homework with primary age children - your language or school language?

[mousymouse]

ds has just started reception.
I have a disagreement with dh.
when I do the homework with ds I use the minority language, the language we speak at home. dh thinks we should make the homework in the 'school language'...

how do you do that? I think it is important to use our language so that he can advance in our language as well with all the numbers and letters...

belgo - talking about homework in the minority language is recommended best practice; it is neither sufficient nor indispensable to make children properly bilingual, but it does apparently help children with comprehension and language development to talk about their day's school work in their other language.

I think I probably have done what Bonsoir describes, taking some time to speak about educational things in the minority language, but it doesn't have to be at the precise moment when they are revising for a test/trying to write their essay, it can be fitted in at a later stage.

However, there are things dcs (and I) can only do in one language- sail a boat for instance- but those are things that most of their peers can't do in any language - so it hardly makes them less than fully bilingual.

But basic concepts that everybody needs to know I have tried to introduce in both languages.

Well I have 2 fully bilingual children, 1 children who is practically bilingual, lacks a bit in French since he changed schooling language at age 10. The younger ones receive no formal education in English at all, yet the 9 year old is able to write like you'd expect a 8 year old to write and reading is the same level in both languages. 6 year old has gone from nil reading in French to reading as well after 1 month at school as I bet a child educated in they UK would progress in a whole school year in English, at home she can read level 4 ORT with ease - have not tried higher as I don't have any books at home at a higher level, yet she does this without me ever teaching her to read. So I cannot agree that my children are not fully bilingual because I am not educating or home educating them in English.

Anyway,I tend not to help the children with their homework, as it's been given to them and not me, the children do it in French when on their own, when they do need a little extra help, I'll use whatever language is needed so that they can work it out for themselves, I suppose mostly I use French, but not because I think it is the better way, simply because it's the language I am thinking in when reading their homework.

Belgo/Bonsoir - the point I was trying to make when using the timetable example (and the point dd's school makes about language submersion) is that I think it is preferable when you are first learning something to do it in the hwk language, then you can start switching once it is fully established. (That's what our school advises anyway.)

Added complication with us is that dd is being submerged in Flemish and French at same time (Flemish for geography, history, lang, lit and French for maths, religion, cooking, gym, lang, lit) and the school insists on rigorous separation between the two, so we have to be quite careful about how all of this is approached.

Btw, as Natation says, dd has virtually taught herself to read in English without much input from us, and her level of reading is as high as her cousins of a similar age in UK. Her English spelling could do with some work though but is improving!

Bonsoir - agree about slave-driver point!

substantiallycompromised - that's exactly why I haven't taught my dds to read in english. Now that dd1's reading in flemish is very good, I have started to encourage her to try and read in english and I have found that she doesn't need much help at all reading in english.

Belgo yes, the compatibility between the two languages is v. helpful I think.

(English to French and back again much harder!)

Yes English spelling for the 9 year old is not so good compared to her ability to read English, whereas her Dutch spelling which is her 2nd school language is usually pretty good, French which is her 1st school language is at the highest level. So it does indicate that formal education of a language makes a difference to spelling, but just because our 9 year old is not so good at spelling in English doesn't mean she isn't fully bilingual. It would be nice for our children to have a bit of formal education in English too, but the only place I know which does this in Brussels charges 30 euro an hour, I'm too tight-fisted to pay that much.

Natation crikey, that is rather steep!

Perhaps we should all get together to form an "English club"?

Having said that, I sort of suggested this among various friends last year and they were initially enthusiastic but everyone's dc were so busy on Wednesday afternoons and at weekends that it was virtually impossible to find a time to suit everyone. Something to think about nonetheless ...

[Sorry mousymouse btw - didn't mean to hi-jack thread!]

Re: compatibility between the two languages - we do the times tables in both Mandarin and English. After all we have to count the number of eggs in twos in the supermarket and we can't possibly do that in English.

As for other homework we talk about it in Mandarin. That includes the reading book, literacy, project and whatever else they throw at us. Then somehow or other it all gets written down in English. But that has nothing to do with me. I am raising translators.

"Stop daydreaming" is of course in Mandarin.

op here
we have now started to do the homework in english but talking about it in our language. no times tables as yet...

flemish and english aren't very compatible for maths because of the way we say numbers, the 'wrong' way round:
eg drie-en-twintig is literally three and twenty instead of twenty-three.

Find this thread very interesting because my dd has just started reception and I am struggling with wanting her to progress in English and get the terminology right eg what she is supposed to do, but would normally only speak to her in our minority/home language. Have tried to get dh involved (English) to at least do her reading with her but he's not always back in time. I'll leave learning to read the minority language until she's mastered English. She's only 4, so would not normally learn to read German until she's at least 6 anyway.

I speak German to my DCs, that's it. When DS (Y2) reads his reading book we discuss it in German and he does that automatically. Until not too long ago DS turned his numbers around, but I think we are there now, he got used to it. I don't translate anything though as there is nothing to translate and when they are older I assume that they will do homework independently.

I agree with 'home educating' as I am always mindful to expand their language skills by giving them a wide range of experiences, talk, read and watch films about it (love YouTube, there seem to be documentaries about everything).