Hi Moms,
My daughter is 6.5 and we've never introduced a second language. I know now is the time, before she's a teen. Has anyone used the Muzzy system and liked it? Or another that was effective? Do home courses work or should we be looking at an after school program? Makes me mad they don't teach it in school like in other countries! Any advice would be great.
try renting it form your library first that way you can see if it works for your kids or not
We just checked Muzzy out at the library and really like it. My daughter is 5 years old.
Yes, kindergarten age is the last call for the early window of language learning and most immersion programs are kindergarten thru 5th. It's SOOOO frustrating that they teach languages in high school here. I know I dont' remember a lick of french that I took for 4 years!!!
Anyway, We have the Muzzy language courses for our kids, the oldest of which is 5. they are great, and they've heard them a thousand times, and they include all the basic sentences, but you really have to do it with them for them to understand what is being said. Once they know it, they have a great basis for pronunciation and vocabulary, but there is still tons she won't know. 6.5 is old enough that she's "translating" in her head from English, rather than just learning it raw, so it would be good to do more on top of the Muzzy stuff as well like classes or exchange student coming to live or anything. The more the better.
We got tons of french childrens books from ebay Canada, so I read those to the kids, and I had a French exchange student at the local college translate some of their other books and babysit sometimes. They're so far behind though, and I feel really frustrated not speaking another language myself.
The Muzzy DVDs are great, because they never get tired of them, and if you're busy, you can throw them on, and at least they're hearing a language. I also rent a lot of French movies from netflix just so they hear it in the background rather than regular tv. Good luck!
We really liked Muzzy, but our daughter started around 1 1/2 years before a trip to Berlin. She enjoyed the stuffed Muzzy and loved watching and looking at the books. Pedagogically, I think it's pretty well done--they incorporate concepts into the story and have little songs or vignettes to reinforce the concepts along the way. It helped prepare our daughter for a summer in Germany, but no program is really going to teach your child to speak and understand the language. For that, they need a community--a classroom at least, or time in the other country would be even better. When our daughter (6 yo) does watch Muzzy now, she likes it but really wants everything translated. At a younger age, she was more willing to just watch and pick things up from repetition and context. Still, even at this age, I would recommend it as a good program to introduce a child to another language, but again, you won't really find anything that you just buy and give her that will make her bilingual. Still, we'll use it with our baby when she's old enough.
A final note--the video and CDRom will probably seem pretty dated/low tech to you (and perhaps your daughter at this age). I don't know if that's important to you. Send me a message if you have any other questions! I think it's great that you're interested in exposing your daughter to another language and culture. :)
