those skills.

Imagine seeing letters and words on paper, then practicing writing them with a pencil. Now imagine singing a song about the alphabet or letter-sounds, with accompanying movements; listening to a story and doing a gesture whenever you hear a particular sound or word; making letters with dough, seeds, etc; writing words with movable letters, chalk, paint, stamps; baking cookies and writing about it.

Which ones will create stronger brain connections?

Here are some activities you can try for handwriting, reading and writing.

And many more activities like these have been curated by Ute and I on our Toolbox for Multilingual Families!

I’d love to see what you and your children are engaged in!
If you’re on Instagram, please tag me: ana.elisa.miranda

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How do you talk to your newborn baby?

3/8/2020

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I've been a language teacher and enthusiast for half of my life. I've learned about foreign language learning and experienced it myself.

For a couple of years now I've been immersed in everything multilingual children and how they acquire different languages at the same time.

I've dreamed of the day my own children would be growing up multilingual. I would love to see them speaking to my family in Brazil, reading and writing in Portuguese.

But then I had a baby…

The most common advice out there is that you should talk to your baby even before they're born. I honestly found myself feeling quite awkward talking to my bump. I tried reading aloud, but I didn't have much material in Portuguese at the time. So yeah, during pregnancy my partner and I read a little bit and awkwardly talked to the bump a little bit.

When she was born I thought "No time to waste! She's here, she sees me, she hears me, she's watching and learning all the time! Let's dooooo this!"

But then… postpartum exhaustion! And you know what newborns actually do most of the time? Eat, sleep, pee and poop. How am I supposed to talk to her? To give her that precious language input?

When I started feeling a bit more like myself and when she started staying more alert, I naturally incorporated "conversations" during: diaper changes, feeding and tummy time. I say good morning, ask how she slept, if she had good dreams, I describe what we're doing, talk about the day ahead, about the weather, etc. I do baby talk, which is slower, emphasizes vowel sounds and helps babies distinguish the sounds and words of a particular language. She started cooing and making cute sounds, so I reply - and so she learns how conversations work!

We also add to the experience by singing and reading a lot to her - pretty much any time she's awake! I honestly like that better than talking, I feel like there’s a purpose and an end to it.

As with any advice, we see what works for us. How do/did you talk to your babies?

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Hi!

I'm Ana - a teacher who loves reading, writing, traveling and nature.

Your Toolbox:

No-prep activities for multilingual children

Charades and Gestures in Multilingual Families

How to help our children with pronunciation in a playful way

Multisensory activities in the multilingual home

How do you talk to your newborn baby?

Hi!

Your Toolbox:

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