Learning Mandarin

We hear Chinese spoken around us, but we get by just fine most of the time with English. The girls and I can say our numbers and some animal names.

The 7 year olds here tell us our pronunciation needs work. Jonathan and I learnt a few chinese characters recently. Now where before the signs meant nothing to us we are seeing the few we know everywhere. We had considered getting a tutor for a whole family lesson, but I thought we might need to start with something more targeted to the kids.

Another homeschooling family recommended Lingo Bus. MsC was a bit hesitant over the idea until their 8 year old excitedly told us all about it. He was super enthusiastic about it.

We just tried our first lesson for free. MsC finished the 30 minute lesson and asked immediately, "Can I do another now?" I think that's as a good a recommendation as you can get from a 7 year old.

It's online iterative lessons with an actual instructor for ages 5 to 12. The instructor spoke 100% in mandarin! There were slides the kids could see to help them follow along. They sang a song a few times too. The instructor used just used her body language to teach the kids when to repeat after her and when to listen. She used a sticker system to too, which was surprisingly effective even online. MsC learned how to say "I love my family (jai) /mother (ma ma) /father (ba ba)". I thought it was "I love my home" until I read the post-lesson comments from the teacher.  

There's lots of materials included in the site. You get access the materials even if you don't sign up for the demo. I'm excited to use their colouring book to learn some more characters myself. I just can't decide whether to print one copy or 4. We'll be signing up for weekly lessons and I'll certainly be listening and and using the review materials along with MsC.