This tailored language course focuses more on the trainees’ Achille’s heel. As a trainer, I have constructed a special test to determine the trainees’ level of language comprehension. After the assessment, the trainees are then being drilled intensively according to their level of understanding and capacity to learn- taking into account their personal ability, character, background and culture. Each learning scheme is uniquely design to fit the dress of the wearer.

After two consecutive months of intensive training with two different trainees, I honestly discovered that all roads lead to Rome. It is not at the end of the road yet, nevertheless, so far as I can tell, it has been a very fruitful journey for both the trainees and the trainer. 

“  You give but little when you give of your possession. It is when you give of yourself that you truly give ”      

A truly beautiful and worthy quote. Something we all ought to carve onto our hearts indefinitely. Plenty of hearts out there are blackened by the stubborness of penurious and greediness. This is hard to swallow but true in reality. Most people take things all for granted. Plenty of us totally ignore, and some even forget that countless of people out there are so unfortunate, naked and beggared from all the necessities which we humans need to survive. Sadly to say, most of them are children.

 It is not easy to lean a hand, or even to part with some of your precious belongings and (worse!) offer them to anybody who truly needs it. The first thought that usually comes to mind is that: hey, this belongs to me. I worked day and night for this, why should I give it to someone else?  There is a lot of truth in that sentence. People who genuinely work day and night to support themselves and families, they too, deserve to have ‘something’  in life.  Who’s to say that they shouldn’t? However, everybody deserves to have that little ‘something’ too. Nobody deserves any less. After all, part of life is giving…

One thing that all hard working people have in common is that they tend to accumulate material things. Yes, they do. They start spending what they thought they need and most of these ‘stuff’ are all piled up somewhere, either in the attic, or closets, or in the basement, or garages etc. The point is: they collect, they accumulate, they gather. Up to a point where there is no return for some people !

But, seriously! Do they actually need all of these things? Some say, yes, some say, not really, and some even say NO. Imagine, collecting all those things just to say NO at the end. NOPE, I don’t really use it actually. I have no freaking idea why I bought the thing. Shocking, isn’t it? To think that people spent enormous amount of money to buy things they do NOT need.

What about toys? Is that luxurious goods or neccessity? To the ‘little people’, toys are considered as a neccessity. I am not referring to the luxurious, too sophisticated, high-tech toys that only the children of the Rich and Famous could afford. I am talking about the real simple toys. Toys help children to grow and to nourish. Toys also build bridges between children no matter where they are. I am saying this because two of the co-founders of the kids4kids club (created under the Lingua Franca Foundation) have decided that they, too, want to participate in the act of giving.

In order to promote diversity and international exchanges, the Lingua Franca Foundation has gone another step further with it’s activities.  This time, the kids4kids club have decided to part with their beloved toys and give them to other needy children who are at the other side of the globe.  Besides parting with their own toys, they have also collected toys from other children who share the same idea and philosophy  - help and give to other needy children. The children have been collecting toys since January 2010 and have piled up over more than 50 kilos worth of toys (soft, wodden, plastic etc).

Finally, the Lingua Franca Foundation is very proud to annouce that…

On the 10th of  May 2010, the Lingua Franca Foundation has taken it’s wings and flown all the way to the eastern part of the globe : a country called Malaysia. There, Lingua Franca Foundation has marked it’s first donation by giving away their first batch of toys (collected by the kids4kids club) to the director of  Hotel Abadi – a hotel which is located in the state of Melaka.

 This hotel is conducting a special on-going campaign to help distribute used toys and clothing to the poor and needy children in Malaysia. This is an on-going project, therefore, the kids4kids club will continue to collect more toys and also chilren’s clothing for the needy children.

We are also calling for more volunteers who are willing to help gather more toys and children’s clothing in their area. We are also hoping for more collaboration with schools and other institutions for more help.

 If you, your child, your family, your child’s school, your workplace, or anybody who you know, want to participate in this noble project, please contact us by clicking here,

and if you want to support our work by donation, please click here.

Because of this great interest, the Foundation has created a club for kids – which one of the objectives is – to also initiate such project among children.  It is also another approach to reach out to all types of children despite their nationality, race and religion. What more of a better way than children reaching out to other children? They can learn to encourage and support each other – giving hand to-hand guidance – while having fun together and getting to know one another more thoroughly and put aside their differences to find a common ground between them so that they can live in a more harmonious way.

So, there it is! It’s now OFFICIAL ! The Stichting Lingua Franca Foundation is now a member and supporter of the Piccolingo Campaign. For your information, the Piccolingo Campaign is an initiative from the  European Union under Education and Culture DG.

