Tag: language

Speaking to your child

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I’m popping here just for a minute to share with you this magnificant lecture that I thought EVERY parent should watch and enjoy. It’s a shame I did not have access to it when my son was between 0 and 3. It would have been much easier for me to reject all the criticism that I was getting for talking or reading too much to him. This is such an important message which basically emphasises that you should grab every minute of those early years and enjoy them with a full heart.

Play people, play, play with your kids. It’s worth it!

You can find the lecture here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSNRtJtNHT4&feature=share

Please share the link further!

When you are aware, the journey is over.

Note in Polish: Zachęcam gorąco do obejrzenia tego wykładu. Szczególnie rodziców dzieci w wieku 0 do 3 lat.

Sing it loudly

lovely cherries

“Vision without action is merely a dream. Action without vision just passes the time. Vision with action can change the world.” Joel Barker

A couple of years ago I wouldn’t have even dreamt of writing this text. My English was bad and broken and I did not have much confidence in stringing sentences together. Now I am cherishing every single free hour that I can dedicate to creating the content for this blog and to communicating what has been happening in my ‘bowl of cherries’. My son is a great teacher when it comes to showing me that skills and habits emerge through repetition over time. And so does our confidence in having them. There is no other answer to solving many of life’s problems and completing what we have started than: Stick at it. Stick at it.stick at it

This blog is still a wonder space for me. My vision for it crystallizes slowly and I know that if I want to make it happen and contribute something meaningful, I ought to do some work on myself first. I notice this to be true in so many other areas of my life too. Even at home. In my marriage. If I spend my day proactively, our dinner conversations are much more lively. There is just more to say. More to share. All members of the family are enriched by individual member’s pursuits. Of course, we’re enriched through togetherness too. Just differently.

run6J8A3667in the orchardThe photos that I have chosen for this post were taken a few weeks ago in my dad’s orchard in Poland. My dad is a great visionary. He makes things happen and tends to his projects very well. Throughout the summer he’s been waking up 4am every day to see to the orchard before the afternoon heatwave commences. This June and July I’ve been really admiring his commitment to helping the cherries be the best – it was so hot that he was watering them every day. Not giving in to the drought. He just knows that a vision can materialize through purposeful repetitions of our efforts.

It’s the only legitimate way to success.

I wish for this blog to be a very meaningful space. Space where you’ll find comfort and inspiration. Space where you find a bit of yourself too. I have spent quite a few years stuck in silence because of my underdeveloped language skills. Learning a foreign language is a great lesson in perseverance. It’s a great opportunity to cater for the visionary in you. There are so many fabulous speakers and writers around. They can be a great source of vision. It’s really empowering to be able to write and to say to the whole world what you are about. Your vision can slowly emerge in your voice and you can sing your song. Louder and Louder.

After a long period of silence, it’s nice to be loud.

cherries and hands

You’ve got the words to change a nation
But you’re biting your tongue
You’ve spent a life time stuck in silence
Afraid you’ll say something wrong
If no one ever hears it how we gonna learn your song? 

(…) We’re all wonderful, wonderful people
So when did we all get so fearful?
And now we’re finally finding our voices
Just take a chance, come help me sing this

I wanna sing, I wanna shout
I wanna scream ’til the words dry out…

~Emeli Sandé, Read All About It (The song is here)

Developing Good Communication Habits with Toddlers: Book Recommendation

My toddler talks_book recommendation

If you are a parent and you’re interested in your child’s language development, you might have heard of Kimberly Scanlon. She is a speech therapist who throughout her work developed a strong expertise in building up children’s communication skills.

In the book that I am recommending she offers 25 play routines (with toys and arts and crafts) in which she describes the activity and suggests appropriate strategies that the parents can use to elicit responses and expand vocabulary. She also offers tips on What to Do if the Toddler Is Not Imitating You and The Do Not List. I also found the Introduction and How to Use This Book sections extremely valuable as they were both informative and reassuring.

