A question for mums of bilingual babies and teachers

[skatty]

Hi My DD is only 8 months at the mo' but I want to be prepared! We live in Denmark but I am from the UK, we have an english speaking home and DD will go to danish childcare and school etc. I know she will learn to speak english first and then will be educated in danish but I really want to make sure she can read and write in english too. In Denmark children stay in kindergarten until 6 or 7 and then only do limited schooling hours which is fine (they put a great emphasis on learning through play and socialisation in the early years and they catch up easily) so I would like to teach DD to read at home but am not surehow to go about it. Are there any books that you recommend? I heard of one called "teach you baby to read" but I think it's probably better to wait until she is ready to learn her letters and try to pronounce things through sound (IYKWIM).

Any advice would be greatly appreciated or any experiences you have had that you can tell me about 

[linfran]

No experience myself but my cousin is from N Ireland (like me!) and her dh is Japanese.  From the time the kids could understand, they each spoke to the children in their own language so the kids got used to both.  They also had storybooks in each language so they got used to the entirely different letters.

Their eldest child is about to start school (they live in South Korea at the moment so that's another language!) so they will get proper reading and writing books quite soon.

[Erin M]

For now, make sure you're reading to her (well, as much as you can, it gets kind of tricky at this age when all they want to do is grab the book and eat it).  Learning to read at this age is more about familiarity with books and print and the sounds of language (the idea that you start at the beginning of a book and go to the end, read left to right, top to bottom, etc).  Also, it is good for children to hear the general rhythm and pattern of language.  As she gets older, you can work on rhyming words, breaking words into sounds, putting sounds together to make words, things like that.   

According to "the research" you can teach some children to read as early as 3 or 4, many aren't ready until 5 or 6.  Prior to that, it's all about readiness, especially the sounds that letters make.  Knowing the sounds that letters make is actually the most important predictor in later reading success.  But definitely make it fun, use things like alphabet blocks, fun stories, things like that. 

I'm not sure about any books specifically, I've got a couple of degrees in education with a whole lot of focus on reading, so that's where my knowledge comes from, but I haven't looked for a good book specifically for teaching at home.  I'm sure if you read the homeschooling thread, I know they've got books that they use with their LOs that seem to work well.

[skatty]

Hi and thanks for the tips, I found some links to some great websites on the home school thread. I do lead by example and will read books while she plays independantly and she has a basket full of books she like to take out and look at the pics and have a chew on so I guess we are doing as we should for now. I learnt to read at 4 so hopefully she will inherit my bookworm gene 

[Ryan&HollysMom]

what if, when the time comes, you get some activity (reading, math, puzzles, vocabulary) books from the UK and did those with her?
i will face the same issue, being german and living in canada. i never really thought about teaching him spelling and such, just kinda assumed he'd get it if i just keep speaking and reading in german.
they pick up a lot from that, so read as much as you can, i'd say.