Since we bought the books, I’ve been showing them to Darius on a daily basis. Thinking of getting more storybooks to read aloud to him since he’s able to sit on my lap for longer periods now without fussing.

We are reading to him in Mandarin for these two books at the moment because our intention is to build his mandarin foundation before his english. Besides, these two books do not have a continuous story and he is still too young to read now. We will try to buy more books in both languages soon.

Showing Darius colours and texture

I love the textures and bright colours in this book. When I show Darius, I say, “粉红色…粉红色的鸟. 绿色…绿色的蜥蜴”…the colour followed by the animal’s name. Later when he’s older, I’ll teach him the printed english text.

He is able to stare at the book and touch the realistic textures using his left hand with me holding it. He resists however when I hold his right hand to touch. He also does not open his right palm fully to feel while there’s no problem with his left. At first, he couldn’t reached the end of the book. He’ll be crying to stop.

Perhaps it’s too realistic? or is he just bored? His reaction seemed to be a little afraid of the prints as he refuses to touch.(He has no problems with grabbing rings and touching other stuff). After a few tries now, he is able to see for longer period without fuss and able to ‘stroke’ the animal picture.

Learning body parts

For this, the protuding monkey helps Darius to have an idea of body parts because monkey faces are the closest to how a human looks. His hands can grab the ear and nose. We go, “鼻子。。。嘴巴。。。耳朵。。。眼睛”, pointing at them or holding his hand to touch them at the same time.

At first when I shake the monkey (it has a rattle sound), he doesn’t seem to like it and cries out. Now after a few more times, he’s more accustomed to it and doesn’t fuss. I wondered again whether it’s because he has restricted vision since it’s thrust in front of his face (he likes viewing the surroundings) or it seemed too real to him and too close for comfort.

cute parts to explore for little hands

For the inside of the book, I read to him in simple Mandarin too. For example, naming the animal and telling him what they are doing…”袋鼠…袋鼠跳跳”.

I will still read full english storybooks to him in English to cultivate his interest in reading but when we speak to him on daily stuff, it’ll be in Mandarin because both of us communicate in Mandarin.

Chinese being a second language is seldom used in school so it will be lost pretty soon if he does not use it at home. Both of us grew up in non-english speaking family and got to learn english only when we were in schools because our parents do not speak the language. Hence, getting Darius to speak Mandarin will help in communicating with his grandparents.

Many parents worry that if the child communicates in mandarin, he’ll have difficulty later on in school. Hence, they start speaking to them in english right from birth. However, they themselves communicate with their partners and parents in Mandarin. I read that children does not really learn language by you speaking to them but more from what they hear going around them. That is, they hear their parents speaking to each other and learn words from there. So it’s pretty strange to me to see parents speaking to their child in english and the next minute, speaking to each other in Mandarin.

Most of the time, their english is also ‘broken’ or singlish because they are afraid the children cannot understand long sentences. I do not think this will benefit the child at all. Instead, the teacher might have to correct the child’s english in school later on. For example, I overheard this, ‘Don’t touch, this is XX’s one’. (this thing belongs to XX). ‘ 你要不要吃fish?(the item in english while the rest in Mandarin).

I’m not afraid that Darius would get a late start in english compared to his peers. Both of us are University graduates, proficient in english even though our parents never spoke the language. Our chinese foundation is strong too. I never had problems getting good grades for my chinese language while I see quite a lot of my classmates struggling with it at AO level. I only learned english when I was five and entered preschool. I taught myself english through schooling, reading storybooks, newspapers and watching subtitles in drama. Of course, I’m not excellent in the English language but I do not think I’m that bad or find it difficult to cope.

(MM Lee’s s views on the chinese language summarised; Full pdf document on his speech)

Chinese Language is definitely more difficult to learn than English so once he is able to speak fluently, reading and writing will come easily. It will be certainly be useful for him later on in life.

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