My primary school forbade use of pencils until 3rd grade and we did math and dictations in fountain ink (it sounds ancient, but it looked nice). The result was slow work and painfully exacting writing. They also graded on a 1-6 scale, where 1 was 100% and 1- was 99%, effectively making a distinct grade for Perfect. I like the idea of showing a child how to do a task well, consistently. It’s no different from studying a great writer to learn writing; we naturally want to know what the highest standard is in order to reach for it. My mother sewed dresses, baked and cleaned, and taught us to read and write, but didn’t teach much of the domestic skills she had learned from her mother. I think one part of that was the shift away from needing those skills (she doesn’t sew anymore as the cost of clothes has dropped so much). But another reason might be that teaching a child these things requires incredible energy and consistent repetition. Right now I need to sweep the kitchen, do I take 15 minutes to show my child who will do a sort-of-okay job and completely forget what he learned by tomorrow, or just quickly do it myself in 30 seconds? I think therein lies mms’ experience with her first child; you have way more time, energy and will to teach consistently with a single child than their younger siblings.

Thank you, ElizaG! This is very helpful. My children are 5, 4 and 1. It feels like every day at least one child is having a meltdown. I pray a lot though because of it, so maybe there is a silver lining. 🙂 Thank you for your thoughts! I really appreciate hearing experiences from mothers who have lived through these years and can share their wisdom.

McLuhan wrote about the sensory experience of television; in the absence of auditory/visual content, the mind “fills” empty space with information, like a hallucination. TV is all audio/visual information, so the mind is by contrast “hypnotized”. Everyone has witnessed a child watching a cartoon; you’re trying to talk to them, call their name and they “snap” out of it. I can’t imagine not watching movies. I don’t even know if there a solution to the screen dilemma other than “try not to do it so much”? I’m curious how other parents handle this without being “cranks” (well-put, ElizaG). 😉

I forgot about Benjamin Blümchen, thank you! I just rediscovered Babar der Elefant and I’m saving Ronja Räubertochter for when my kids are a little older. I am so excited to find some used book options on Amazon; I just discovered that a lot of German classics (Goethe, Rilke, Wagner, etc.) can be purchased as like Oberstufen readers. 🙂 Yay!

I love this topic of New Frontiers! It seems like a common thread in EFL (chores, “immersion” in single authors and memorizing long pieces of poetry) is trying to cultivate in your child the ability of sustained effort in the face of growing challenges. Which is really, really hard. Doubly so when Longfellow competes with Pete the Cat or whatever. I never studied in school and rarely did more than the bare minimum, so I feel like I am trying to climb a huge hill made up of 30 years of lazy work habits to instill some patience and fortitude in my children. 🙂 Where does technology fit here? It makes things so much easier, in the sense that I can google pictures of pill bugs for my 4 year old (at least once a day, I don’t know why). And I like Anki, because it’s fantastic for oral recitation and review. But I know that if the internet has made it hard for me to read long books and memorize poetry then it will be even harder for the next generation who was born into the “encyclopedia in your pocket” world.

Do the other children speak your native language with each other? It seems like the younger ones are at a disadvantage because so much of their linguistic input comes from older siblings. If you can pull off a summer of OPOL, it will be like the mental equivalent of a daily chore practice. 🙂

Thank you for the response! It is probably contra the spirit of EFL to ask what you do, but as I’m really starting out with the under-10 age: is there anything you wish you had known or done differently with young children?

That’s amazing! We live in a suburb sans hogs or big rooms, unfortunately. I am certainly learning to appreciate how different chores look across the country, but I am determined to establish good work habits for the children (and me!). Thank you for the great ideas!

For my children‘s habits (they are young): I have spent probably 90% of my teaching efforts on vocabulary in the past year and it’s brought really neat results. I think a lot about words being the „constitution“ or stuff we are made of, even how we think, and children have this amazing ability to memorize enormous amounts of new words. So one of the habits my children developed is writing unknown or interesting words on Post-its and putting them on our „Word Walls“ in the house (one on a door, one in the restroom). We go over some definitions every day, which gives them practice speaking and developing precision in their speech. A second habit I am currently working on with them is chores. I would like to find more physical tasks that can be done by say, a 5 year-old, that doesn’t require so much oversight. I welcome ideas! A final habit I am trying to establish now is a practice of working in dialectical (if that’s the right word for it?) media during the week; like if we’ve read a lot, then listen to instrumental music or go for a quiet walk after talking much.

Thank you! You are amazing! Now I am definitely going to look for some Scandinavian authors translated into German. 🙂

I have been reading Dupanloup and Susanna Wesley’s writings (who taught her 10 children at home!), which has me thinking a lot about habits in the context of educating my children. For my habits: I am trying to fit good words into new contexts, like singing the Psalms with my kids and memorizing - instead of reading out loud - interesting pieces of literature. I am trying to watch for the tiny beginnings of bad habits in my children to address them early when it is still easy. If I know they are practicing something that will have to be broken later in their lives, I try to fix it now. I’m trying to eat no snacks between meals as a practice of more physical discipline I‘ve dropped all composition exercises with my rising first grader and we just pick out interesting sentences in literature we are reading, which he copies into his notebook. I am trying to not „teach“ all the time, and spend more effort listening to what my children find interesting in what we read or look at.

Where do they sell used German books on Amazon US? I would like to get some books for myself, but the .de shipping is so costly.

Hallo! We are a bilingual German-English household. I am trying to teach my young children German and have collected some books and workbooks over the years. Here are my favorite resources: YouTube - my children enjoy Janosch and Sendung mit der Maus. Amazon.de - besides the obvious children’s books, I’ve purchased some great text-, and workbooks for learning to read, intended for German Grundschulkinder. Librivox - you can search by language and find all the Gebrüder Grimm fairy tales in audiobooks, for free. What are your favorite resources?

Hello all. I’m new to posting, but a longtime lurker. I just wanted to post a great recitation of “Hiawatha’s Childhood” for those that would like to hear the flow and pronunciations of the piece. I memorized it and my children love listening when we are waiting, sitting, resting, etc. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=dgfPluV0shE

My DS is 4 and will be attending K in the fall. He is currently reading Magic Tree House books and working through Building Thinking Skills Grade 2/3. However, he can’t write legibly at all. He gets frustrated trying to write letters and numbers. He doesn’t like drawing, either. What should I do?