Parents! Give yourselves a break!
Parents! We need to give ourselves a break!
You know, I think we are way too hard on ourselves!
And this is especially true when it comes to language learning.
I have been speaking to quite a few people lately who are putting so much pressure on themselves and feeling like they are failing themselves and their kids, especially when it comes to teaching their children, their own heritage language, their language of origin, the language that they, the parents themselves grew up speaking in their own family home.
Does this sound like something that you might be also feeling?
Because when I’ve been talking to these, these friends and clients that I’ve been chatting to recently, I get the feeling that in the minds of us as parents, there’s the either the old or the nothing camp.
And I just wanted to jump on and talk to you all about the fact that there isn’t a zero to 100 in language learning, and nothing in between! All the in between stuff is super important. Just as fun, just as valid and just as valuable.
So what I wanted to say was that, even if you feel like you’re at zero, don’t beat yourself up!
You are doing the best you can with your kids, whatever amount of language they are taking on board, they are still taking it on board.
So even if you know they can say ‘Hello’ ‘Goodbye’ in your heritage language, that is still better than nothing. So pat yourself on the back and say job well done. At least it’s something and know that you know, if you want to you can work towards there being more language as part of their lives as they continue to grow up and show an interest in your heritage language as well.
If you’re thinking about taking that next step, and helping your kids with some digital resources for learning your heritage language, you might want to check out the free resource pack that I’ve put together.
It’s about eight pages long, and I’ve packed it full of YouTube channels, apps, programmes, anything that’s a digital resource and that is aimed at kids, that is really handy for language learning, many of them are free as well.
And I’ve included some of the language specific ones as well for Italian, Japanese, Chinese, Spanish, French, and German.
So you can download that resource for free HERE!
But what I really wanted to also ask was, when you’re thinking about, you know, your heritage language and what it means to you and what it means to your family as a whole. What kind of feelings does that bring up?
Are you anxious that you’re not passing on enough? Or are you content that you know, your kids are taking you on board enough of the language and culture? Or is it something that is just not part of your life at all and maybe one day it will be and maybe one day it won’t be in? And you’re totally cool with that?
I would love to know! So if you have any thoughts or anything you’d like to share with us, please pop it in the comments.
I love hearing from you!
And I wish you a wonderful language filled day!
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