Teaching your child to read and write English

[MaryP0p1]

Not sure if this is the right board but hear go.

When we arrive in Italy my dd could already read and write so no porblem there.

However DS is only 4 and can't and he will learn the Italian alphabet and to read and write in Italian but not until 6. I therefore need to do it, he won't learn to read and write English until 9 minimum. I don't want to confuse and wondered if anyone else has had or has this situation and what they did, what worked and what didn't. Advice wanted.

Thanks

I'd say start familiarising him with the letters... they look the same in English and Italian

Maybe enrole some neigbours with kids for help?

Does your ds speak Italian or only English?

I'm in the UK but German so I speak German with my kids and dh English. And dd is learning letters etc. in nursery in English (obviously ). When I use the German alphabet it throws her a little but she then simply asks me 'what does it look like?'... I then try to sound it out but she is the visual type and I write it down for her on a separate piece of paper.

Not much help I know but ... bump! :)

ds speaks both, prefers english to Italian but that is rapidly changing. He dreams and reverts to Italian when not really thinking about what he saying.

Thats basically what I've been doing. in Italy children get a lot of homework. My 8 year old gets about 1hr a day. when she's doind her homework I have been doing pre reading writing skills with him, I.e. reading, writing, puzzles.

I hope that will work and not confuse him.

I haven't tried it myself as DS1 is just 2.5 yo. I look at the letters with him and teach them to him in French. My theory is that it is not different that learning about a circle or a square.
For reading, it seems that it is better to leave 2 years in between the time the chils is learning to read in one langage and another. Other wise it can confuse them. So in your case, teaching to read in English now (Do you think he would be ready for it ?) or wait until he is 8yo. That's sounds a long way away isn't it ?

Good luck anyway !

I taught my kids the english alphabet and did loads of the reception style stuff from UK as we live in germany and when they started real school I stopped to let them get into the german way of doing it and now after a year they are starting to do the things from UK class 1 and 2 with me at home and trying to read and they ask if they aren't sure with words with double ee or oo and they picked it up really quickly. I would say to start now but stop and don't do any when the 1st year starts untill they are away with reading and writing initalian so they don't get confused.

When we lived in Italy DS was 3 and went to 'asilo' there where he learnt the Italian alphabet and was beginning to read and write in Italian when we left (he was 5 1/2). It was only at home that he ever heard any English and only from me (DH speaks Portuguese) but we got him lots of 'learning' games and adapted them to English and also used a lot of 'learning' books which I always bought in the UK when I visited - the star books and curly cat exercise books were especially good. We found that actually he was far more advanced in English that the children of equivalent age in the UK and had no problem at all with the Italian. We also had some videos in English and ordinary story books. TBH we had no problems at all and just did the English in parallel at home. Just be sure that he learns the full English alphabet because the Italian one has some letters missing!

Just got back from a trip to the UK. I bought some first reading books and some letter games, I also have some anyway. Over the summer I do a little bit with him. I think he's ready to start now as he's showing a lot of intereste in both reading and writing. I think by the time they really start with him (about 2 years) he should be quite certain of the english alphabet and therefore won't be too confused.