Teaching Chinese at Home

[laughingcat]

dimsum:

Just to share, the next 2 levels of Basic Chinese 500 基础汉字 500, BUDDING and BUILDING are now available at Popular Bookshop.


Popular is currently having a promotion till 30 October for the Budding series. Each book is selling at $4.90 instead of the usual $6.90. No further discount is entitled with the Popular card.

Took a quick look, on one page of Budding Book 5, \"后\" was in Traditional version.

And in Building series, their \"嘴\" is not right. They used the informal cantonese character \"咀\"

Hello Dimsum, only the level 2 have promo. Not the level 1 and 3.

[dimsum]

laughingcat:

dimsum:

Just to share, the next 2 levels of Basic Chinese 500 基础汉字 500, BUDDING and BUILDING are now available at Popular Bookshop.


Popular is currently having a promotion till 30 October for the Budding series. Each book is selling at $4.90 instead of the usual $6.90. No further discount is entitled with the Popular card.

Took a quick look, on one page of Budding Book 5, \"后\" was in Traditional version.

And in Building series, their \"嘴\" is not right. They used the informal cantonese character \"咀\"

Hello Dimsum, only the level 2 have promo. Not the level 1 and 3.

Yup, as I had written, the promotion is only for Budding series aka level 2.

[jeestan]

tamarind:

jeestan:

Hi Tamarind,


I have no idea how to get my child to like Chinese, you mentioned getting books from Dangdang. Does it help totally uninterested children like mine?
I really need help. I am even thinking of changing to malay if possible because dh and I can speak some malay. But I want to really have a go at chinese because we are after all both chinese.

I will really appreciate it if you could give some tips on how to get children like mine to like chinese. My boy is getting 70 plus now for chinese, he is in p2.

Hi jeestan,
It is best to start developing a love for Chinese between the age of 3 to 6. After that age, it will be very difficult. According to experts, kids have a amazing ability to learn languages before the age of 7, after that, they slowly lose that ability.

The reason whey your child hates Chinese, is because he is already good in English. It is only human nature to reject learning something new.

For your child, getting good books for him may not be effective, because he may not be able to read many of the words in these books. You can try to read with him, and teach him to read the words (do not make him check the dictionary). But you will have to be very hardworking, and make him read more than 1000 words, start with very simple books. I would also advise you to use the Si Wu Kuai Du series of books.

Other methods are watching Chinese TV series, choose those that are suitable for kids, and learning to sing Chinese songs.

If you want him to improve, you must be prepared to put in a lot of effort. You have to make sure that he is reading out loud and listening to Chinese for at least 2 hours a day. I wrote before that I only teach my kids for 20 minutes a day, but that is because I started since they were 4 years old. Now that your child is already 8 years old, you will need to spend a lot more time if you want him to improve.

Another idea that I have is total immersion in a Chinese only environment, perhaps during the school holidays. You can try to search for primary schools in China that allow you enroll your child for a month during June or December. I have not tried that before, but I am trying to find out more about this while I am in China.

Hi Tamarind,

The immersion programme sounds very good! I think my boy really needs that. Can you keep me updated if you find out more about this?

By the way, are you a chinese teacher or anything like that? You seem to know so much about helping kids in their chinese! :celebrate:

[tamarind]

jazz,

The teaching methods are guidelines only, it is up to you to do whatever that is most suitable for your child. I did not use the word cards to re-arrange the sentence, because my kids are already 6 and 7 years old, I can just point to the sentence and they can read very well. But it may be helpful for very young kids. You can try and see if it is effective. I use the word cards to play games with my son and he likes them.

For words that you think your child will not understand, it is OK to just teach him how to read it first, and explain when he is older.



jeestan,
I am not a Chinese teacher. I love Chinese and I used to do very well in Chinese when I was in RGS and RJC, and I only spent very little time studying the Chinese textbook. I find learning Chinese very easy, and I loved to write long Chinese essays. It is not that I am good in languages, because I used to find English very difficult when I was a student. It is the methods that are important, and I am grateful to my Chinese teachers who taught me.

I am teaching both my kids based on my own experience, and I would like to share it with other parents too. Please read my blog for the details :

http://tamarindvillage.blogspot.com/2010/09/how-to-raise-bilingual-child.html

I also hope that other parents who are good in Chinese can share their experiences too

[toddles]

Tamarind,


thanks for your generous sharing. I find it especially helpful because your two children learnt at different paces, and it's great to have some idea of how to help those who both show early aptitude and those who don't.

what's great is also that you're from an english speaking family background right? can identify with you on that count, and also on loving mandarin despite all that. hoping that this trickles down to my dd, cos my dh and both sets of gramps are certainly not going to be much help here!

[Trapwithin]

First . .thanks Tamarind for this wonderful thread. :thankyou:


I have trouble getting the Si Wu Kuai Du considering that Dang Dang do not work well with VISA.

Then I found this site http://www.sgshinekids.com/index.html
We can just self-collect and buy it for S$41.50

Hope that helps all who are looking for it.

[Brenda10]

Trapwithin:

First . .thanks Tamarind for this wonderful thread. :thankyou:


I have trouble getting the Si Wu Kuai Du considering that Dang Dang do not work well with VISA.

Then I found this site http://www.sgshinekids.com/index.html
We can just self-collect and buy it for S$41.50

Hope that helps all who are looking for it.

Thank you for provides an alternative path.

I just check and find the following books quite interesting. May consider taking for my child.

法国 柚子的故事(9-15yr)
玛蒂娜故事书第一辑10册 :lol:

[jazz]

Hi Tamarind,


Thanks for yr prompt response. Think I stick to the rules strictly. . BTW, can share how u play the games to yr kids?

[autumnbronze]

Trapwithin:

First . .thanks Tamarind for this wonderful thread. :thankyou:


I have trouble getting the Si Wu Kuai Du considering that Dang Dang do not work well with VISA.

Then I found this site http://www.sgshinekids.com/index.html
We can just self-collect and buy it for S$41.50

Hope that helps all who are looking for it.

Thanks for sharing, Trapwithin :celebrate:

[toddles]

Trapwithin:

First . .thanks Tamarind for this wonderful thread. :thankyou:


I have trouble getting the Si Wu Kuai Du considering that Dang Dang do not work well with VISA.

Then I found this site http://www.sgshinekids.com/index.html
We can just self-collect and buy it for S$41.50

Hope that helps all who are looking for it.

You can consider buying through sprees... that's what I did, and with shipping it only cost me $32.30.

of course, the waiting time will be longer than just cash and carry.