Spanish Languages Varieties
03 Feb 2012 Leave a Comment
in Bilingual language learning, Uncategorized Tags: being bilingual, bilingual, bilingual resources, bilingual smart, diferences in languages, diferent languages, english, language education, language varieties, learning other language, learning spanish, spanish, spanish dialects, spanish varieties, usa languages
The Spanish-speaking world is very diverse. Spanish is the language of 19 separate countries and Puerto Rico. This means that there is no one standard dialect.
Another difference is the use of the word “vosotros” (you all, or you guys) as the informal form of “ustedes” in Spain.
Castilian sounds to Latin Americans much like British English sounds to U.S. residents.
The settlers and traders of southern Spain took this dialect with them to the Caribbean and other coastal areas. Today Caribbean or “Lowland” Spanish is characterized by its relative informality, its rapid pace, and the dropping of “s” sounds, allowing people to talk more quickly.
Wow! What do you think about the spanish languages varieties, now?
I have to say that the first time I came to USA, I was surprise about the spanish language varieties, I could not understand some words in Spanish, words from people from Costa Rica, Mexico, Guatemala, Puerto Rico, etc… I was surprise about the language varieties in my Spanish Native language, that I did not know about before. I had to learn differents words in spanish from different countries and I realized that some of them can had a bad meaning in some countries that I have to be careful about when speaking and viceversa.
Well, we will probably be expose to all those Spanish varieties if you live in United States, which is not bad at all and it will also help us to learn about other cultures as well. But remember it is all still Spanish and even some words are different you will be able to understand people when you learn Spanish.
Brain Research Confirms Developmental Stages for Language Learning
22 Jan 2012 Leave a Comment
in Uncategorized Tags: bilingual education, Bilingual language learning, bilingual schools, brain development, development stages, english language, language learning, learning a second, learning by listening, sensory enviroment, singing, spanish language, teaching your children languages, third language
Every healthy child is born with 100 billion brain cells, and each cell makes up to 20,000 connections. Whether these brain cells make connections or whether they die depends on if a child lives in an enriched environment (Buzan, 1984; Diamond, 1988; Ornstein, 1984, 1986).
What is an enriched environment? An enriched environment is one that provides plenty of sensory stimulation. Marian Diamond, a brain researcher at the University of California at Berkeley, has produced some of the world’s most intelligent rats. When she put the rats in cages filled with games, puzzles, mirrors, colors, and textures, they grew more brain tissue. When she put the rats into non-enriched cages, their brains shrank (Diamond, 1988).
How can you teach a second or third language to Young Children?
Infants can learn by listening, seeing, imitating, and practicing. So talk to them from the start. Tell them what you are doing. Introduce them to rhymes, songs, games, and counting in a second or third language. If you can’t speak another language yourself, get plenty of tapes. Consider boarding a foreign student. Most importantly, make learning fun!
Does a bilingual school help your children (ages 0 – 4) to be bilingual?
21 Jan 2012 Leave a Comment
in Bilingual language learning Tags: bilingual education, bilingual school, culture, english, immersion, immersion schools, language songs, languages, learning, learning other language, schools, smart kids, spanish
Language study for children is based on immersion. Kids sing songs and play games will help develop language comprehension skills. which is a natural way of learning language.
When children start learning languages at birth, they have the capacity to learn many languages at once without getting confused — because, as the brain develops, so too does the ability to separate one language from another.
Not only is learning a foreign language easier for children than it is for adults, but children who are exposed to other languages also do better in school, score higher on standardized tests, are better problem solvers and are more.
Language lessons would help children to appreciate their heritage as well, it is very important.
Some languages take more time to learn than others. My daughters will start learning French pretty soon. They are learning English and Spanish. I have been told that they can start learning French since they are very little, like any other language, through songs, games, etc. But they will start learning the grammar at age 8 or 9 around 6th grade, grammar is not easy as speaking in some languages, like Chinese, Hebrew, etc.
