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How to help your child with English at home...
How to help your child with English at home...
Advice from the MEFIS Learning Support Team by Simon Johnson
Advice from the MEFIS Learning Support Team by Simon Johnson
Many parents who are concerned about their children’s English level and overall performance at school often ask for advice on how to help their children at home.
Many parents who are concerned about their children’s English level and overall performance at school often ask for advice on how to help their children at home.
The first piece of advice we would offer any parent wanting to support their child is: help your child maintain and improve in their own mother tongue.
According to a broad study of the research on the importance of mother tongue and academic performance conducted by UNESCO
“Research shows that children who have a strong foundation in their home language are more successful at school than monolinguals and enjoy a greater feeling of self-worth and identity.”
Self worth and identity all stem from your mother tongue
Children use their prior knowledge to learn new skills and concepts and this includes the knowledge they have of their mother tongue and their home culture. They can use the knowledge they have about their mother tongue to successfully acquire an additional language. In other words, by supporting the development of your child’s skills in their home language, you are actually also giving them strategies and skills to improve their English. This is especially true in reading.
To be able to read you need to have a certain amount of vocabulary and knowledge of the sounds of the language before you start matching them to the letters and words etc. It is therefore easier to learn to read in your mother tongue and you can use your experience of this when you are developing reading in an additional language. While at school, your child will gain a lot of exposure to English throughout the day and will receive support from our Learning Support department.
By supporting your child’s development in their mother tongue, you will be giving your child the most important learning resource that you can.
Maintain and develop your child’s love and ability to use your mother tongue naturally through:
- Reading and watching movies together
- Playing or cooking together
- Listening to and learning songs and dances
- Tell them about your life back home and family stories
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