Hi! Just looking for recommendations/suggestions. I have a two year old and we would love to start teaching him Cantonese as his English is just exploding right now. My husband is Chinese/speaks Cantonese with his family but I’m Caucasian and at home we only really speak English so he feels he’s losing his skill.
I’ve used dropps before but just wondering if anyone has any videos/apps/suggestions for helping us to introduce Cantonese to our toddler?
The most important things is forcing them to respond in cantonese, instead of responding in English, and giving them actual feedback, as in responding when they speak. Watching Cantonese media wouldn’t work unless they have very solid grasp of the language. One method is for your husband to only speak Cantonese to them and only response if they speak it back, ignored when speaking English.
Many bilingual children come from a household speaking the language at home and it is different from school. So speaking cantonese at home and having them speak/learn english outside will help them know both naturally at daily life levels.
If you don’t know cantonese you could learn it together with your baby, after all having them start to use cantonese at home and not be able to communicate with you may create a conflict for the child (I’ve heard of similar issues but every child is different).
Hambaanglaang! I’d recommend buying their readers, but it’s all on YouTube and pdfs on their website too. It’s great especially if you don’t know how to read Chinese characters.
My ex and I have been using a ‘one parent one language’ model: I speak Danish, their mother speaks Cantonese, and then we speak English to eachother.
Our 8 year old masters all 3 languages quite well by now, our 3 year old seems to have figured out that if he just speak English, we all understand… In that case I simply repeat what he says in Danish and ask if that’s what he means.
Anyway, getting some Cantonese content helps a lot, for instance Peppa pig is easy to find the same episodes in all 3 languages, and since kids like repetition it’s just about shuffling up the languages a bit. I see in other comments that bluey is also available in Cantonese, and that show can usually keep our 3 year olds attention.
Disney has a lot of Cantonese dubs. I just watched Nightmare Before Christmas, Enchanted, and The Lion King in Cantonese. I’ve also watched Lonesome Ghosts (1937), Trick or Treat (1952), and The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949) in Cantonese on the app. The dubs are very accurate IMO. My husband (he’s white and I’m a native speaker from HK) watched them with me since they’re also English subbed.
I recommend showing Cantonese dubbed Ultraman, they upload their superhero vs monster shows onto their Cantonese YouTube Channel for free.
Though most of them are blocked inside North America, becauce of licensing laws. A vpn would circumvent that if you have one and it’s also on ViuTV, though that is a Hong Kong-Macau only service.
Great responses already! Get your husband to only speak Cantonese with your son so he associate it as such. Also check out some (Disney) Cantonese dubs — and compliment with Cantonese songs.
Only my husband will be able to do this at this point since I’m planning to learn along with my toddler but maybe at least he could do this! Thank you!