How to Teach a Foreign Language With a Game

I am Iranian-American and fluently speak, read and write Persian and it is very important that my daughter know my language and culture. When she was a baby I would begin every morning showing her Dino Lingo flashcards and saying the word out loud. I would use the same categories every day for a few days. As she has gotten older and is more surrounded by English, it has become more difficult to get her to speak it back to me. I have heard similar stories from other bilingual parents about their children understanding the language but responding in English. Here is a game Sarina has really gotten excited about called, "Is there a ______ in Sarina's (or Mommy's, Daddy's etc.) bag?" We wrote it out phonetically in English so she could "teach" her dad who is not a Persian speaker and listed out the articles of clothing. That extra teaching element made her more excited to practice and master her speaking skills.

The best part about this is that thanks to Google, we don't have to know a language to play this game. I recommend sticking with one category for 3-5 days. We practiced with clothing for three days and then moved on to items from our Haft Seen (our Persian New year set up). After we have a good hold on the Haft Seen words, we will transition into school items i.e. book, ruler, scissors, etc.

Some items we place on our Haft Seen.

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