In the past few weeks I’ve picked up three new books on how to help children learn as I navigate this pandemic-homeschool season. And one thing they’ve all pointed out is this: the best way for kids to learn is if you make it fun. Which, like, of course! But when there’s homework to be done and worksheets in the world and tasks to accomplish… making learning fun just sometimes feels like a lot of effort.
I think that concept is especially true when teaching our kids Spanish here in the U.S. though! So I wanted to share three ways I’ve been really trying to make reading and writing in Spanish MORE FUN. Which is something I think we can all use a little more of in this terrible Year of Our Lord 2020.
1. GAMIFY. When I was prepping materials for BILINGUIFY!, I gave my graphic designer a list of favorite picture books in Spanish that I wanted to recommend to my students. She had the awesome idea to make that list into a book bingo instead! It’s MUCH more fun for my kids to fill out that bingo card as we read new books than to go through a list (bonus that it’s also a cool way to track what we’ve read). I also heard from parents in the class that it helped get their kids excited about reading these books even if they had previously been resistant to reading/being read to in Spanish. I’m trying to carry forward this concept of gamification into other parts of our learning now!
2. INVITE. This is one of my favorite things for helping my kindergartener practice writing in Spanish: I write her a little note & ask her to write back. Then I leave it somewhere for her to find. Then she writes me one! It’s such an easy way to make learning fun. At first I just did these on loose pieces of paper, but now we pass a little notebook back and forth and it’s so awesome to see our older little notes (like when she described her dream from the night before IN DETAIL, haha).
3. PRETEND. Sometimes there’s just no getting around a worksheet or something else your kid is not that excited about doing. So in those moments you gotta bust out the pretending: “Excuse me, I need this edited right away! I have to send it to press immediately! Can you please help?? Do you think you can edit this for me really quick? … Oh my gosh, I’m so glad you’re available.” BOOM, worksheet done. Don’t underestimate your kid’s enthusiasm for play!
I hope these ideas are helpful as we tackle a new year of schoolwork & trying to raise those bilingual babies. My goal is always to help my kids feel like both Spanish and English are a part of them. And I know the best way for that to happen is if speaking español is just… fun!