October 2009 of James 5.5, Sydney nearly 8 years
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October 2, 2009
Today I was playing this made up "soccer" game with James. He invented the rules, which generally fit his purposes. We were using a junior size basketball and the Four Square board on the driveway was the point keeper. I was so amazed to see him whispering in Portuguese under his breath until he got to the right number.
It made me think of my friend Jimin yesterday. She and her husband are Korean and have a kid James' age. She watched my kids yesterday while I had a meeting and when I went to pick them up, she watched James and me speaking Portuguese. She said that her son was in Korean school on Fridays because when her mother came to visit fm Korea, she was quite upset that the little boy didn't speak Korean. Jimin looked sort of guilty and sad as she said that. She said, "We try to speak it to him and I thought he would be able to speak it, but he only understands." She was pleased he'd made great strides since starting the Friday school.
Anyway all this to say that I loved today how just playing ball was like a mini-language lesson (and math actually). And James was having SO much fun, getting up into the big numbers and having to ask what comes after 49 and such. (As you can see, our game was a far cry from soccer, with such scoring.)
I am SO excited because today Brazil won the bid for the Olympics 2012! It'll be in Rio. I want to go SOOOO much. I'm hoping to figure out a way to interpret enough to earn my way over. It would be just too incredible. I was alone when I heard it on the radio and jumped up and down in the kitchen!
October 20, 2009
I spoke with my friend Marcy today about how she and her three year old are doing with multilingualism. He speaks Italian with his mother, English with his father, and Spanish in preschool (after having spent much time in Spanish when they had a live-in nanny). She said that at his school, they do everything in Spanish except the "feelings" expressions and vocabulary. Their thinking being that these children will be mainstreamed into English speaking schools and need the language of socialization to be in English. Hard to say my take on that. I can see where the theory comes from, but it seem, to be an either/or solution when there's one that doesn't leave out the second language. Perhaps doing them in both languages. I'm not thinking overt language teaching, but instead, when a child forgets to say 'por favor', the teacher could prompt the 'por favor' then say, "mas tu sabes como se dice en espanol?" ("but do you know how to say that in English?'). Just a thought.
October 28, 2009
Today I heard the saddest language story. A mother at the school came to the US at 8 years old knowing no English. She said she did a show and tell early on in her time there and her English wasn't very good. The other children teased her. She went home and refused to speak Spanish with her parents from then on. She told her mother she wanted to speak English like Americans do. It's interesting b/c now, she has barely any accent. Can you imagine how sad a mother would feel to no longer speak the one language she knows well to her kid?
October 29, 2009
I've noticed the Sydney has the most trouble speaking in Portuguese not necessary in the period of TIME she's just had (I used to feel the amount of time she's just spent speaking English was the cause). But it's that the experience took place in English. So we can have an easy conversation about a time with just the two of us because at that time we were speaking Portuguese. Or she can discuss what happened with Stela that afternoon. Talking about abstract concepts isn't any more difficult for her in Portuguese than English. Vocabulary is still an issue, but the main barrier is that she's basically having to translate what's happened into Portuguese. It's confusing to her when she gets to a direct quote, for example, in a story where the people are speaking English. She sometimes just says that bit in English and then goes back to Portuguese. At dinner time I notice that she'll tend to talk to me in Portuguese instead of talking "toward" Stephen (which is preferred b/c then she'd speak English and all could understand.) But it's hard because he doesn't keep the same eye contact and behave as if he is as is as interested as I do, so she moves her focus from him to me and then is uncertain what to do about the language.
October 31,2009
Went to the Gal Costa concert last night. Knew heaps of people (to the point where Vorakarn ask why I don't run for mayor). I ran into 3 of the women I know from the Brazilian bible study I used to go to when I first moved to NC. I really do want to visit with the group again. Maybe I can go with Stella in a couple of days. I love just eaves dropping on Brazilians' conversations. The language just laps out and makes me happy.
