any speech/language experts about?

**jamsplat** · 21-06-2012, 09:03pm

or indeed anyone with any ideas...

Background: we live in norway, 3 kids (dd1 is 6, dd2 is 4, ds has just turned 2) all of whom use both english and norwegian. dd1 is at (norwegian) school and the two youngest are in (norwegian) kindergarten. we have just moved into our own house but spent 9 months living with my non english speaking in laws so less english exposure than usual for the kids.

I have no worries about either dd1 or ds in terms of their english but dd2s has gone seriously haywire. Vocab is not brilliant but not terrible either but the syntax and grammar is

**jamsplat** · 21-06-2012, 09:25pm

oops posted too soon...

syntax and grammar is really off the wall

does anyone know of any games/fun stuff that I could use to work on those elements particularly, or is it just a case of exposure exposure exposure and hope it sticks?

**RealGoneKid** · 21-06-2012, 09:33pm

I'm no expert at all but there's loads of educational stuff on the Cbeebies website (bbc.co.uk/Cbeebies). I'm not sure whether any of it would be any use, but it might be worth a look.

**Anne** · 21-06-2012, 09:37pm

Try reading stories . This will help her hear what she needs. If you don't have access to real ones, try online ones and audio books will help .

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk.

**Faith** · 21-06-2012, 09:58pm

Have you tried Moshi monsters and the like? It's really helped my DD with her reading and writing- there's grammar and spelling quizzes in there, and she's forever writing wee notes to her friends...

**Dr Spouse** · 24-06-2012, 10:30pm

It's hard. I am not sure that it is possible for children to be really fluent even in a language that is spoken daily at home if they don't have another immersion setting for that language - whether that's another family that is English speaking, an English Saturday/evening school, or similar. My younger niece is more or less the same as you describe, and it's especially true of younger children who have older children input too. Children who live in country A and go to school in B language always seem to be fluent in A language too but it's hard to do it the other way round.

My older niece is not as poor in English as the younger one (they are 8 and 5, and they spend most of their days when they are not at school with my brother only who speaks English to them and he also does loads of reading - but even the older one is very hard to understand at times, and the younger one gets very frustrated in her English). The older one is coming to spend a few weeks at primary school in England with my mum and both she and my mum are really looking forward to it, and I think it will help her English no end. Hopefully the younger one can do it soon too. That's the kind of immersion that they tend to need - a summer with a relative, or a weekly visit with another family, or (e.g. as Polish families or Chinese families do) a weekly language school.

Having said that, I know that the English provision in school, even primary school, in Norway is more or less approaching immersion. Most adult Norwegians who I have met speak perfect English and have almost no accent. I would not worry about my nieces' English if they lived in Norway! But the older one's English lessons at school are no better than primary school French or Spanish lessons would be here (colours, numbers, nursery rhymes, and a very poor accent from the teacher). Your kids will have something very different and much better.

I am not massively convinced that computer/audio will help. Children don't really learn much language from that kind of setting (it's not directed to them individually). And at her age in your educational setting she won't be reading/writing will she?

I'm afraid it IS exposure exposure exposure but you may be able to find some interesting alternatives (English playgroup? Families you can visit regularly - and play with the kids one to one not let them all go off and speak Norwegian?)

**jamsplat** · 25-06-2012, 09:38am

thanks everyone

we are reading loads of english stories and I have removed the norwegian childrens channels from the TV so if they want kids programs their only choices are english language DVDs (mean mummy) Ditto DS/ipad games.

We do meet up with other english speaking families but all of the kids speak norwegian as well so it's not a perfect immersion by any means, but we try. There is s new (american) child in her kindergarten who doesn't yet speak norwegian, but he's not yet 3 so his speech generally is limited and DD2 (in her peculiar wisdom) has decided she won't speak to him because she doesn't know him

Her best friend (norwegian) is also desperate to be able to speak english (her parents lived in the UK for several years) so we've been playing 'english lessons' which goes down well

. My parents are coming over for 4 weeks so that should up the immersion level (along the lines of if you don't speak english you won't get what you want..... fo course it doesn't help that both of them but especially my mum are going rather deaf

)'

The english provision at school is really pretty good, I was at the end of year show on friday for the primary school and about 1/3 of the show was in english, but you're right Dr S, its another 2 years before she goes to school. That said she is beginning to read in english so maybe that will help as well. Exposure exposure exposure and we will get there. DD1 is sorted apart from an insistance that 'anything' means 'nothing' and using a direct translation of the norwegian phrase for wetting yourself

My poor mother was most confused when DD1 started yelling 'I'm going to wee wee me out'

So we'll get there with dd2 too

**Dr Spouse** · 26-06-2012, 04:57pm

I like the idea of playing english lessons!

and my parents are both pretty good at getting the nieces to speak English to them.

Is there any mileage in making the play sessions with English speaking kids a bit more structured (e.g. word games, singing nursery rhymes, or just baking/craft together but with you speaking English to them the whole time?). I do think they have a stage when they don't realise you can speak English to other kids, or they forget you can, kind of thing.

Sounds like it's going to work out for you though as you are well ahead of my nieces' situation (partly because of the school provision where they are, but also slightly due to lack of effort and easy weeks-long babysitting by the in-laws).