Recent studies indicate that the best time for a child to learn another language is in the first three to four years of life, since language learning is a natural process when children are young.
when people immerse themselves in a language like children, through play and exploration, they can learn a language quickly and easily. So the more we become child-like in language learning, the easier it becomes. Children growing up in a well-rounded environment learn to speak at least 2,000 basic words by the time they are four years old. Simply observing how babies learn to talk proves that they are natural learners. During the first six months of life, babies babble using 70 sounds that make up all the languages in the world. They will then learn to talk using only the sounds and words they pick up from their environment, most importantly from their parents and caregivers. A baby’s brain will then discard the ability to speak in languages he or she does not hear (Kotulak, 1996).
Unfortunately, most American schools teach foreign languages when students are in high school. Foreign language teaching should begin when children are in preschool—when teachers can maximize a child’s willingness and ability to learn. By the time a student reaches high school, the optimum learning period is lost.
So RUSH! give your children the gift of languages!
Does it help to take a child to visit other country to their language skills?
12 Jan 2012 2 Comments
in Uncategorized Tags: bilingual education, bilingual kids, children, culture, difficult languages, easy languages, english, grammar, helping you kids, improve your grammar, language and culture, languages skills, learning english, learning other language, learning spanish, multicultural enviroment, multilingual enviroment, other languages, relational, second laguage, spanish, speaking languages right, third language, traveling, visiting other countries
Taking the child to visit in a country where the parent’s language is the language of the environment is a great idea!, it is very helpful. If it is practical: taking the child to visit other country at early age 2 to 4 years old, help them a lot in their language skills and sending the child to spend time with grandparents at about the age of eleven or twelve is also a good idea, for many reasons.
This is probably a good place to remind parents and children that a multilingual environment is also a multicultural environment, and that it is very difficult if not impossible to separate language from culture. Without a context (culture) for the language, the child will have difficulty making sense of the meanings underlying the words.
My Old daughter (5 years old) is completely bilingual English, Spanish now, she values the languages. I took her to Peru when she was 2,3 and five. I did not think too much about how she learned Spanish, everything was natural for her, she will speak Spanish to me and turn around and speak English to her Dad with not problem, but..
My youngest one she is 4 now. She went to Peru when she was one year old and she hardly remember that of course. but I have being talking in Spanish to her since always!, and she never will answer me in Spanish, she spoke English to me and everybody, she did not want to speak Spanish At All.
When she was 3 almost four years old, I thought to myself Gezzz! can not believe she does not speak Spanish at all, after all this time I have being speaking Spanish to her and putting a lot of effort into that. She understood everything I say all the time, but she couldn’t make any complete sentence at all.
So I decide to take her to Peru plus need to get some things done there as well. I stayed for a month, it took her one week to start making whole sentences. ONE WEEK! could you believe that? by the second week she was making perfect sentences and speaking Spanish fluently.
I thought SHE DID NOT KNOW how to make sentences, she did not know how to speak Spanish. I have to confess I WAS WRONG!. She had everything in her little brain, everything!, it was just she did not want to, WHY? because she did not value the language, she did not think other kids in other countries speak Spanish as well, she did not think that was an important language to learn, she did not think she need the Spanish at all.
First week kids will say to her, I can not understand you, kids will speak Spanish to her and since she understood she will speak English back and kids will say again I can not understand you, can you speak in Spanish? that was it, she want the kids to understand her, she is very relational, she want to play with the kids, have a good time with them.
My oldest daughter she is very perfectionist, she cares more about speaking right and doing things right so I may say traveling to Peru helped her a lot but more it helped her in speaking it right, like conjugations like: Yo fui, el fue, nosotros fuimos, ustedes iran.. etc. which took her a lot of time to learn until we travel to Peru she learned in one month.
But to my younger daughter traveling to Peru helped her to understand that Spanish is important too, just as important as English, in fact she will have more friends if she speak more languages, she love having friends.
I will say if you are capable to travel to other country. DO IT, do not think it twice! GO! if you are not, well groups of kids who know the other language will help a lot!
