Teaching Chinese at Home

[tamarind]

MyBaby:

I have these compilation CDs -

- 滚石金韵民歌 (80 Greatest Folk Songs)
- 梁文福绕梁一世 (total of 5 CDs)

I've also found some of the songs on you-tube:
- 光阴的故事 （http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrtZUUPiEMM）
- 快乐天堂 （http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5M8tB_OA8M). I like this video best as the animation is very pretty and I love the singing by the children

For some of these songs that DD likes, she will even type out the lyrics and memorise the words. She will also ask me for the meanings of the words and song. Some of the songs that appeal to her are 光阴的故事， 日出， 请你告诉她 (from 雨季 musical) ，天冷就回来.

Thanks ! I will search for the CDs in the shops.

My girl likes Chinese New Year songs. Her Chinese teacher gave her a copy of the lyrics of some CNY songs, and she enjoyed copying the lyrics.

[tamarind]

tree nymph:

Hi Tam,
I thought you boy will like 永远永远爱你 series, cos its all dinosaurs! Personally, I like the series, cos I thought the stories are quite moving and the values behind is quite good. My kids love them too.

Thanks for the recommendation of the books, I'm getting some from dangdang. I also want to get some books with bigger words for my gal, else I may have to think up of some stories and write it for her liao. and I'm TOO busy to do it! Need to get her to practise reading more Chinese books else...

tree nymph,
My boy has many books about dinosaurs with better pictures than the 永远永远爱你 series, so I didn't expect him to like them. He likes these books purely because of the moving stories. It is so delightful to see a little boy so keen to read some books over and over gain. Thanks for recommending them !

You bought 可爱的鼠小弟 already ? Both my kids read this series of books many times over one year already, they still laugh when they read the books now.

[tamarind]

porcupine12trade:

Hi Tamarind,

How to get a refund from dangdang if we do not like the books? Thanks!

You can definitely return the books and get a refund if you don't like the books.

http://support.dangdang.com/helpcenter/api_cms/helpcenter/question_sort/2242/179422.shtml

But this is only worth doing in China. If you send back the books, the shipping cost may be more than the cost of the books.

Refund is only possible when you order direct.

If you order from a spree organizer in SMH, she will not do it for you. Honestly, I don't advise other people to join sprees in SMH because it can be quite risky. Take note that there have been many cases in which organizers collected money then disappear. Recently there is a case of one organizer giving her account to another person who is not authorized to organize sprees. But there are some honest ones around. You need to be careful.

[tamarind]

keltong:

I am waiting for the day he will pick up a chinese book and read himself, I think I will hug and kiss him to death :lol:

加油！I am sure it will happen !

I clap and cheer every time my P1 boy completes reading a Chinese picture book out loud to me That makes him very proud of himself, and he is motivated to read the next book.

[milo66]

Hi Tamarind, need some advise from you. Saw that you home school your boy in K2... how do u find it, is tat ok?


Our family will be relocating this June and my boy will be missing his K2 in Singapore. System in US seems so relax until I am so worried he is unable to cope with P1 here.

Have read through your blog and am doing some work with him everyday hoping to understand where is his weakness.

For Chinese, he is currently attending enrichment at JG and am doing 四五快读 with him at home. Thankfully so far so good. When I am over there, will conc on 四五快读, read and speak more chinese + self given ting xie be sufficient? Thanks for ur advise

[keltong]

porcupine12trade:

Good news, very encouraging progress :). I also use 基础汉字500, the most basic set on my K2, I cover the HYPY coz she will use them to read the words. So far, it is helping her to recog the very commonly used words, I hope she will finish the basic set soon and by time 45kuaidu arrive, I can use that on her.

It has actually been quite fun doing 基础汉字500 with my K1 boy. He is learning quite slowly but we are so proud of him when he remembers the word, I think with the repeat words he sees every day, it will really help him to remember. We cheer and clap and hugs when he manages to remember the word and he have this glee look on his face. Haha.

porcupine12trade:

But i find very time consuming to teach both Eng and Chinese. I have 3 kids, #1 is independent on eng, I need to push her harder for chinese. #2 is 85% independent on english, but she wants me to sit with her while she read. I took Tamarind advice to read with her, now she will read for me and i think it is really better this way, chinese will definitely b an effort for me to teach her. #3 doesnt know how to read eng/chinese, so i have to work on him too.... wah shiong!

I only have 2 and already a struggle so I can't imagine how you (and other parents) cope with 3 (or more!).

My P5 can read on his own, but still loves me to read for him. So I will read him Eng stories for bedtime followed by 哆啦A梦 in Chinese. For my K1 I will do 基础汉字500 every morning and night, and also a different story book that he chooses for bedtime story. And if I still have the energy I will read a short chinese story to him too. To think that I myself never cultivated the habit of reading, it has been a struggle, but a good one.

We all need to 加油！

[keltong]

MyBaby:

keltong:

I am waiting for the day he will pick up a chinese book and read himself, I think I will hug and kiss him to death :lol:

Dear keltong, I know how it feels. When my son who is dyslexic told me that books can be interesting and that he has ran out of books to read from our home library, the super elated mummy rushed out to buy books and searched the library for books that he wants to read!

