MadridBear

Hi guys

My child is at the local School in 4 year old class, he has started bringing homework in Spanish and knows all the letters and can write simple words and more complex words with his mothers help.

I would like to start to introduce English reading and writing to him and was wondering if anyone else does this themselves without hiring a private teacher?

I have looked at finding a proper uk home teaching course for the base of the lessons, but I am not having much success finding cheap or free lesson plans and the like.

Any help appreciated.

Thanks

lynnxa

lots of people do this themselves, but personally if you are planning to stay here I would recommend (from a teacher's point of view) leaving anything formal until your child is reading well & fairly independently - that's not to say don't read english-language books and magazines with him - but not formal lessons

my youger dd was 5 when she started in Spanish school, & my older one nearly 9

the younger one could read a little in English, but we decided to let that slide until she was reading as well as a spanish kid in Spanish - when we (& her teachers) were happy that she was, (age about 7) we started reading English language books with her & I started doing worksheets with her

before that we had of course bought her magazines & so on in english, so she was exposed to written english - but we didn't make a big deal out of it

we took this decision because we needed her to be completely fluent in the language of her education - castellano - and they also have to learn valenciano in our area

we did this ('english lessons') for maybe a year until she was reading fluently & independently - she now reads to her age level & her spelling is no better or worse than any of the English school educated kids I know

I do periodically listen to her read in English, and she also does english (as a second language) at school - and she knows more about english grammar than many UK educated 16 year olds

MadridBear

Thanks for the advice.

My child is only learning Castellano as we live in Madrid.
So it is only Castellano and English he would be learning.
We will be staying here and his mother is Spanish.

I understand what you are saying and take the advice onboard.
Formal lessons might be a bit much at his age but he seems to be doing well in Spanish for his age.
It might not sound like much but he managed to write Lobo for himself with his homework yesterday just by thinking about the word......

I would like to start some for of English classes with him.
I would also like to know what others think....

I fear that he may get confused and fall back with his Spanish if I push too much.
I also fear that he falls behind in English and doesn't take to it later...
And another fear is that he stops having fun when we go home (which averages about 6 weeks a year) because he can't keep up with his cousin (the same age) and other kids....

Again, many thanks for taking the time to reply and I would be very grateful to have the feelings of a few other ex-pats!

Cheers

lynnxa

yes, that's my point - the rules of written english are so very different to those of spanish!!

keep talking to him in english, keep him exposed to written english, maybe just by having a story from an english language book every night & having him'read along' - but don't make a big deal out of it!!


and most of all don't worry!!!

even just by exposing him to written english you will be amazed at how much he will pick up!!

he might not read english as fluently as his english cousin - but I bet his cousin can't read any spanish at all - so your son is already at an advantage

fionamw

From a professional's point of view (and of course she's a mum too!) Lynn's advice is worth listening to - I'll add my two penn'orth
My son, now just 9, started school in Spain at the age of rising 5 having attended nursery in the UK for about two years but with no formal English education
He picked up Spanish quickly and despite being in an International school is still fine, having scored higher than Spanish classmates in lengua in a recent test!
However to English - what we did was buy a load of Oxford Reading Tree books, initially for the first few levels; they're far from cheap but they're a very trusted scheme and the kids generally seem to enjoy them (I knew them from my days as a classroom assistant in the UK)
9yo was about 6months behind his English peers in his reading age before starting the Brit system here, judging from a conversation with one of the staff at Oxford University Press - so I'm guessing with some parental input & encouragement, a child stands a greater than evens chance of doing ok!
One detail - don't know what Lynn would say - I would stress trying to get your child to know BOTH alphabets clearly distinguishing one from the other; that's about the only point ours still has confusion on - I or E, J or G, Y or I or LL, etc (by sound, that is, because Spanish is sooooo much more logically phonetic than English!)

lynnxa

yes the Oxford Reading Tree books are brilliant!!

as far as the alphabet is concerned I've never really worried too much about that - the names of the letters in Spanish are very similar to the phonetic sounds used in most English schools now

I used to do English with an 8 yr old child who had obviously been at English school in the UK for a few years before he started here at Spanish school - his mum didn't want him to forget his English in case they returned (they did after about 9 months...........) - I was amazed & horrified that he didn't know the names of the letters - just the sounds

twistedmelon

Kids are absolute sponges, it's only us dumbass parents who worry.
Having been in this situation a few times I clearly remember being amazed that my two youngest just picked up an english book one day and just started reading it.
Yes they do need some help but not over the top.
Strangely one of the things I've noticed is that they replace ing with ed on the end of words a lot. This is something my english speaking spanish friends do, which I understand but why my kids do it is a mystery and no amount of correction seems to sink in.

JLFS

I agree with your opening line.........oh wait a minute, I thought you meant "spongers".

The older they get the more they sponge.

angiescarr

Couldn't agree more. Teaching your children should feel informal and fun to them. Bedtime stories, games in English etc etc. And I'd go further than lynnxa . They'll learn more about English grammar and spelling from a Spanish school than MOST English pupils. Just look at the qualitry of some of the posts on this forum!

tednsharon

You can buy Oxford Reading Tree "read at home" books in packs of 10/12 really cheaply from internet book stores such as The Book Club or Red House. I've bought just about all of them over the years. Not sure about delivery to Spain though - you might have to get someone to bring them over for you!
Sharon

fionamw

Ours manages to muddle the sounds: I in Spanish and E in English therefore when spelling out loud in English he doesn't know which one to say even though he actually KNOWS the correct spelling (of whatever, and usually!!!!)

I meant not the read at homes, but the whole scheme (or at least a selection thereof) as per school use - as I said, expensive but good

lynnxa

oh yes!!

in our house you will sometimes hear 'do you mean spanish or english EE? if we spell using the letter names

so we just spell phonetically...............like the english schools....