Will my kids get confuse if they learn two languages at the same time or maybe a third language?
12 Jan 2012 Leave a Comment
in Uncategorized Tags: bilingual, bilingual day care, bilingual education, bilingual enviroment, bilingual teaching, children, children learning, difficulty in languages, english, gift of languages, grandparents languages, growing bilingual, languages, learning a language, learning more than one language, lids learning languages, mom language, mutlingual, native languages, parents languages, soanish, teaching, teaching children
It is entirely possible to teach an infant two or even three languages, and four is not unheard of.
In Europe, a great many toddlers learn four languages with little or no difficulty. Some countries in Europe offer children in the early grades of elementary school the possibility to learn to read and write in their ‘home’ language
The main requirements for this learning are: the parents speak only their mother-tongue to the child because the child will have some reason to learn the languages (motivation); and there is reinforcement of some kind for these languages, preferably outside the home. If the language of the environment is a third language, then the child will easily learn the third language once they start playing with neighborhood children. I t is very possible a child learn 2 or more languages at the same time.
Parents who want their children to learn their mother-tongue must realize that it will take work, beyond simply speaking their mother-tongue all the time to the child. Especially if the spouse speaks another language, which is the language of the environment, the parent speaking the ‘minority’ language will have to be sure that there is sufficient input for the child to learn and reinforce what has been learned. This means things like reading out loud (this should go on until the child learns to read on their own, and for a few years afterwards until the child says stop), singing to them and teaching them songs and nursery rhymes, showing video films in the parent’s language (radio is not as good as there are no visual clues), and having other adults or children talk to the child in this language (grandparents are invaluable here). Taking the child to visit in a country where the parent’s language is the language of the environment is also a good idea
There is considerable debate among linguists as to when the ‘language learning window’ closes, if it closes at all. However, there does seem to be an ‘optimal’ age for language learning, when the child’s mind is still open and flexible, and not cluttered with all sorts of other learning, not to mention the society’s views on which languages are ‘prestige’ languages, and which ones are regarded by the society as of little or no importance. The latter affects motivation: children will be admired for speaking a ‘prestige’ language, and teased and bullied for speaking a ‘non-prestige’ language. When the mind is being taught many many other things than language, there is less ‘processing space’ left for language learning.
At the moment, the ‘optimal’ time for learning a second language appears to be ‘at the same time as the first language‘, i.e. in the home beginning at birth to three years (providing the parents speak these two languages as their mother tongue). The next best time for learning a second, third, and even a fourth language, appears to be between the ages of two to seven years. A third period for learning a second language is from about ten to thirteen years of age, this is in cases when the second language is not the language of either the parents or the environment. This is the reason behind the push to introduce ‘foreign’ language learning into the curriculum of elementary schools, in the grade when the child is about ten-eleven years old.
Which language is easy to learn? Spanish or English?
07 Jan 2012 2 Comments
in Uncategorized Tags: bilingual, bilingual CDs, bilingual DVds, bilingual kids, bilingual music, CDs, children, difficult languages, DVDs, english, kids, languages, learning, learning a language, learning spanish, learning sppanish, spanish, statiscs, which language is easy to learn
Well, while no language is simple to learn, those that are more closely related to your native language are certainly going to be easier to learn than ones that are not.
Learning a completely different writing system can also be a big challenge, though that does not necessarily make a language more difficult. Grammar and sentence structure can often play a larger role in difficulty.
Since it’s impossible to say with certainty that there is a language that qualifies as “most difficult”, See these statistics and rankings provided by the the Foreign Service Institute (FSI) of the US Department of State which are intended for native English speakers. They say Spanish is one of the easiest language to learn… Wow! It is very important if we (parents) are Spanish Native Speakers, to teach our children Spanish as well so they can be bilingual..
Is that true? Can we learn languages through music?
20 Oct 2011 Leave a Comment
Learning Spanish through music will help you to learn faster. It is a fun way to learn.
