Monthly Archives: April 2015

Inviting Montessori to nuestra casa

Posted in Education & Learning, Play, RIE/Respectful parenting by

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Beauty. Order. Concentration. Harmony. Nature. Child-centered learning. At home.

Beginning with Cristina’s wonderful blog on the integration of Montessori philosophy in the home, followed by our family’s recent visit to a local bilingual Montessori school, and ending with my reading the highly-recommended Simplicity Parenting (book review forthcoming), I decided to rethink and redecorate nuestra casa to better accommodate E. and to her facilitate her play and learning. I found that both personally and professionally (from the perspective of a former teacher), I resonate with the  Montessori philosophy. Continue reading →

Adjusting your family’s language policy – part 2 (Family Fridays)

Posted in Families & Interviews by

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 (Photo via Carissa Rogers, Flickr CC)

¡Feliz viernes, amig@s! Today I’m excited to bring your part 2 of a special installment of Family Fridays: adjusting your family’s language policy. (You can read part 1 here.)

Three multilingual blogger mamás share their experiences with making a changes to their home language plan. We’ll first hear from Jen, who you may remember from this past Family Friday interview; Becky, who lives in Texas with her husband and five children; and, Maria, trilingual mom living in France.

If you and your family are considering adjusting your language plan, I hope you will find helpful advice and encouragement from today’s moms.

Happy reading, and happy weekend! Continue reading →

Book Review: “Unconditional Parenting” by Alfie Kohn

Posted in RIE/Respectful parenting by

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 (Photo via Stephan Hocchaus, Flickr CC)

All children have one basic need: to be loved unconditionally.

This is the basic premise of American author Alfie Kohn’s 2005 book Unconditional Parenting: moving from rewards and punishments to love and reason. What parent would disagree with that? I don’t think any.

But, what if I said to you that Kohn argues that the traditional parenting method of punishing bad behavior and rewarding good behavior actually sends a message of conditional love to our children? Skeptical? Me, too, before reading this book. But, now that I’ve finished it, I cannot recommend it enough for parents. In fact, it has also made me reflect on my eight years of teaching; so, I would also recommend it to teachers. Continue reading →

Adjusting your family’s language policy – part 1 (Family Fridays)

Posted in Families & Interviews by

bilingual parenting bilingualism multilingual family language linguistics family language plan espanolita

 (Photo via Carissa Rogers via Flickr CC)

Read any book or website on multilingual parenting and one of the first pieces of advice given to new parents is: decide on your family’s language policy.

The second piece of advice? Be consistent. Stick with your plan and get support from your extended family and community.

But, what that new parent might be hard pressed to find is advice on how, why, and when to change the original family language policy. Continue reading →

On my bedside table (and, in my Feedly) – part 7

Posted in Education & Learning by

books libros reading espanolita bilingual parenting bilingualism(Photo via Sharon & Niki McCutcheon, Flickr Creative Commons)

“It is what you read when you don’t have to that determines who you will be when you can’t help it.”

– Oscar Wilde

Periodically here on the blog I share with you what I’ve been reading lately, both in the way of books (on my bedside table) and blogs (in my Feedly). Hope you find something that grabs your interest. Happy reading! Continue reading →