How can you introduce your homeschooler to the world community while increasing his/her written and verbal communication skills? There’s only one answer: teach your child to speak and understand a new language.

With a little preparation and the right tools, you don’t need to be fluent in a foreign language to teach it effectively. Here are some simple tips to help you get started:

• Head to your local library to find foreign language picture books with pronunciations. Better yet, ask the audio-visual desk if they have books on tape so that your child can hear a native speaker.
• Check out videos and movies with a bilingual approach… or, for more advanced students, subtitles.
• Look in the newspaper for local events related to holidays around the world. Attending a Cinco de Mayo event for instance, is a great way to learn Mexican songs and activities.
• Watch sports such as soccer on a foreign language television station and try to follow the commentary.
• Plan an activity with a family from another part of the world. Ask that child and his/her parent to speak in their native language for the afternoon.
• If you can’t afford to travel to another country anytime soon, visit the “Chinatown” or “Little Italy” in a nearby American city.
• Use the endless resources on the World Wide Web. For French instruction, visit http://www.parlez-vous.org. For Spanish, try http://www.espanole.org. And there’s a variety at http://www.csun.edu/~hcedu013/eslsp.html.
• Consider inviting a foreign exchange student to live in your home for a summer, six months, or a whole year.

Finally, remember that children will be most excited by language instruction if they can see it in action and put it to use. If you can provide your child with a relaxed environment in which to practice the words and phrases that he/she has learned, your child will gain the confidence necessary to pursue that language to fluency.

What are your favorite ways to incorporate culture & foreign language in your home? Come join in the discussion at the Homeschool Bliss Forum.

These and many more great tips can be found at www.Homeschool.com