Teaching a Foreign Language In Your Homeschool
Do you want to add a foreign language in your homeschool? Not sure how to add it so it will be fun for the whole family? Let’s have a chat about TalkBox.Mom and how it can help you add learning a foreign language to your homeschool.
Teaching a Foreign Language In Your Homeschool
Having multiple children at different levels sometimes makes it a little bit difficult to teach a subject at once without having to do a ton of work to alter the curriculum to their levels. As the years’ pass, it seems like I have less and less time to devote to each child for every subject. While my daughter can do some work independently, my son demands constant attention. It can get frustrating, which is why I like to bundle up the subjects to things they can both do as much as possible. I am so excited to share how I am bundling up a foreign language in our homeschool with TalkBox.Mom. Before we continue, please take a moment to pin this post to your homeschool board.
Adding a Foreign Language in Your Homeschool
Deciding to add a foreign language in your homeschool is a personal decision. While in most cases it isn’t required, many times it is requested from your children or maybe even you have been interested in studying a certain language and having your children know it as well.
There are many reason why learning a foreign language is a good idea.
Why Learn a Foreign Language?
Learning a foreign language is beneficial in both ways you can see and can’t see. In our current interconnected and interdependent world, having another language under your belt is a vital skill that allows you to engage in the world in a more meaningful way. Let’s break it down in our list of ten benefits to learning a foreign language.
Ten Benefits of Learning a Foreign Language are:
- Connect. As humans, we thrive on connecting with others. Being able to communicate with someone in his or her own language is an amazing gift. Bilingual individuals have the unique opportunity to communicate with a wider range of people in their personal and professional lives.
- Career Advancement. Language skills can be a significant advantage that sets you apart from your peers. No matter what the career, the demand for bilingual professionals is growing.
- Brain Benefits. There are brain benefits of learning languages. People who speak more than one language have improved memory, problem-solving and critical thinking skills, enhanced concentration, multitasking ability, and better listening skills.
- Cultural Connections. Language is the most direct connection to other cultures, therefore being able to communicate in another language exposes us to and offers an appreciation for the traditions, religions, arts, and history of the people associated with that language. Creating more cultural understanding and positive attitudes toward the culture associated with the language.
- Access to the World. Traveling as a person who can speak the language can transform a trip abroad. It can change you from a tourist to someone who can fit in with the locals and open doors to opportunities for studying and working abroad.
- Gain Perspective. Exploring a new language and culture naturally leads us to draw comparisons to what is most familiar. When we learn about another culture, we shed light on the good and bad things in our own culture that we may not have been aware of.
- Enhances your first language and aids you in learning more languages. Did you know that learning a second language improves communication skills and multiplies your vocabulary in your first language? Especially among children, because when you learn a new language, you develop new brain networks that are primed and ready when you embark on learning a third or fourth language.
- Access to foreign media and entertainment. Our world is filled with more than 6,000 spoken languages. Learning another language opens doors to more information. When you add a second language, you then have access to all the information in that language.
- Grows Your Confidence. Learning, especially learning a foreign language, often requires putting yourself out there and moving out of your comfort zone. Creating a sense of accomplishment when conversing with someone in their native language.
- Strengthening Decision Making Skills. When we deliberate in a foreign language, we distance ourselves from our first language and therefore distance ourselves from the emotional responses and biases held from our native language. Creating more systematic and clear-headed decisions based on facts.
Learning a Foreign Language with TalkBox.Mom
A few weeks ago we received our first TalkBox.Mom and it changed the way we all started learning Spanish in our homeschool. We have used other tools in our homeschool to teach or learn a foreign language but TalkBox.Mom is a way for us all to learn at one time. It isn’t a curriculum as much as a lifestyle. Kind of like homeschooling!
TalkBox.Mom is subscription-based and it’s designed to have you speaking the foreign language from the moment you open your first box. Instead of spending a ton of time navigating the world of conjugations and worksheets, TalkBox.Mom focuses on actually speaking the language in your home.
