Learning a foreign language brings a plethora of benefits for parents and their children. Not only does research show the increase in overall school performance, but children gain additional skills that aid in their personal and professional development. As parents, we strive to enrich our children’s lives by signing them up for activities such as soccer, dance, and music lessons. Supporting your child in learning a foreign language can be difficult, especially if you don’t speak the language yourself. Nonetheless, there are techniques that can aid in your child’s overall learning process. Here are the top three tips parents can use to support their children’s foreign language learning activities.
- Plan ahead: Parents should have a plan in place to get children engaged in foreign language learning. Parents can do this by setting up weekly goals, making time to practice with children, and building further exposure to the foreign language. Once the plan is in place, parents must stay consistent with their study plan. As parents will see, learning a language requires tenacity, steady progress, and organizational skills to keep the children on track.
- Practice makes perfect: Learning a foreign language is like playing an instrument or a sport. The more children make time to practice, the better they will do. Parents can contribute to their children’s overall understanding by reinforcing concepts at home. This can be done by speaking to them in the language they are studying, using picture books, and labeling household items in the language being studied. As long as your child is practicing for even as little as 5 minutes a day, they will improve their chances of developing fluency.
- Have reasonable expectations: Language learning takes time. No one ever said that it would be easy. To aim for a favorable learning outcome, it is important to create a positive learning environment at home by encouraging your kids to practice the language, to allow for mistakes, and to exercise patience when faced with the challenges of learning a new language at a young age.
As parents, we only want the best for our children. That is why Foreign Languages for Kids by Kids aims to provide an innovative teaching approach and a variety of materials to aid in the study of foreign languages.
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