There are a lot of things to love about September: cooler weather, sending the kids back to school (well, maybe not SENDING them to school this year but you know what I mean), bouquets of newly sharpened pencils…
And one thing that I ESPECIALLY love about September is celebrating 1) Mexican Independence Day, which we do every single year and 2) the start of Hispanic Heritage Month! For me, both are opportunities to make sure my little Latinitas are strongly rooted in their heritage. And while you never have to wait for an annual event to take pride in your cultural background, I really like that as a nation we collectively take a few weeks to celebrate the histories, cultures and contributions of Americans with Latin American backgrounds (and there are so many!).
I’ve been thinking about what it means for Latinx children to celebrate their heritage as we approach Hispanic Heritage Month. I thought I would share what my June BILINGUIFY! students wrote about why it’s important for them to raise kids who connect to both culture and language. Here are some of my very favorite things they wrote:
“My daughter will be the definition of being an immigrant in this country. She will be a part of two different cultures and be fluent in two beautiful, rich and powerful languages: English and Spanish.”
“I want my girls to identify as strong, Latina women, and I think being bilingual will help them feel more connected to the culture.”
“I thought I just wanted my girls to connect to their heritage, family, have advantages later in life, etc. But once I started digging, I realized I wanted my daughters to get to know me. Speaking and maintaining my Spanish is an integral part of who I am. I want them to know my story. Parenting is really hard and adding Spanish to my plate feels even harder. But now I feel like I have a greater reason for doing all of this.”
Can you relate to any of these? I definitely can!
I thought I’d share a few virtual options for celebrating a virtual Hispanic Heritage Month at home this year since most in-person events will probably be canceled:
- The Smithsonian Latino Center (SLC). The SLC has tons of online resources, including the Smithsonian Latino Virtual Museum. Here are their family & public programs, and they also have a teacher’s toolkit with bilingual learning activities for pre-K-16 that you can find here. So cool!
- Google Arts & Culture: Latino Cultures in the U.S. The Google Arts & Culture online collection has things in lots of different categories, including film, sports, dance, music, tradition, and style. And (no surprise from Google), it’s user-friendly and very easy to navigate.
- Grupo de Artistas LatinoAmericanos (GALA) Hispanic Theatre. The GALA Hispanic Theatre in Washington, D.C., recently launched a new digital strategy, GALA En Familia, so that we all can engage with Hispanic and Latinx performing arts from home. On their sites you can see dance performances, monologues, reading, lectures y más. All the videos are in Spanish (with options for subtitles) so that’s great for a little extra Spanish exposure.
Whether you’re already speaking Spanish at home with the kids & want to make sure you keep momentum, or you want to raise bilingual kids but haven’t quite nailed your strategy yet, this is a great month to “echarle ganas!” Hispanic Heritage Month provides so many opportunities to connect with our Latinx heritage and this year especially, I’ll take any excuse for a celebration I can get.
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P.S. I can’t tell you how happy it makes me to contribute even in a small way to helping parents tap into the joy of raising kids who are rooted in their heritage and language. Soooo happy! So I’m thrilled to say that in honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, I’m opening up BILINGUIFY! one last time until 2021!
If you’re ready to feel inspired and creative about bilingual parenting, I hope you’ll join us. No matter where you are in your bilingual parenting, you belong. Promise! I’ll open the program on September 17th & we start on September 28th so mark your calendar if you want in!