Habits to Help You Build a Family Culture of Language Learning
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Back in 2015, I was a mom of one very high-energy baby, who was trapped along with me in a Milwaukee apartment for much of the winter. Desperate for ways to entertain him (and get things done), I let him play in the bath for hours each day while I listened to podcasts, folded laundry, and worked on my dissertation.
During one of those leisurely bath sessions, I heard Sarah Mackenzie talking about “family culture” on her Read Aloud Revival podcast. As a new mom, I loved Sarah’s vision of “building a family culture around books,” and it got me thinking: what else did I want to be at the heart of our new little family? Who were we and who did I want us to be?
Given that both my husband and I love language learning and travel, it seemed only natural that we’d want to share those things with our kids. And as time has gone on and our family has grown, we’ve been so lucky to be able to do just that with worldschooling trips, homeschooling our kids bilingually, and learning a third language at home.
And while doing those things has contributed to our family culture, they’ve also all taken a lot of work. Just like Rome wasn’t built in a day, neither was our family! And it fact, this culture continues to be something that I need to work at every day, which is why I’m hosting the Homeschool Language Challenge this month (on Instagram and in my Facebook group). We all need encouragement to stay consistent in our goals—me included!
Now, that said, I also admit I have an advantage here, since I’ve had a few years to practice being consistent in our homeschool foreign language study. And because of that, I wanted to share some of the ways in which I keep our family on track, without becoming overwhelmed. No matter where you are on your language learning journey, there’s likely something here that you can pick up and apply to your life.
So here they are:
Five Habits to Cultivate a Family Culture of Language Learning
I set the example by modeling language learning for my kids. This year, I became convicted that if I wanted my children to consistently speak Spanish with me, they had to first see me using my Spanish throughout the day—and not just when I was talking to them, either. To that end, I started a few routines that have helped me model real-life Spanish usage to them.
First, in the mornings, I do my chores while listening to either a playlist of Latin worship music (I love Amazon music for this!) or Radio Nueva Vida (which we stream through our Amazon Alexa). Starting the day with Spanish-language music reminds me to speak consistently to my kids in that language, and getting it going is as easy as a simple voice command.
On our morning walks, I listen to El Washington Post, which gives me a 20-minute overview of international and domestic news (and is usually appropriate for listening to with little ears around). At nighttime, I listen to our TalkBox.Mom phrases while washing dishes. My boys know that I’d really like to improve my Portuguese accent, and it’s powerful for them to see me practicing that! And it’s also powerful for them to see me struggle sometimes. Takes the pressure off.
And since I always have a good book going for myself, I’ve started listening to Spanish-language audiobooks in their presence. My oldest son and I enjoyed listening to the first two Harry Potter books this year, and he can’t wait to turn 7 years old in January so that we can listen to the third (his birthday gift).I make easy trade-offs to increase my kids’ use of our target languages. Our family has long had a rule that any videos we watch have to be in Spanish, and this simple practice has really helped my kids grow their vocabulary and grammar skills. Between the many options available on Disney+ and YouTube, pretty much anything they want to watch is available in our second language.
Realizing that with an active toddler at home, my time and mental capacity for teaching Portuguese are limited, I recently made a conscious decision to allow them a little extra screen time daily—but only in Brazilian Portuguese. Each week day, my kids watch one episode of Galinha Pintadinha Mini, a show for preschoolers, and then we talk about it and write down new words we’re learning. This supplements our TalkBox.Mom curriculum and gives us lots to discuss, so that I don’t have to make up conversation topics to get my kids to practice speaking. They watch each day while I prep dinner (within earshot) and then we chat in Portuguese while setting the table. This hasn’t added any additional to-dos to our day, but it has made good use of the so-called “witching hour.”
If you’re looking for even more easy trade-offs to get more language exposure for your kids, I have that right here.
I outsource language learning to others, which also means accountability for me. Once a week, our son meets with his Portuguese language tutor on iTalki to practice his conversation skills. Not only am I grateful for her excellent teaching, but also the fact that his weekly class provides built-in accountability for me! Simply knowing that he will meet with her helps me to stay consistent with practicing our third language. This isn’t the only way to outsource foreign language learning of course, as I’ve written about before, but it works great for us!
I pair the difficult habit (Portuguese practice) with an easier one (daily walks). If we’re really struggling to practice consistently, I will use our daily morning walks to fit in Portuguese practice time. Since there are so many language learning games that I can use with my kids while walking, and we’ve already got that habit firmly in place, I have more mental space for working on our third language. We can even listen to our TalkBox.Mom phrases on my phone while we’re out, thanks to a $20 bluetooth speaker. I love killing two birds with one stone!
I visually track our progress. Because it takes me an enormous amount of effort to practice Portuguese with my kids (not joking here—it’s true!), I need a visual reminder to stay on track each day. Enter my trusty calendar (see above). This is a super simple way to record what I’ve done after the fact. I simply inscribe a little “P” in the corner of each date that we’ve practiced Portuguese. If I have a whole ton piled up at the end of the month, I know we’ve got a good routine, but if there’s less than I would like, I think about ways to work in more practice (like, say, tweaking #1-4 above).
In Conclusion: Pick One Habit and Build from There
I’ll be totally honest—there are some days when I have almost completely abandoned these habits. When I was pregnant and in total survival mode, and then had a high needs baby, outsourcing language study was about the only thing I could do! But under usual circumstances—the everyday challenges of raising kids, managing a household, and homeschooling—all of these strategies are a big help to me.
So, might just one of these strategies help you bring more consistency to your homeschool? Is there something that you could start doing tomorrow to make this happen? If so, what would that be—let me know in the comments!
