2374 First timer

Hi I am married to an English bloke who's mum and dad were Italians who moved to Worcester in the 50's. His mum now lives with us. We have two young children and I am concerned about them missing out on the opportunity to learn the Italian language etc. My husband is almost fluent and occasionally chats to his mum but English is spoken 99.9% of the time. We have taken two trips to Sardinia and are planning another in June. We have just purchased a satellite dish to receive Italian channels, but we do not know which are the best ones to watch. Not much progress is being made, they can both say chaio (I don't even know how to spell it) :confused:

Category
Introduce Yourself - Piacere Conoscerti

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sun, 01/15/2006 - 15:25

Muzzy do a range of video / dvd's aimed at children, although expensive, you could even try looking on EBay for a second hand copy.

[url]https://www.early-advantage.com/Shop/default.asp[/url]

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 01/16/2006 - 03:30

How old are they? We found several books and games on Amazon that DS3 - who's 10 - is doing quite well with. Also there is a bookshop in London called The Italian Bookshop, which might be useful.

Can you not ask DH and MIL to speak in Italian regularly? Maybe each morning, or during tea? And insist on no English in the house. If they're still quite young they should start picking it up really easily.

HTH

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 01/16/2006 - 04:12

make it fun - how about an Italian day(or meal) at the week end - if nonna and your husband speak Italian then it should be easy - all food, cuttlery etc in Italian and please and thankyou. conversations led by mother in law and husband - get them to label items around the house in Italian -then have a quizz to see if you can remember the names.Birthday cards to be written in Italian.
Learn the numbers with an Italian game of Bingo!
Kind Regards
Pamela
learning the language slowly!!!

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 01/16/2006 - 08:25

Thanks so much for the advice. I think meal times would be the best place to start, we do always eat our evening meals together. :)

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 01/16/2006 - 13:00

Oh to be young and have the opportunity to become bi-lingual! Lucky children hope you all enjoy the learning!!