When it comes to educating children, few efforts are too many, and one of the things that is most often emphasized today is learning English , since it is one of the most widely spoken and demanded languages in the world and It is shown as an excellent future opportunity for the little ones.
Many schools and nursery schools have already adopted a bilingual teaching style so that children can become familiar with a language that, in the long run, will be very advantageous and profitable for them to learn. But we can also adopt certain guidelines at home, aimed at finding the language as something else to learn and normalizing it without problems.
Simple activities to get closer to English
- Label objects and places that are known to them with their English names, such as table ; chair- chair ; window- window … .etc.
- Play homemade memory games and create flash cards with names and pictures in English. In this way, the little ones will normalize the words and learn vocabulary in both languages without difficulty.
- Help yourself with technology and look for educational applications that contain games or stories in your native language and in English.
- Find songs from children’s movies and cartoons that are familiar to them and put the songs in English so they can learn them in multiple languages and compare. With this activity they will develop their listening, comprehension and pronunciation skills.
- Use old magazines and create a collage with English words to later find their meaning. Creativity will be the key in this activity, since the little ones’ interest in collaborating and learning new things will depend on it.
- Look for famous phrases of fantastic characters like those from Toy Story (always characters that are familiar and attractive to them) and look for their meaning in English so that they are able to see the equivalence and feel the phrase as something known and fun. For example, Buzz Lightyear’s phrase from “To infinity and beyond”, change it to “To infinity… .and beyond!” and decorate her room with it.
All these activities must be carried out in the form of fun and entertaining games , since it is about them taking an interest in the language and taking it as something as natural as if it were their own. Do not turn these techniques into a routine of memorization or continuous study, because if so, you will fail in order to normalize the situation of learning a new language and that your children may be attracted to it.
