Raising A Bilingual Child

This is something I get asked about often so I thought I would do a round up of where we are now!

I'm not sure I would have lasted long in Japan if I hadn't come across the playgroup when Ebi-kun was a baby, he was about 6 weeks old the first time I went along, very much for me back then not him! 

We would meet weekly, usually on a Thursday at a room that we could hire in one of the members apartments. We would sing songs and play some games with the babies/toddlers then usually go for lunch outside (weather permitting). Sometimes we'd meet up at a jidokan - the city play centre or at the park and we would have regular events at the weekends.

The kids became firm friends and even though they don't see each other that often you would never know.

All our kids in the group are mixed race and bilingual, in some cases trilingual and the main purpose of the group was to have an English speaking environment for the kids to hang out in. We made it a rule that only English would be spoken, that was the adults too, which works most of the time. Now the kids are older, Japanese tends to be their play language or they switch back and forth but I do think that having the playgroup structure in place when they were little made a huge difference.

It's hard to believe that most of these kids have been friends since they were babies. Unfortunately now they are older, we don't get to catch up as often but it's great that as soon as they do see each other, they are off having fun as if it were only yesterday they were hanging out.

As we live in an area with very few foreigners we also felt it was important for Ebi-kun to have friends that were mixed race like himself so that he never felt weird or strange because he doesn't "fit in" with the local kids. He is different and that's something I want him to be proud of, not ashamed of. 

Apart from the bullying incidents in the first grade, he hasn't had any issues, he has found his place and his friends now think it's "cool" that he is bilingual. He doesn't get embarrassed about his English and knows that he can use it as a secret language sometimes!

Having a fully bilingual child isn't an easy job and there is zero luck involved. It requires the parents to be dedicated and consistent in what they believe to be the best way forward. For us, that means using English as the family language and 95% of the time only English in the house.

We try to watch the TV and films in English, we listen to English podcasts and music and chat with friends and family back home when ever possible. 

Every morning Ebi-kun reads a chapter of his book to me and at night I read to him before bed, we have just started the next epic journey... Lord Of The Rings. I know some people will think that at 11 he is too old to be read to be I think it gives us a great connection. Sometimes it is hard to find something in common to talk about, books bridge that gap. And there is the plus that we often watch the film version afterwards and dissect and compare it to the book.

Writing is the one thing that we need to keep on top of, the rest falls into place but after a full day at school the last thing he wants to do is sit down and do a load of writing.

I don't believe in workbooks or drill sheets so I try to make the writing fun, like the Dr Who story sheets and Mini Writing Books on topics that he is currently interested in. I'll do a separate post on what he is up to at the moment.

Trips back to the UK are important too, having a grasp on the language isn't enough to be bilingual, the culture plays a part too and the best way to absorb the culture of a country is to be there. So although I joke about getting out of this hot sweaty hell hole in the summer, it isn't just for my armpits benefit, I want Ebi-kun to absorb as much of his heritage as possible.

So yes, he has missed the summer fireworks and festivals in Japan and sometimes we have missed a Japanese event because a playgroup event takes priority - Halloween, Easter and Christmas parties are the main get togethers these days. But I feel that those sacrifices are worth it and that being bilingual and carrying both cultures with him are well worth it.

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A day to remember - reunion of old friends

As  you know, I'm part of a bilingual playgroup and Ebi-kun joined when he was just 6 weeks old, he has grown up with these kids and it's great that when ever we get together they just get on with it and go and play. There are never any fights or arguments, they all get on great!

This was a picture I took of them a few year ago, they all look so cute and little!

And here they are now, we had one kids missing as he is off in Portugal playing football for Urawa Reds Jrs and we had an extra couple in this time (the boys in red). Ebi-kun really hit it off with the older of the brothers and wanted to play with him again but sadly they are visiting from the States and were heading off to Osaka. We are going to see about setting them up on skype!

Of course we couldn't let all the kids have all the fun!



As the kids alternated from playing outside then coming in to cool off, the dads played music...

Ate cheese!

By using a blow torch on it!

We did let the kids eat too, we're not that mean, although I think most of them missed out on the blow torch cheese! Too bad!

And yes, there were cocktails, lots of cocktails. Although I stuck to the wine, the next day was really hot and not the best weather to recover from a hangover!

So yes, a good day was had by all, the kids were all exhausted and the adults (most of them) drunk!

Looking for ward to the next event!

Using Songs For Poetry Inspiration

Ebi-kun and I decided to dissect some song lyrics, one of his favourite songs is Beautiful Day by The Levellers (who he got to see live back in the summer).

The song isn't really about lovely sunshine and skipping through meadows with the wind in your hair... or whatever. It's actually very political so it turned out to be a very interesting lesson.

We started by going through the lyrics a few times and then picking out a few key sections. We talked about what each bit meant, was it literal or did it have a hidden meaning? Why did they use the 5th of November as the date in the song? Was it significant or did it just sound good?

It was interesting to listen to Ebi-kuns ideas and point of view about it all. 

I had to finish up to get dinner started but Ebi-kun felt inspired to write a poem, not connected to the song at all, just how he felt at the time...

On A New Kick…

Ebi-kun has got a new 'thing' with his writing. He started off with Mozart a couple of weeks ago and since then he has done Da Vinci, Sea Animals, Hybrid Cars and the latest being Andy Warhol. 

