☜ How I found the way to teach my son English ☞

I have two kids. The smaller is 3 years old. He's in kindergarten. There is an English class there but he didn't like it. So I've decided to teach him English at home myself, twice a week.

I'm not an English teacher but qualified enough to teach my son.

At first, I tried to raise his interest in English by letting him play with his animal toys while telling him their names in English. I also teached him simple verbs like "sleep", "wake up", "run"... by playing simple games describing those actions.

He liked it, wanted to learn more.

But he had trouble focusing on my teaching (to repeat the words, understand the meaning), and I had trouble finding new, interesting ways to raise his interest further to keep him focused.

A month went by, he still like it but it was due to the playing, not the English thing. Yesterday, I tried changing the format to be more formal, hoping that he will be more disciplined and I can save my energy. It went like this:

Instead of just naming the animals, I told him a short animal story (in English), with him sitting opposite to me instead of by my side. He got bored, distracted easily by other things. This repeated a few times.

Then I opened my laptop, showing animal pictures, and asked him the names of some animals. He asked unrelated questions instead: What is it doing? Where is the hammerhead shark? I could answer those, but they would derail the topic and use up all my energy.

Then I tried to open the kid story "The Boy Who Cried Wolf" on some websites. They were littered with ads, popups, bad layout, and were too advanced for a 3-year-old: "flock of sheep", past tense, long sentences.

By that time, he felt tired already, wanna cry. So was I.

Then, I asked the main question out loud: How can I make you become more interested in English so that I don't need to use lots of energy to make you focus?

And the answer appeared right before me: The banners. We had big banners of animals, fruits and numbers for children with both Vietnamese and English words on these, but I haven't used them much. When I pointed my son to the animals on the banner and asked their names, his eyes brightened right away, and uttered the names correctly. Same for the fruits. It went well, complete focus.

We had fun learning again.

So, the next time I want to teach my kid on a new English topic, I only need to draw or print the materials, put them on the wall, and just play simple games with him on that topic.

In software, that subtle change is called fancily: User centered design.

--Vinh