Sunday, 30 March 2008

Commands in foreign languages

This was something discussed on the Enki conference which is to use commands in a foreign language which the child responds to physically to help immerse them in a foreign language at times. We do this anyway (although French and German are our 2 languages of choice) and it does work and keeps those pathways open.

STOP

  1. French - arrêt
  2. German - Anschlag
  3. Spanish - parada

OPEN YOUR BOOK (I looked the Spanish up on Babelfish)

  1. French - ouvre votre livre
  2. German - öffnen Sie Ihr Buch* (I use the formal 'you' with her so that she will sound more respectful to German speakers)
  3. Spanish - abra su libro

GOOD MORNING

  1. French - bon jour
  2. German - guten Morgen
  3. Spanish - buenos dias

This is something I forgot - the other week we were out and Springy heard some non-English speakers and was able to discern that they were speaking French. It felt wonderful to know that her ears are tuned into French as well as English. I really want to be able to take her to France for a week but we will have to see (money is very tight at the moment).

The countries that I dream of seeing with my husband and Springy are France, Austria, Finland and Norway. I'm too cowardly to have all the vaccinations for places like India.

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