Our newest educational resource, Building Bridges With Bilingual Books And Multicultural Resources is now available in a complete teacher’s set. These sets are available in Spanish and Arabic, as well as a set with assorted languages. Read on to learn more about these sets.
Continue reading Culturally Responsive Teaching Set with Lesson Plans & Bilingual Books
Today, teachers need to provide welcoming and inclusive educational environments for their diverse student populations. By building culturally responsive classrooms, all students develop a greater understanding of, and respect for, diverse cultures, enhancing community in the classroom. A new book helps educators embrace multiculturalism in their classrooms with lesson plans, games, and fun diversity activities.
Continue reading Celebrate Diversity in the Classroom with Lessons & Activities in New Teacher’s Manual
Language Lizard is excited to announce a new bilingual children’s book that will make a great addition to your library or home collection! Food, Food, Fabulous Food introduces young readers to multicultural foods from all around the world.
Continue reading New Bilingual Children’s Book! Food, Food, Fabulous Food
Language Lizard was thrilled to be a sponsor of Multicultural Children’s Book Day (MCBD), a movement to bring attention to the need for more multicultural children’s books in classrooms and libraries. Check out our previous post about the importance of books that feature diverse characters and multicultural stories.
We enjoyed discussing issues about multicultural books with educators, authors and parents as part of the #ReadYourWorld Twitter party in January. If you missed it, be sure to sign up for the MCBD newsletter so you can join in next year.
As part of Multicultural Children’s Book Day, we shared a few of our favorite bilingual multicultural books with bloggers and book reviewers, and we’re excited to share their feedback here.
Continue reading Multicultural Picture Books & Reviews
Searching around for a really special gift for multicultural families and teachers working in diverse communities? Check out our new, exclusive collection of 25 of the best multicultural books for grades 1-3 that celebrate diversity and teach children about different cultures. (Note: Additional sets targeted to Pre-K through K, and to grades 3-5, are also available on the Language Lizard site.) Continue reading 25 Favorite Children’s Books About Diversity
Language Lizard is thrilled to offer a new, exclusive collection of must-read multicultural books for preschool and kindergarten children! This set of books gives you an instant, award-winning library of diverse books for your classroom or home. No need to search around! We’ve selected 25 of our favorite multicultural stories that expose children to cultural and ethnic diversity and celebrate differences.
The books portray children from various backgrounds, including African American, Hispanic, Middle-Eastern, Asian and Native American. The set includes stories related to the immigrant experience, books that help children embrace their unique heritage, and folktales from around the world.
The entertaining and well-reviewed stories help students appreciate diversity and build community with those around them. Children in diverse classrooms will build self esteem as they read/hear books in which their culture or ethnicity is represented. (Note: All books in this set are in English. Educators looking for bilingual multicultural books, click here or visit Language Lizard’s language-specific pages.)
In a previous article, we offered tips to get you started in terms of choosing the right bilingual baby books, making dedicated reading time and reading with enthusiasm. In this post, we would like to offer some of our favorite bilingual books for babies and toddlers.
In a recent interview published in the Princeton Alumni Weekly, Casey Lew-Williams, co-director of the Princeton Baby Lab and Princeton assistant professor of psychology, discussed research regarding how young children learn and communicate, and how this supports their development. Lew-Williams mentions that quality of speech comes first, and then quantity. In other words, it’s not important to talk all the time; even when playing with a young child, you’re interacting with them and exposing them to language, often in creative and meaningful ways.
In terms of reading to babies and young children, he says: “Reading is another fantastic way to expose a child to language. Ideally you’re not just reading the pages in a book. You’re pausing to engage with the child: How does this relate to his or her life? Children’s books are more diverse in terms of vocabulary and grammar than speech. So there’s an extra value to reading, because it gets parents outside their own natural tendencies or conversational topics and into the language and ideas of an author.”
In this bilingual board book by Annie Kubler, little fingers have fun finding the pre-cut holes on each page, while singing along as the driver and passengers of the bus ride through town!
Summer is a great time to enjoy fresh food, try new recipes, and connect with family by sharing both a good meal and a good book. Language Lizard is making that easier with our “COOK & READ” Giveaway where you can win a cookbook and a bilingual book.
Family Language Learning: Learn Another Language, Raise Bilingual Children
Written by Christine Jernigan, PhD
Paperback and ebook
Review by Sue Kwon
Inspired by her experiences with foreign language learning, in professional settings and in her own family, Christine Jernigan, PhD, set out to write a unique guide for parents who want to raise their kids to speak more than one language. Specifically, Family Language Learning is designed for parents who are still in the process of learning a second “target” language themselves, or who are fluent but living in a country where another language is dominant. Jernigan, who instructs foreign language teachers at North Carolina State University and works as a language coach for parents, writes in a flowing, humorous and engaging style. The many personal anecdotes told by the author, as well as by other parents raising bilingual children, range from amusing to deeply moving. Readers will find themselves relating wholeheartedly to the language learning adventures (and misadventures) these parents have experienced.
This book is meant to be a how-to guide, or “springboard” as Jernigan calls it, for parents in the early stages of teaching their children a new language. It is also intended as a motivational tool, or “cheerleader” for when those parents inevitably run into roadblocks, or are feeling discouraged. Throughout, readers are encouraged to remain flexible, and to make adjustments when a situation demands it: “Keep your language plan in play dough, not stone,” as Jernigan very nicely puts it.
Family Language Learning stands out particularly because of Jernigan’s unique approach to the subject of language learning. While most experts focus on the academic, social and economic benefits of learning a second language (as does Jernigan, from the very first chapter), this author also explores in depth the greater emotional bond that learning a new language can create.
This book is accessible to every stage of language learner, even those at the very start of their journey. Concepts and terminology are explained in a clear and concise manner that assumes you have arrived with no prior language training. Each chapter delves into a different aspect of language learning, from why it’s important for your children to learn a new language to why you should encourage your kids to read foreign language material on their own, and how to motivate them to practice writing in the target language.
While Family Language Learning can easily be read cover-to-cover, thanks to Jernigan’s conversational style of writing, the chapters are broken into sub-sections that also make it easy to flip to the particular topic you’re seeking answers to. So, even when you’re well into your language journey, you can find just the right words of guidance and encouragement you need when you reach a bump in the road.
Family Language Learning
Additional, valuable information on bilingualism and language learning can be found in A Parents’ and Teachers’ Guide to Bilingualism by Colin Baker, a classic book in the field now in its fourth edition. This book is an extremely thorough guide for teachers of bilingual students, as well as parents who are raising bilingual children, whether they are fluent in the second language or not.
A Parents’ and Teachers’ Guide to Bilingualism can serve almost as an encyclopedia of language learning because it offers a wealth of information on a very wide range of topics. Each chapter is dedicated to distinct subjects, like “Family Questions,” “Language Development Questions” and “Reading and Writing Problems,” and within each chapter are Frequently Asked Questions that Baker has encountered over decades of working with parents and colleagues in bilingual education, as well as in his personal experience successfully raising three bilingual children.
A Parents’ and Teachers’ Guide to Bilingualism (4th ed)