We are using TalkBox.Mom to learn Spanish in our home together, it’s incorporated in our daily lives. The charts live on our fridge and closet door now, and we are all learning together. I love that feature! I love that I am not expected to be teaching something I hardly know, but we can all be learning alongside one another.
Subscription? How does it work?
TalkBox.Mom is subscription-based, and you have a lot of control over how you receive and use your subscription. Some of us work on the challenges weekly, others monthly or something in between. You can purchase 1 subscription box and pay as you go, renewing every 1, 2, or 3 months. You can purchase 4 boxes at once, and this renews every 4.8. or 12 months, or you can purchase 9 boxes at once. All renewals can be canceled anytime, and the price depends on if you buy in bulk, but one box costs about $80.00.
What’s in the TalkBox.Mom Subscription Box?
In our first box, we received creative printed materials to display around our home. Which means I don’t have to print anything myself! These materials include ways to track your progress and charts with words and phrases to use in our daily lives.
There is also a handy phrasebook that works with all your TalkBox.Mom subscription boxes, a great tip is to look up the phrases you use on a daily basis in your home and work on those first.
There is also an app. It may be hard to pronounce words that are foreign language; that is why the TalkBox.Mom app comes in handy. Download the app and look up the phrases that you use or the ones for each challenge. Listen, and recite these words and phrases as you work through your challenges and start incorporating them into your daily life.
In each box there are three challenges, start with your guide to phrases, work on vocab and add cards to the where items live to remind you to use these new words and phrases.
TalkBox.Mom in Our Homeschool
We are enjoying the TalkBox.Mom approach to learning Spanish. It has been a gentle and applicable transition. We are not learning how to ask directions to the library or asking what time the train is leaving. Instead, we start off with food and how to let others know we are hungry or all done. This helped us be able to begin right away by using the language in our daily lives.
We loved how this program was more based on speaking the language right away, versus understanding the grammar and conjugation. Although you can totally add that if your child is interested. My daughter enjoyed writing out the words she was practicing on a dry erase board, but my son did not and it wasn’t required.
Be Consistent with TalkBox.Mom
It is easy for the charts to start blending into your other décor and forgetting to use the foreign language instead of English when you are in a rush or frustrated. However, taking a moment to switch things up (like where your charts are) or going through the phrases of the day each and every day can make all the difference. Consistency is key, you must be consistent with anything you want to accomplish or learn. TalkBox.Mom is there to support you every step of the way, with their lifetime access to the TalkBox.Mom app, their private Facebook group which provides resources, accountability, support, and encouragement to help your family grow into their second language.
Learning alongside my children is one of the best things about our homeschool and I love learning Spanish with them. TalkBox.Mom offers a plethora of languages that you can try in your homeschool. You can try out French, German, Hebrew, Portuguese, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Romanian, Russian, and of course Spanish. If you just can’t decide which language to tackle in your homeschool, TalkBox.Mom can help. TalkBox.Mom’s mission to create conversational comfort and competency in almost any place in the world is what makes it stand out from all the competitors.
Looking For More?
Are you looking for more? Additional items are available through TalkBox.Mom Academy and Bookstore, with more printables, books, and even supplements like math in Spanish. These items can be purchased separately with no obligation or order a box, but the support and audio downloads are only available to subscribers. If you’re interested in checking out how TalkBox.Mom works, you can join The Ball Challenge for free. The Ball Challenge provides lists of phrases emailed to you each week, for four weeks, and even additional resources once the challenge is up.
Win a TalkBox.Mom For Your Homeschool
TalkBox.Mom Will Help You Win At Learning Foreign Language in Your Homeschool
Like many of you, we are busy trying to juggle all the things. Multiple kids, multiple levels, different learning styles. TalkBox.Mom is a great way to meet all their and my needs. We have enjoyed incorporating Spanish into our daily lives and gaining more confidence in our abilities to speak and understand Spanish. If you are looking for a gentle way to add a foreign language into your homeschool, try TalkBox.Mom, you are sure to enjoy it! For $20 off the first box+book. Use code: thankful. Offer expires Dec. 20, 2020.
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