Our brains are pattern seekers and they are attracted by rhyme & rhythm, movement and motion. The beat increases memory retention. (Fun way to learn…)
Music helps human beings not only remember but retain information for a longer time. You can learn anything easily at a higher speed if you have learned it through music. (Fun way to retain…)
We also learn by repetition, repeating the music tone and lyrics over and over help us to remember (Fun way to repeat..)
My husband learned Spanish at age 20 and he started with music, when I met him he knew Spanish fluently. He had all the Spanish CDs you can imagine. Yes, my favorite music CDs, he had them all, I did not need to buy more. In other hand I han a lot of CD’s in English, because I was trying to learn English as well. When we had our daughters, we realized that to maintain the Spanish at home was not easy as we thought, we needed to make an effort. Music was always a great way to hear Spanish at home and in the car, of course :.)), Songbooks worked great for us, we sing to them from the songbooks and our children really loved that, mommy and daddy singing.. yes, the best fun of all!
To learn Spanish through music, you have many options to start with. There are lot of materials: CDs, DVDs, Songbooks, etc. at the web, Search around and you will find a lot of materials to start learning Spanish.
Give your children the gift of learning other language!
“Dual program” Empieza en Kindergarden.
02 Aug 2011 Leave a Comment
Did you know? Tu sabias…
Que si no inscribes a tus niños empezando Kindergarden en el programa dual o de immersion (Dual Program or Immersion) la probablilidad que ingresen es muy poca. Por mi experiencia personal si estas interesado en que tus niños entren en un programa dual o de immersión, tienes que prepararte, encuentra el colegio que estas interesada, si tu niña tiene la edad de 5 años, está lista para Kindergarden, inscribela en varios colegios, es importante que asistas a las reuniones que se dan a principio de año. En muchos Estados, si no vas a esas reuniones es muy dificil que ingreses, por que todas las inscripciones y cupos se realizan en las reuniones. Luego las evaluan, si no alcanzas te colocan en lista de espera y las evaluan, de acuerdo al examen o preguntas que la profesora le realiza al alumno en Español e Ingles, depende como son los resultados, son colocados en la lista de espera, y pues bien si alguien se retira y tu estas en lista de espera tienes proababilidad de ingresar. Si no ingresan en Kindergarden, lo mismo sucede solo tienes la probabilidad que tus ninos ingresen si alguien se retira del colegio en el año que estas buscando, primer grado, segundo grado, etc.
Hay mas probabilidad de ingresar en Estados donde hay mas variedad y la gente se muda frecuentemente, en pequeños Estados es mas dificil por que la mayoria empieza en Kindergarden y permanecen en las clases hasta finalizar la secundaria.
En otros Paises donde existen programas duales como en Estados Unidos, también tienen el mismo procedimiento. En Peru por ejemplo programas duales Ingles-Español, Español – Alemán. Solo aceptan niños que empiezan en Inicial-Kindergarden. Y hay probabilidad en otros de ingresar en otros años, solo si algún alumno se retira.
Antes de Tomar una decisión averigua los programs duales o de immersion (Dual Program o Immersion Program) en tu Area/Estado/Pais
What are Dual and Immersion programs?
21 Jun 2011 Leave a Comment
From my experience both mean the same thing. I have friends with kids in both programs in diferents states and they are exactly the same. Per definition this is what I found.
In dual language education programs, students are taught literacy and academic content in English and a partner language. The goals of dual language are for students to develop high levels of language proficiency and literacy in both program languages, to demonstrate high levels of academic achievement, and to develop an appreciation for and an understanding of diverse cultures.
Two-way immersion (TWI) is a distinctive form of dual language education in which balanced numbers of native English speakers and native speakers of the partner language are integrated for instruction so that both groups of students serve in the role of language model and language learner at different times.
The structure of TWI programs varies, but they all provide at least 50% of instruction in the partner language at all grade levels beginning in pre-K, Kindergarten, or first grade and running at least five years (preferably through Grade 12).