Marco Bertolini, the co-Founder of Lingua Franca Foundation, has been appointed as a supporter  for the Piccolingo Campaign for Belgium from PICCOLINGO.

boy reading a book

I have been speaking English with my children since they were born. It’s not their only language since we speak more than three languages in the house. But to my astonishment, my children are able to recognise words and sentences from any English book and are able to read them fluently. All I know is that, all these years we never stop talking and practising the language. We speak English every single day.

One thing here that I feel the urge to mention is that I make sure the children speak proper English. Not any ‘broken’ English as most people put it. I have the tendency to keep correcting their sentences whenever there is the need for correction. This is because I know for a fact that it is crucial to speak the language correctly so that the person receiving the information will benefit from understanding fully what you want to relay in the first place – hopefully without having to repeat over and over again for clarity.

boy and girl reading a book

Now, it seems that my hard work has been paid off – slowly (I am waiting for a big fat cheque at the end of all this! Haha, just kidding…) Honestly, I am genuinely happy to see that my children are benefiting our endless effort all these years.   There are a lot of sweat and tears along the journey, however, I am more than satisfied with the fruitful result. Imagine that throughout the years,  it was I  who read the books to the children almost every night. And now? Now, it’s totally a different story altogether. It’s a total opposite, really!  The children are the ones who read pirate adventures books, or stories about beautiful princesses and the ever lasting Prince Charming. Or stories about little boys and girls, or stories about frogs and swans, gnomes and fairies and even funny comic books to me instead! You should have seen the look in their eyes once they start reading on their own. As if they have found the long lost treasure  from Treasure Island. They are so proud to tell me, ” I can read, mama…. I can read!”

With this, I am now teaching the children the proper structure of the language through writing. I do not have to start at the very beginning since this is no longer an unfamiliar territory.  I am sure that the children will have more pleasure in learning the language  thoroughly since I am already seeing signs of ‘having so much fun‘ while they are reading and writing English. I am entirely convinced that the children will be able to read, write, speak and hear the language in full gear in the very near future! Never under estimate the power of the mind of a child….

]]> http://linguafrancafoundation.org/2010/01/10/uuhh-uuuhh-mama-i-can-read/feed/ 0 Suziana Salleh boy reading book boy and girl reading http://linguafrancafoundation.org/2009/11/18/piccolingo-in-the-netherlands/ http://linguafrancafoundation.org/2009/11/18/piccolingo-in-the-netherlands/#comments Wed, 18 Nov 2009 06:43:26 +0000 Suziana Salleh http://linguafrancafoundation.wordpress.com/?p=414 Continue reading →]]>

The Piccolingo logo

As you have read about the Piccolingo – an European program aimed to promote early language learning for preschool children; I am wondering  and strongly hoping that this sort of project is achievable and manageable in the Dutch region.

The Lingua Franca Foundation (Lingua Franca Academy) – is seriously promoting such cause – wanting full exposure for very young children to adapt to more than one language. Having to master more than one language is considered a skill – and to be able to learn and sharpen one skill at a very tender age is a long lasting investment! Not many children having this unique advantage, but those who do, should be given full boost to further their knowledge in this field.

From my understanding and observation all these years, I can conclude that foreigners come to settle in this land of tulips for plenty of reasons. Some for work and business opportunity, some for furthering their education and knowledge, others for private reasons; for example wanting to re-connect to families who migrated  to the the Netherlands long ago, and most of them come to this country for the sake of love. Here in the Netherlands, it is common to see many ‘mixed’ couple with ‘mixed’ children strolling down the street. Seeing that many children come from a ‘mixed’ environment – having families coming from diverse backgrounds and speak with more than one language – this environment should be more encouraging – and not being oppressed nor ignored! – to suit the need of the present and the future. It is proven worldwide that people who possess and practice more than one language can benefit more in life.

Most pre-schools here in the Netherlands only stress the importance of one language; the Dutch language. Learning another language is only stressed upon after the age of 10 in the dutch school system. This is definitely not an ideal learning environment since brain stimulation for languages starts at a very tender age. It is  not a complicated manner. It’s rather simple actually. The younger you are, the easier and faster your brain capacity to absorb all information – ESPECIALLY when it comes to language. The brain works as a sponge – absorbing every word and store them all. The understanding of the word comes a bit later, but the very least is that the brain has been exposed to a ‘new’ word every time permissible!

It would be an idealistic world if you could see all generations able to socialize respectfully and with tolerance. Can this be possible? I surely think it is! If so, how? Well, personally, I think having knowledge of more than one language can break that barrier that keeps us apart and being ignorant. Language is a means of communicating; and to know more languages  brings people closer and open their minds to the differences they have and learn to understand how to live with one another respectfully and harmoniously.

