About Best4Future Blog
Welcome to Best4Future blog! This blog was created by Lina Dickson, a mom who grew up frustrated in learning a foreign language in a non-native language environment.
This blog is an exploration of raising children with more than one language, a record of my efforts to teach Chinese to my daughter DD, and a journey to look for fun and effective ways to bring up baby bilingual.
Under the category Bilingual Baby, you can find comprehensive information concerning language/bilingual learning, parenting and teaching.
It aslo includes lessons on the simplest single Chinese words for daily usage, phrases, sentences, grammars, colloquiums, historical and cultural backgrounds, stories and etc.
As every other mother on this planet, I want to do well as a parent. I want to protect and ensure her healthy growth. I want to recognize, respect and nurture her natural development. I want to bring her up as a responsible person contributing to the society. This blog is an opportunity to share with you information on child education and caring (e.g. Get children eat vegetables) from my personal prospective.
Of course, this blog also includes DD’s personal stories geared to every stage of her growth (e.g. Baby’s Growth) and development. It started with my pregnancy, her birth story, first year, second year and will continue until she turns to 10. I cannot wait to see what she will look like by that time!
You are welcome to ride along with our journey and learn Chinese with DD! I hope you will enjoy the information and stories from this blog and share in the joy and fun with us!
I hope you will benefit from the information on this blog and enjoy your own experiences with your child’s education and growth process.
About Us
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DD: DD is a lovely little doll. She arrived in June 2008 at 6:00 Am. She was 21 inches long and weighed in at 7.06 pounds. She has my heart-shaped face, lovely flat nose, and pointed chin, along with M’s large eyes with long eyelashes, cherry little mouth and soft silky hair. I cannot wait to see what she will look like when she grows up! Click Baby’s Growth to see her personal stories geared to every stage.
Mommy: Hi, I am Lina Dickson, known as DD’s mommy in this blog. I dreamed about becoming a mom for 5 years. Now, at last, I am living my dream.
As to my interests, I love museums and libraries. They are the first places I would visit when I come to a new city. I can stay in an art museum or read in a city library for a whole day without feeling bored. These are the places which bring joy to my heart and peace to my soul.
A little more about me: in a previous life, I was a reporter, editor and assistant director in a provincial TV station in China until adventurous spirit and a full scholarship brought me to the U.S. to pursue Master degree. I have a Bachelor degree in International Journalism and a Master in Communication. I also finished all the classes required for the Ph. D degree.
He is highly intelligent, extraordinary smart, and surprisingly knowledgeable. He is an excellent computer architect and programmer who always bring out the best in coworkers and obtain the greatest value for the company. He is also a book lover.
Is there any fault of him? Yes (nobody is perfect). He is a little bit sensitive and stubborn.
Grandma: Grandma is M’s mother and my mother-in-law. She is one of the most amazing women I have even met. She raised four children, all turn out to be fine and all love and respect her.
As her children grew up, she went back to school in her 30s and had a successful teaching career. Now she is mostly retired, efficiently juggling a part-time job, charity activities, volunteer work, red hat events, bridging, and house chores. She does it all, and she does it all well. She loves books, libraries and museums too.
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awesome!
I think the first step to teach kids chinese is let them be involved in that environment.
Don’t push them too much, just let it goes and make them talk whenever and whatever they want.
@Peggie: That is a good advice! Yes, I do my best to provide DD a natural Chinese language envoronment, and wait patiently for her to begin to speak Chinese. Now she is starting to say few words, some in English and some in Chinese. And I encourage her to talk no matter which language.
mommy
Lina: Such a lovely place. Hugs to your DD.
@Ngoc: thank you! Definitely come to visit when you are in the town!
Dear Lina,
My name is Maria Retana, a writer for bilingual children’s books, (English/Spanish) I am creating an e-newsletter for teachers, parents, grandparents and educators in general. I wanted to know, since you have wonderful articles that I would love my subscribers to read, if I can have your link on my e-newsletter. Feel free to check my website to see what we are all about. Thank you and I hope we can work together some day.
Best Regards,
Maria Retana
author/presenter
@Maria: Yes, please feel free to put my link on your e-newsletter. It is my honor!
Also, I went to your website. I love your bilingual books. I am just thinking to add Spanish/English books to my bilingual bookstore (www.best4future.com). They are exactly what I am looking for!!
I will email you about the details. Have a nice holiday!
Lina
Hi Lina and DD
I really love your picture above especiall your daughter’s name which sounds so cuite. I will visit your book sotre as long as I have time cause I am a teacher. Blessings to you and your family!
@Yinfang: Nice to hear from you, old friends! Glad to reconnenct with you and I will call you soon. Happy Chinese Lunar New Year!
Hello, I want to express my congratulations for the initiative to help other parents with your experience about bilingual children.I’m a Portuguese teacher for foreign students and I have been teaching for children English and Spanish.It’s amazing to see how they learn so fast.By the way,my blog is http://paulopazpiece.wordpress.com/
Please,feel free to visit my blog about Portuguese Classes and if you know parents who need Portuguese ,you can indicate mine.
Obrigado,
Paulo
@paulo: Thank you for the warm encouragement! It definitely makes me feel great when knowing the work I have done got appreciated. Yes, I will mention your blog to other parents who are interested to teach their children Portuguese. Also, just for curiosity, are you teaching Portuguese in the US? Where do you get the text books and teaching materials?
Hello Lina -
I am glad that I found your website, it has lots of resource. I live in New Jersey and raise my children in French. As a family, we go 2h / week to chinese school on Saturdays to learn mandarin.
I am looking for French books, stories, DVDs that teach Chinese to French-speaking children. Do you know any books? Or any recommendation on where I could look? Or any contact you could have?
Xie xie for your help.
Franck
@Franck: Glad that you like my blog. Thank you for commenting! The books and DVDs I have in my bookstore are brought from China, a lot of them are bilingual (Chinese/English). It is really difficult to find French/Chinese children’s books and DVDs from Chinese publishers. I have beeing looking for them for a long time, since I want to expose French to my own daughter.
Good news is I now have a set of French/Chinese cartoon DVDs in my bookstore: http://www.best4future.com/bilingual-dvd-martin-morning-chinese-french-8-dvds-p-453. And I might have more French/Chinese books and DVDs coming in May or June. I will let you know when they arrive.
Also, I also have a number of Chinese children’s books that were translated from famous French writers, like T’chopi series and I love reading blue series. I will get the French original versions in the future when the bookstore grows a little bit bigger.
Hope this helps! Please feel free to ask if you have any inquiries.
Hi, Lina, it’s me. Nice to hear about you. Pls contact me.
@Liu Yan: Nice to hear from you!Could you please leave me the email or phone number? Thank you!
Great blog. Would you be interested in sharing some of your language experiences with us at InCultureParent.com? Pls email me to discuss more! Thank you.
@Stephanie: Sure, I would love to. I will email you soon.