Hang in there, slowly but steadily, it will pay off! Most important thing is- don't rush and give lots of encouragement.

Yes...I will hang in there...thanks!

[keltong]

tamarind:

keltong:

I am waiting for the day he will pick up a chinese book and read himself, I think I will hug and kiss him to death :lol:

加油！I am sure it will happen !

I clap and cheer every time my P1 boy completes reading a Chinese picture book out loud to me That makes him very proud of himself, and he is motivated to read the next book.

Thanks! You are my inspiration to start doing something serious with them instead of sitting around and complain. Thanks to you and all the encouraging words and inspiring stories of everyone here.

:thankyou:

[tamarind]

milo66:

Hi Tamarind, need some advise from you. Saw that you home school your boy in K2... how do u find it, is tat ok?


Our family will be relocating this June and my boy will be missing his K2 in Singapore. System in US seems so relax until I am so worried he is unable to cope with P1 here.

Have read through your blog and am doing some work with him everyday hoping to understand where is his weakness.

For Chinese, he is currently attending enrichment at JG and am doing 四五快读 with him at home. Thankfully so far so good. When I am over there, will conc on 四五快读, read and speak more chinese + self given ting xie be sufficient? Thanks for ur advise

Hi milo66,
I actually did not spend much time teaching my boy everyday since I am a full time working mum. I am very happy with his standards of English, and amazed by the amount of general knowledge that he has learned by reading on his own. His Chinese is not as good as his older sister, but already much better than the average kids his age.

Teaching English and Chinese at home is definitely possible even for working parents if you can get good resources.

If you can finish 四五快读 before he enters P1, and make sure that he remembers every word in the 6 books by constant revision, then he will definitely be more than well prepared for P1 Also, try to make him read at least 500 to 1000 words out loud from a good Chinese picture book every day, this is excellent for practicing oral skills. Make sure you get as many good Chinese story books as possible, dangdang.com ships worldwide.

After he has completed 四五快读, you should start to teach him hanyu pinyin. I don't have any resources for hanyu pinyin, will post here if I find any.

For writing, get these books to learn about the different names of 部首 and also practice writing :
https://www.popular.com.sg/images/product/book/70341.jpg\">
https://www.popular.com.sg/images/product/book/70344.jpg\">

Don't make him write the same words many times a day. Instead, teach him to write one or two simple sentences about what he has done every day.

[milo66]

tamarind:

milo66:

Hi Tamarind, need some advise from you. Saw that you home school your boy in K2... how do u find it, is tat ok?


Our family will be relocating this June and my boy will be missing his K2 in Singapore. System in US seems so relax until I am so worried he is unable to cope with P1 here.

Have read through your blog and am doing some work with him everyday hoping to understand where is his weakness.

For Chinese, he is currently attending enrichment at JG and am doing 四五快读 with him at home. Thankfully so far so good. When I am over there, will conc on 四五快读, read and speak more chinese + self given ting xie be sufficient? Thanks for ur advise

Hi milo66,
I actually did not spend much time teaching my boy everyday since I am a full time working mum. I am very happy with his standards of English, and amazed by the amount of general knowledge that he has learned by reading on his own. His Chinese is not as good as his older sister, but already much better than the average kids his age.

Teaching English and Chinese at home is definitely possible even for working parents if you can get good resources.

If you can finish 四五快读 before he enters P1, and make sure that he remembers every word in the 6 books by constant revision, then he will definitely be more than well prepared for P1 Also, try to make him read at least 500 to 1000 words out loud from a good Chinese picture book every day, this is excellent for practicing oral skills. Make sure you get as many good Chinese story books as possible, dangdang.com ships worldwide.

After he has completed 四五快读, you should start to teach him hanyu pinyin. I don't have any resources for hanyu pinyin, will post here if I find any.

For writing, get these books to learn about the different names of 部首 and also practice writing :
https://www.popular.com.sg/images/product/book/70341.jpg\">
https://www.popular.com.sg/images/product/book/70344.jpg\">

Don't make him write the same words many times a day. Instead, teach him to write one or two simple sentences about what he has done every day.

Thanks Tamarind for your recomendation. I hope I can succeed in teaching him Chinese myself. He will still attend school in US but seeing the no of holidays there, i doubt will be sufficient

Getting him to read aloud to me everyday as suggested in ur blog. He is in P&J Book 5a now and actually the school has completed the 3 letter phonics with him. Jus realise that he has no initiative in trying to sound the words himself! Have to depend on me to break up for me unless i prompt him to. So now wat i did was buy book of lower standard for him and hopefully will encourage him to read instead of ME reading to him. Am i doing the right thing?

Jus to check with you. When u make ur kids read aloud to you, wat happen if they meet some new words that they dunno? Mine refuse to try sounding by phonics so most of the time i will have to tell him else cannot go on liao. any suggestion?

Will continue to jiayou cos i believe no matter how good the school and system is, without the parents emphasizing at home, its also useless. Thanks!