Here are 10 benefits of being bilingual:
Learning a language is a great way to keep your brain healthy and sharp.
Being bilingual can improve a person’s multitasking skills, attention control, problem solving and creativity as it promotes outside-the-box thinking. It can also help improve your memory – handy when shopping and remembering people’s names!
Studies have shown that bilingual children can outperform monolingual children in a number of subject areas. The effects of bilingualism can help improve a child’s educational development, cognitive functions, social skills, literacy, and emotional skills that have positive effects for many years to come.
Being bilingual exposes an individual to diverse customs, ideas, and perspectives from different cultures. Of course, you can still learn about other cultures without knowing a second language, but language learning really allows for a more immersive experience.
If you are or aspire to be a globetrotter, learning languages is a must! Traveling is way more fun and easier when there isn’t a language barrier, you can have a more immersive and authentic experience. You’ll be able to talk directly with the locals and make more friends along the way. Knowing what food to order without pointing at pictures and asking for directions when you get lost is also a bonus.
Speaking a second language can provide more job opportunities, depending on which languages you speak. Communication in the workplace is important, and more companies, especially those with international offices, are considering bilingualism a high priority. Being able to communicate with foreign clients or customers is considered a big advantage too.
Learning a second language helps you reflect on your own language and gain a better aptitude for languages in general. The improved understanding of how language works, coupled with the experience you have already gained, makes it all the easier to learn a third or fourth language. Just look at Queen Elizabeth I.
Raising your kids to be bilingual may help them acknowledge the importance of their culture and heritage, as well as develop a stronger personal identity. It’s a great gift to be able to pass on to your children especially if the home language is different to the language taught at school. If you have simply learned a second language, this knowledge can be a big help in encouraging your children to become bilingual too.
Recent studies reveal that bilingual people’s brains age more slowly and therefore they live longer and more satisfying lives. It is now widely recognized that being bilingual can delay neurological diseases like dementia and Alzheimer’s.
Speaking a second language opens up a whole new range of social opportunities and can enhance your social skills and confidence. Put simply, the more languages you understand, the more people you can converse with and the more meaningful those relationships can be. As you use your language skills to connect with a wider range people, you’ll give a boost to your confidence in social situations more generally.
Being bilingual should boost your confidence in the dating market. A Valentine’s Day survey done by language software providers Rocket Languages revealed that 79% of people think someone who is bilingual is more attractive while 77% perceive people as more intelligent if they speak another language. OK, not exactly scientific proof, but interesting nonetheless!
As a parent of two young kids myself I know that traveling with kids is not easy but I don’t agree that it’s not worth it. To the contrary, travel has many benefits for kids no matter what their age and messing up their routine once in a while can do a great deal of good for them.
Here are 8 reasons to travel with kids while they are young:
Many parents seem to think that to travel with kids is pointless because they are never going to remember or appreciate it while they are young. I can’t count the times I have heard, “Oh yes we would love to go one day, maybe when the kids are older as they won’t remember it now”. or “Oh I would, but she loves her routine and I don’t want to mess it up”.
As a parent of two young kids myself I know that travelling with kids is not easy but I don’t agree that it’s not worth it. To the contrary, travel has many benefits for kids no matter what their age and messing up their routine once in a while can do a great deal of good for them.
Here are 8 reasons to travel with kids while they are young:
1. Life shouldn’t stop once you have kids
Just because you have had kids, life doesn’t need to stop. Yes, once the little ones arrive we can settle down to a certain extent and enjoy family time. But why can’t that family time mean travelling together. If you loved to travel before, then you can still travel with kids, it just means that you travel differently. Different isn’t a bad thing either. Travelling with kids means slowing down, and seeing things through a little ones eyes. Children view the world much differently than we do.
2. It is cheaper to travel with kids while they are younger
Traveling when your kids are younger means a lap seat on the plane if they are under a certain age, or at least a discount once they need their own seat. Kids traveling on trains and buses usually receive similar concessions. When you are booking into a hotel they usually have family rooms with a porta cot, meaning most of the time the cost for accommodation is minimal for kids. Sight seeing is cheaper too as kids under a certain age are usually free, discounted or you can buy family tickets.
As kids get older, they need their own seat, their own bed, and have to then pay full price for attractions and activities while out and about. That’s when it gets expensive traveling with the family.
We have done a few long haul flights and it was so much cheaper when our kids were younger.
3. Schools are flexible in the younger years
In many schools it is difficult to get permission to take kids travelling during the term time. There are some schools which even forbid it and parents can get themselves into trouble. That’s why travelling with kids before they go to school is the easiest, as you don’t have to travel only during school holidays.
4. Travel means getting out of the usual routine
Home usually means routine. Getting out of your little home bubble and doing something different can mean a breath of fresh air for both you and your kids. Get out of the routine, explore something or somewhere new. You never know what you will learn from your kids.