He starts off by doing a brain storm about the subject matter, using books or the Internet to find out the information he needs and makes notes as he goes along…

Then he uses the information to write a 'story' about the subject. This is working really well at the moment, as he gets to choose what to write about, he is using his research and reading skills and then writing skills. After he has finished I get to check he work, I don't correct anything, instead I will tell him I can find 3 spelling mistakes and 1 grammar error or whatever, and challenge hint o find them. Sometimes he does other times he doesn't. This helps me understand what is just a silly mistake and what he is really struggling with. Capital letters at the start of a sentence is one that he trips up on all the time, so I get hint o check and correct those before I even look at it.

He has a lined notebook with 22 lines per page and he generally fills a page with each subject, I hope as he continues he will start to write more but for now, I am happy for him to write as much as he needs to.

As long as he is enjoying doing it, that is the most important thing for me and I'm sure it will be fun looking back at his stories in a few years time!

Top Tip: If your child gets through paper like there's no tomorrow - buy them notebooks and sketch pads. Seriously, the boy draws and writes all the time and we would end up with realms and realms of bits of paper. Moving him onto notepads and sketch books has made a huge difference plus now I don't worry about throwing out that all important scrap of paper!

Bilingual Playgroup Picnic

April 1st was a full on day for me, with the registration for Clear The Clutter closing and all the stuff that needs to be done on the back end for that and the we had a picnic planned with the bilingual playgroup so I needed to make a bento too and leave the house in time to catch the 10am train.

I did manage a quick April fools joke on Ebi-kun…I screamed like crazy and shouted there was a mouse in the washing machine…totally had him :) Need to be more prepared next year!

Turned out to be a beautiful day for the picnic, the cherry blossoms were perfect! We managed to find a lovely spot under the trees, the kids played well and us moms had a good chat and catch up.

Obligatory hanami shot…

Ebi-kun found his own spot to enjoy the view…

It's much harder now to meet up now the kids are in school, which is a real shame, I miss the regular weekly meetings, as much for my sanity as for the education side of things.

A free resource to build family connections and strengthen language skills in kids.

I am talking Skype or not specifically Skype but any video calls, such a mac's version or google hangouts. We Skype all the time and it has a made a HUGE difference for the relationships with Ebi-kun and family back in the UK. Google hangouts are much more fun and you can have up to 10 friends on at once BUT you need to have a high speed internet connection for it to work well.

We don't make it back to the UK that often and then when we do it is often just a day or two at most where we get to spend time with extended family. You wouldn't think that if you saw the cousins together, there is no shyness or awkward moments - they get straight in there.

When you first introduce video calls, it can often be quite awkward, no one knows what to say or how to interact. Here are a few tips which helped us to get the ball rolling as it were...

Prompts - Have an adult at each end with some questions to prompt the kids with, parents often know if there is some common ground that you can connect the kids with. M-chan on the picture above is a big Hello Kitty fan and we are in Japan, home of the mouthless cat so Ebi-kun was telling her some useless kitty facts. Her brother is Lego mad so the boys tend to talk about that and show off their different Lego models. 

Singing - When M-chan was younger the only interaction we got out of her were songs, she wouldn't talk but was happy to sing, so we would sing songs together or she would teach Ebi-kun 'playground alternatives' to the songs he knew.

Games - guessing games are fun, charades or similar.

Quizzes - these could be pre-prepared, each child makes up 10 questions to ask the other one.

Show & tell - or show and brag as it seems to be with the Lego boys! We have friends in the US and when we chatted to them, the boys got super excited when they discovered they all liked Ninjago.

Once they have got going, you can step back and leave them to it. 

One of the issues that arises when raising a bilingual/bicultural child is that, they don't always know the child language or child appropriate way of saying things. Purely because (in our case) most of his English is absorbed from adults. 

The other thing is the introduction to different accents. The majority of our English speaking friends here, don't have a very strong local dialect but of course, back home the dialect changes every 20 miles or so. It is great for Ebi-kun to interact with friends and family back home so that he can get used to hearing all these different accents. M-chan lives in Wigan and has the sort of accent which wouldn't be out of place on a building site! Her older brother has a very mixed up accent because they moved around a lot when he was younger, so although he sometimes struggles with what M-chan is saying, it is good for them to communicate.

Now, over to you... do use Skype or similar and do your kids? Do you have a games or activity that works really well? Please share in the comments section below.

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Friends...

We are lucky, I met H when I was pregnant with Ebi-kun, she was equally as round and uncomfortable as she was pregnant with her second, the boys were due about the same time but Ebi-kun was a week early and H-kun hung around for a couple of weeks so there is about 3 weeks between them. They came over to play on Wednesday and the weather was lovely so I tried out the new oven and made pizza, the kids ate theirs outside.

Then yesterday we had a playgroup play date. I recently moved the group from Yahoo over to Facebook and in doing that we have found ourselves some new members, yesterday we met three new families along with some of the old ones. The kids have all grown up together so there is no awkwardness when they meet, they just get straight into it and off to play. We basically have two rules with the playgroup, the first is that all the members are raising their children to be bilingual Japanese/English and that when we meet as a group only English is used.

In a country where those who are different stick out like a sore thumb, it is great for the kids to know that they are not weird or anything and that there are other 'hafu' (mixed race) kids like themselves and it is also good for them to have somewhere to use English, it is funny how they automatically use English and there is a sometimes a slip into Japanese but it is good to that they are comfortable using both languages.

If you happen to be in the Saitama area, are raising bilingual children and want to join the group, you can find us over here.