Our son is being brought up with three languages and I am his primary source of Polish language, my husband is his primary source of Italian, and English is the language of the community. At the moment all three languages develop at the same pace but slower than the language development in his monolingual peers. Thus, by monolingual standards, he experiences a language delay. I’ve been looking for a book that would improve my ability to stimulate my child’s language development, but also for a text that I could recommend to my child’s nursery. Although this book is not about how to talk to multilingual children, I like its focus on simplicity, language-wise and play-wise. I like its very practical and realistic tone too. It definitely sets the expectations right and makes you question less and communicate better.
Scanlon, K. (2012) My Toddler Talks: Strategies and Activities to Promote Your Child’s Language Development. Createspace, North Charleston, SC.

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This is not a sponsored post. Just a recommendation.

Nothing New: moving forward

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My Nothing New Project has come to a standstill over the summer. I came across a few situations where I didn’t have a choice but to buy something new for myself and my son. Things like that always happen when you think you can relax, don’t they? For example, when you simply forget to pack that essential jacket you need because the place where you’re staying in the mountains drops to 6°C or when your child’s feet grow almost overnight and you realise that he will not make many steps in the old ones any more. I’m forgiving myself these small departures from the nothing new project as they really are justifiable but there is something else too… my little weakness that I indulged in while in Poland. I love Polish children’s’ songs and stories (written and spoken). I tried to say no to them, but I do see them as an essential part of my son’s childhood. And not just my son’s. They will also be used by a number of children because I am starting a group for Polish kids in my town which will focus on popularising Polish rhymes and stories among the expat children. So it turns out that those books have become a bit of an investment into community building and I’m happy I am making use of this investment.

So all in all, what’s the status of my nothing new project? I’ve slipped but I am carrying on, being mindful of what and where I buy or what I don’t buy. It’s almost the end of September and pre-Christmas shopping madness is about to start – I am sticking to the nothing new project just for the sole purpose of staying true to the message of the Christmas period – that new is born and not bought… that a true and long-lasting regeneration and renovation comes from effort, time and nourishment. So for these next few months I’ll carry on learning how to be patient, more hard-working and nurturing. I hope you’ll stay with me to see to it. ;)

Bringing up a trilingual child – the beginning

Three languages

Those of you who are familiar with my family setting would know that we use three languages at home. I had the great pleasure to write about bringing up a trilingual child for www.trilingualchildren.com It’s a wonderful space full of great advice and wonderful stories. Below are the leading paragraphs to my article:

More delight, less doubt. Bringing up a trilingual child – the beginning

I just came back from the hospital with my small and beautiful little boy. He was an easy-going newborn who settled himself into a nice routine very quickly. I loved holding him in my arms late at night and absorbing his peace. Blissful, wonderful peace. I felt enormously happy. I felt rewarded, blessed and enriched; but my fortune was not made of money, but of affection and attachment that strengthened and deepened with every day, unconditionally, unremittingly, and peacefully.

It was in this peace of a quietly breathing newborn baby, in a room that smelled of baby shampoo, just after midnight, that I realised that I want to bring up my son as a trilingual child, that the biggest gift my husband and I can give to him is the gift of languages, an opportunity to enter and explore his parents and grandparents’ cultures and to draw strength from them.

But there are other reasons too. That night when I was looking at my son, I saw generations of people in our genealogical lines that came before us. My son wasn’t made of me or my husband only… those genes that made him where not ours only. I understood then that my son has already got a heritage, a heritage that he won’t be able to understand or access without knowing and understanding the languages that my husband and I speak. Raising him up with one language seemed unfair… both towards him and those people before us.

So there we are, living in multicultural Britain, bringing up a toddler speaking Italian, Polish and English and doing everyday things just as other families do. We are developing our routines and with those routines our toddler is grasping the languages and learns about the world. Many parents tend to get overwhelmed at this stage of their child’s development because it’s so easy to think that you need to provide additional language input on top of the usual care. To me it’s about using language while exercising daily care, while bathing, while potty training, while putting the shoes on and when collecting toys off the floor. The language comes with care and attention. It’s not separate from it.  Click here to continue reading…