5. Travel helps kids explore differences
Visiting new places allows children to explore new types of food, meet new people, and be exposed to different cultures and lifestyles. When kids travel, they learn that not everywhere is like “home” and not everyone is like the people they know.
6. Travel teaches what kids can’t learn at school
Children learn invaluable lessons while traveling which cannot possibly be taught within a school environment. With travel, children gain independence, confidence, and learn real life skills through real life situations on the road.
7. They may have less desire to run off and do it later
I never traveled much with my family when I was young, except for within our state. I come from a large family so putting 9 of us on a plane overseas would have been quite expensive, and not to mention stressful for my parents.
The first chance I had once I finished university though, was get a one way ticket overseas to explore. And I didn’t come home until 12 years later, with a husband and 2 kids in tow!
Though I would love my kids to travel and have the chance to do and see and experience the things I have, I secretly would rather them take short trips and come back and settle down close to home. (In case they meet someone overseas, get married and end up staying there!)
If kids travel while they are young, and at least see some of the world, they may have less desire to run off and try to do it all later on.
8. Kids are “old enough” to travel
Don’t wait until your kids are “old enough” to travel and explore the world, your home country or even the city you live in. Children are amazingly adaptable to new situations, and traveling with kids can be enjoyable, and beneficial at any age.
Article by Mums Little Explorers
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So how should you engage in books and reading with your children?
Read to them often…snuggle down on the lounge, turn off all the technology, grab a pile of their favorites and read, read, read. Children love to be read to. A child’s love of books and stories begins a long time before they can be independent readers and it’s our job to cultivate and nurture the love. Reading to your child builds vocabulary and comprehension. Children with a broad vocabulary are better readers. They are more able to comprehend both the written and spoken word, make learning connections, and it helps them spell, predict and decode new words.
Read together…there are a couple of ways to do this. There is a process called read-a-long, which requires the readers to read along together. Hold your child’s finger and follow along under the words. You lead, keep the pace and the reading fluent. For the older reader you can simply take turns reading a paragraph or page. Reading with your child builds fluency, comprehension and confidence. You can also use this time as an opportunity to emphasis sounds in words in relation to letters and to talk about rhyming words and word families.
Independent reading…Children need to practice reading, everyday and everywhere, street signs, billboards, birthday invitations, it all counts. Just like any skill the more you practice the better you get. Remember this time is about practicing reading not testing reading. Firstly, explain to your child why they need to practice the skill. I talk to children about ‘building their reading muscles.’ Then, think about yourself as a reader, there are certain things we do without thinking that are good reading behaviors.
These include:
• Reading a blurb or synopsis to get an idea about the story, encourage your child to look at the cover and title and think about what the book might be about. Prepare their brain for the reading
• Practicing a reading before reading aloud, allow your child to quietly practice before reading to you
• Check unknown words, allow your child to ask you how to read new or unknown words, encourage them to work it out supported by you
Once your child is ready to read use Pause, Prompt, Praise when they encounter new words.
Pause– give them about 5 seconds of thinking time to self-correct.
Prompt– offer prompts such as
• Keep reading and see if that helps you to work out the difficult word
• Look at the sound – what would make sense using that clue?
• Go back to the beginning of the sentence and reread, get your mouth ready to make the sound – what word does your brain want to say?
• Look at the pictures, do they give you a clue?
• Try chunking the word, break it up into smaller chunks of sound
• Try stretching the word, run your finger along it and stretch out the sounds Try one or two of these, if they don’t work ask your child if they would like you to tell them the word or help them to work it out. This is an opportunity for you to model using the prompts.
Praise– the reading behavior: ‘I like the way you re-read to make sense. I like the way you broke the word into chunks, used the beginning sound, used the picture cue.’ We can even say ‘I liked the way you stopped at that word and asked for help so that the story made sense.’
Talk about books…international research tells us that parents who read to and with their children and have conversations about social and political issues give their children academic advantage. We know books allow us entry into a world of imagination, but they also give us opportunity to talk about social and political issues with our children. How does a little deaf and mute boy use diplomacy to end a war? (Boy, Phil Cummings) What do each of us and our culture bring to the Australian landscape? (I’m Australian Too, Mem Fox) How do we learn to be just who we are and by doing so make the world a better place? (Hark Its Me Ruby Lee, Lisa Shanahan). After the reading, do the talking. Share the story, its meaning and message.
Books are for enjoyment, sharing, learning and coming together. Make this the focus of your reading with your child, a special and precious time to stop, share, talk and learn together.
Happy reading!
Article by - Mary Ryan
Mary is an educator with more than 30 years experience. She has taught Kindergarten to Year 6 and has held a number of leadership positions in schools across Sydney. Mary has a particular interest in the space between school and home and a determination to empower families and schools to work positively together for the benefit of children.