Dancer_Mom Posted February 18, 2013 Share Posted February 18, 2013 We have a great opportunity as a friend of ours will be visiting Romania. We lived there as young adults and only returned with a minimal number of books in Romanian. This was ten years ago and we didn't imagine we would decide to teach our children the language. We are now teaching our children Romanian. I speak to them in Romanian and we have a handful of books. We use youtube to watch shows in Romanian. Otherwise the offerings on Amazon are slim to none. There is one website that offers some books and DVD's but the ordering isn't set up well for international shipping. So if all he could do was ship several boxes or possibly bring one small suitcase of stuff back - what would you suggest? I am thinking mostly books that cover many different reading levels. Maybe some DVD's? What might I not be considering? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
momof2cm Posted February 18, 2013 Share Posted February 18, 2013 Now that our kids are older and have Kindles, my family and friends purchase e-books. They send them to me through dropbox. It works well and it is a lot cheaper. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giraffe Posted February 18, 2013 Share Posted February 18, 2013 Paperback books to maximize the number while minimizing weight. A variety of levels, a variety of subjects. A few familiar stories that have been translated to Romanian so one can more easily discern what is happening in the story and therefore decode the language (I'm doing this with Peter Pan in Turkish). A dictionary. Not a Romanian -English translation one but a straight Romanian dictionary. Ok, maybe a translation one too. DVDs are helpful too, but with region encoding you may have trouble playing them in the US. We had this problem, it's frustrating. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Neige Posted February 18, 2013 Share Posted February 18, 2013 What about audio CDs? DS has a bunch of CDs of nursery rhymes and kids' songs in French, and I find the vocab that is incorporated into the songs he remembers much better than otherwise. He will go around the house singing them. I guess it would depend on how old your child is, too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dancer_Mom Posted February 18, 2013 Author Share Posted February 18, 2013 A dictionary. Not a Romanian -English translation one but a straight Romanian dictionary. Ok, maybe a translation one too. OH YES- thank you - I didn't even think of that- it would be extremely helpful! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dancer_Mom Posted February 18, 2013 Author Share Posted February 18, 2013 What about audio CDs? DS has a bunch of CDs of nursery rhymes and kids' songs in French, and I find the vocab that is incorporated into the songs he remembers much better than otherwise. He will go around the house singing them. I guess it would depend on how old your child is, too. I like this idea as well - I have 4 year old twins and one of them loves trying to pick up words to songs so I think this would work especially with him. Thank you everybody - every single post so far has something I didn't think of - anything else? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roadrunner Posted February 19, 2013 Share Posted February 19, 2013 We bring school books since we are interested in the language. Otherwise history related books, local folk tales.... I always research a good local english language bookstore that often carries local lit translated into English. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caterpiller Posted February 19, 2013 Share Posted February 19, 2013 I don'tknow how old your kids are, but if you have young ones it could be fun if he could get a doll that speaks romania, Learn through play :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Petrichor Posted February 20, 2013 Share Posted February 20, 2013 Thanks for this thread, DancerMom! We're in a similar predicament with our language from back home, and I had only thought to get school texts in reading/writing/grammar and a few living books. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
In The Great White North Posted February 20, 2013 Share Posted February 20, 2013 DVDs are helpful too, but with region encoding you may have trouble playing them in the US. We had this problem, it's frustrating. A multi-region DVD player will solve this problem. http://www.220-electronics.com/blu-ray-dvd/region-free-dvd-player.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nan in Mass Posted February 24, 2013 Share Posted February 24, 2013 How old are your children? I would want books and audiobooks. And a dictionary, not a translation one but a regular one. Summer review workbooks might be nice for a little written work (the French have these - don't know if they are common in Romania). Song books, especially folk songs, which have some unusual vocabulary and are very singable over and overable. CDs of children's songs. What about a children's cookbook? Then you could cook in Romanian and work on kitchen vocabulary. (Or perhaps you could write one yourself?) I think I would think about which vocabulary you need and select books accordingly. If you are fluent in Romanian and speaking it at home, then cooking vocabulary will come naturally while you make cookies with your children and a cook book wouldn't be very useful. What would be useful was a nature book that has jungle animals (for example), things you don't have in your house or discuss naturally in the course of your day. Or science books so they can learn that vocabulary. Children's history books would be good, also. A geography book would be nice. They would have to be things your children would want to read or have read to them, though. The French have very appealling nice children's non-fiction. Do the Romanians? What are your children interested in? Books about those interests would be good. For example, if one likes soccer, perhaps there are biographies of soccer heros? Or a book on soccer moves? I would look for folk/fairy tales as well because those are easy to read over and over. What about a game or two? The biggest thing I would consider is whether the book would interest my children enough for them to want to read it. If not, it won't be very effective. If all else fails, I would get TinTin books lol, if they are translated into Romanian. I KNOW my children would read those. Nan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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