writer and home-maker
Last week I had parent teacher meetings for both children. These were fifteen minute sessions with their teachers and without the children there. And we have these three times a year now - late autumn, early spring and before the summer holiday. Both of them are doing OK, though I was told of some areas... Continue Reading →
One of the joys of having children who speak two languages is watching them learn them both. Hearing them talk to each other in a mishmash of them. Helping them learn words that they only know in the other language. That they can teach you words that you haven't learnt yet. Now that both children... Continue Reading →
What I hadn't thought about when learning a new language was that it's not only the words that are different. The sounds that things make are different too. For example in Dutch cows say "boo" and cockerels crow "kukuleku". And recently I found out that the sirens of Dutch emergency vehicles go tatu tatu not... Continue Reading →
Dutch public libraries have an annual offer, where for the months of July and August they provide a pre-defined list of ebooks freely available for all library members. These books are all in Dutch, but they cover a variety of age groups (from 4yo to adult) and a variety of genres. They're available through a... Continue Reading →
Last week I found out that I passed my re-take of the Dutch NT2-2 exam. So I have now completed the qualification. My First New Year's Resolution completed for 2017! Doing the exam the second time around I knew what to expect and I used the time better. The longer questions have thinking time before... Continue Reading →
A little while ago we went to see Dirk Scheele at the theatre. He's a Dutch children's rock star. We quite like his songs and listen to them frequently. One night after the concert rocket boy was trying to go to sleep, and complained that when he tried to translate one of the songs into... Continue Reading →
Well I'm getting on with Dutch. I've even writted a blog post in Dutch. I feel I should admit that I did have help from my Dutch teacher with it as you can see below. I'm finding it easier to have conversations, though more than one person is still difficult. As it tends to go... Continue Reading →
Dutch will be the language of my children's education. They will do exams in Dutch and their proficiency in that, as well as the subject, will determine which secondary school and then university they will go to. I do find this quite intimidating and I switch between worrying that their Dutch won't be good enough... Continue Reading →
Learning any new language is intimidating, especially learning it as an adult. What I want to say in conversation is much more complicated than what my son chatters away to himself. Different tenses, sub-clauses, conditional etc are rarely part of his standard vocabulary and yet they are of mine. Combine that with the alien (to... Continue Reading →
