Teaching reading in both french and english at the same time

[Neptune]

My 3 yo is ready to read. He knows almost all his letters sounds in both french and english and he understand the concept of blending.

I am not aure how to proceed in teaching him to read without him being confused. Tips?

 

How did you teach your kids to read in 2 language simultaneously?

 

Thank you!

[maize]

One of my sisters learned to read in English and French at the same time, she was in kindergarten in a bilingual school. I don't think confusion was a problem, but she did comment that French was easier to read than English (probably because French is more phonetically consistent).

[Monica_in_Switzerland]

My son also started reading lessons at around 3.6 or so.  I did Phonics Pathways with him in the daytime, and my husband did Leo et Lea with him in the evenings, going very slowly according to our son's pace.  It worked great. 

[4KookieKids]

My son wanted to read around that age. I stuck with one language (German) first when starting reading lessons, and figured that I'd just add in English later. He lost interest for a while, and then decided he'd rather learn to read in the English first, since his best friend can read in English (three years older than him, but he's oblivious), and started learning to read again. I thought the transition might be bumpy, but he had absolutely no issues switching languages.

 

When we play sound games, we often just point out the differences in languages. Occasionally he'll say a german letter sound when we're doing English, and I just say something like "that's right, in German, O says oh, but in English, it says..." And when he asks about certain words in German books, I do it the opposite way around. He seems completely nonplussed by the switching, even though I thought it would be really confusing for him.

 

I'd say to just jump in and don't make it a big deal. He'll sort things out, and probably do it alot easier than you expect. 

[bibiche]

I would just teach him to read in one language.  We picked French because it was DS's stronger language and his reading knowledge in that easily transferred to English. No need to bother doing it twice.

[mathmarm]

I would go for reading in the minority language because it will need every advantage down the road, first. Reading, as I understand it, is a transferring skill and since both languages in question are phonetic or alphabet based as opposed to character based, I'd teach the minority language first because it will add to the opportunities in the minority language.

[Tsuga]

My kids both are learning to read in English and German. Protip: just because they get blending and decoding doesn't mean they are ready for reading. For whatever reason, my kids both could sound out a word years before they jumped to reading. It was really irritating! Anyway, back to your question, I think that OPOL is good for this. The person speaking French reads in French and the French reader and helps them sound out in French ("this letter combination makes this sound in French, ask [other person] what it does in English"), and the person speaking English reads in English and helps them sound out in English.

 

One nice thing about French is that they also have a lot of multiple-letter combos for sounds, and they also have multiple sounds depending on letter order. So at least the logic is kind of similar.

 

I've found that with German, it's so straightforward that I almost don't have to give lessons. French is different, though.

[bibiche]

I found these two books very helpful for teaching reading in French:

http://www.amazon.fr/LImagerie-lecture-niveau-Lucienne-Mestres/dp/2215066245/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1382824988&sr=8-1&keywords=imagerie+de+la+lecture

http://www.amazon.fr/Phono-Grande-section-maternelle-d%C3%A9but/dp/2218750961/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1382825022&sr=8-1&keywords=phono