Teaching children to read at an early age is the key to success. We taught our first child to read at age 3, using flashcards.

That does not mean that all children should go to school at an early age. Our study of bilingualism in this website refers to learning the language at home.

Our children felt the importance of knowing English. We are big readers and that showed the children that reading is fun. As they grew older we added other activities. We taught them how to write and they wrote letters to their Bubbe and Zeide who live in America. We made birthday cards and holiday cards and sent them to aunts, uncles, and cousins in America. They learned to write stories and poetry. They saw their father working away at the computer writing articles, translating, and running his many discussion groups. They saw their mother working as a typist and writing poetry. We taught them how to type. It was all important, yet it was all fun. At the age of four our youngest said, "Please teach me how to type." She was too young and her fingers wouldn't reach. At the age of five she said, "Now I'm a big girl. I'm in kindergarten. Please teach me how to type. Everyone else knows how to type. I also want to know." What motivation!

We did all of this in English since that is our mother tongue. We have friends who did a similar thing in Russian and others, although to a lesser degree, in French. The language doesn't matter. It's the bilingualism that's important.

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