Everything has to start from somewhere. So, I think it is  extremely crucial to start to learn another language from a very tender age. Not only the children learn another language and having fun by doing it, in addition and most importantly, they also learn that the world do not only revolve around them and they have to learn to live together and respect each other’s differences despite colour, race, religion etc.  After all, at that tender age, children see pass the differences and the colour of the skin due to their  purified souls. Then, perhaps, this idealistic world I mentioned before can actually exist…. Don’t you think so?

You can give us your opinion by completing the poll below…

You can also contribute to the discussion on our FaceBook Page here.

We appreciate your collaboration and we are really thankful for any ideas or suggestions, so don’t hesitate to make your opinion known to us.  Thank you.

]]> http://linguafrancafoundation.org/2009/11/18/piccolingo-in-the-netherlands/feed/ 0 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 Suziana Salleh logo_boca small world http://linguafrancafoundation.org/2009/11/17/bilingual-children-learn-better/ http://linguafrancafoundation.org/2009/11/17/bilingual-children-learn-better/#comments Tue, 17 Nov 2009 06:56:12 +0000 Marco Bertolini http://linguafrancafoundation.wordpress.com/?p=409 Continue reading →]]> Two days ago, I published a post about Piccolingo, an European program aimed to promote early language learning for preschool children.  Here, is an article I wrote several month ago on early language learning and its benefits.

Some myths and legends about language learning seem very difficult to eradicate…

One of the most ancient and long-lasting wrong idea about bilingualism is that children who are exposed to several languages at home face learning problems and are retarded in their acquisition of their mother tongue.

A new study of the Sissa (Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati – International High School for Advanced Studies) just demonstrates the opposite : children early exposed to bilingualism at home develop earlier and better learning capacities than monolingual kiddies…

Experiments carried on by Professor Jacques Mehler and Agnes Melinda Kovacs show that bilingual young children cope easier with some verbal stimuli based tests.

In one of these tests, children have to associate a sequence of sounds with the position of images on a screen.  For instance, when the  baby hears a sounds sequence based on a AAB pattern (like loloba), a puppet appears on the left of the screen.  When the sequence follows another pattern, ABA (like lobalo), the puppet appears on the right side of the screen.

Monolingual one year old children  can only anticipate the apparition of the puppet according to the AAB sequel while bilingual kids are able to predict the position of the puppet in both sequences.

According to the researchers, bilingual children develop an early ability to take in consideration the important things in a determined context, while their monolingual colleagues are lost in a dark forest of details…

Theses children, also develop – even before they talk ! – a capacity to observe the tiny linguistic nuances of the parents languages and can learn foreign languages easier and faster than monolingual children.

A good news for language lovers, isn’t it ?

If you want to know more about this research, you can read the press release of the Sissa or go to the Science Magazine website to read the abstract or purchase the full article.

“Every child should learn at least two languages”. The European Council.

The Piccolingo logo

For the European Union, “multilingualism lies at the heart of the EU.”  Therefore, the European Institutions, throughout the Lifelong Learning Program is supporting initiatives related to language learning.  For the European Commission, there are 3 strands of the multilingualism policy :

1. Encouraging language learning and promoting linguistic diversity in society.
2. Promoting a healthy multilingual economy.
3. Promoting social integration through improved knowledge and acceptance of languages.

As languages are one of the four key activities, the Lifelong Learning Program offers a wide range of actions designed to support language learning, including language learning at an early age.

The European Union is launching a campaign, named Piccolingo, through the 27 Member States.  This campaign aims at parents and seeks to raise awareness about the fact that young children who start learning languages at a very early age will, as they grow older, will confidently approach foreign languages and cultures.

Through the Piccolingo campaign, many parents will realise that learning languages before starting school is beneficial because their children will:

• Find communication easier
• Learn and memorise through play – good preparation for school
• Learn to be open-minded
• Feel at home in any country
• Increase their chances of finding a job
• Find foreign cultures alluring rather than threatening
• Appreciate their own culture

Piccolingo is also a network  throughout Europe.  Every association, group or network who wants to work in the field of early age language learning can be part of the scheme. Piccolingo supports actions such as :

• A cultural institute introducing parents and young children to language diversity during particular activities
• A child welfare association organising conferences on early language learning in a civic centre
• A local cultural association organising a multilingual storytelling event in a public library
• An immigrants’ association organising a multicultural event with immigrant families based on young children’s nursery rhymes from different countries
• A parents’ association organising a conference on early language learning at school
• A nursery school organising a multilingual event involving families

The support provided by the Piccolingo program consists essentially of sharing and mainstreaming.

Through the Piccolingo campaign, you can:

• Promote your initiatives and actions
• Present your organisation or network in a European directory
• Share and enrich your practices, resources and testimonials
• Use the Piccolingo logo for greater visibility

Find more about this program on the Piccolingo Website.

If you want to know more about the European Union Language Policy, visit this page.