Learning German, advice or help appreciated!

[Aroura]

Hi all,

So, as some of you know I homeschool my daughter.  We started learning German last year, because I think being bilingual is one of the best gifts I can give her for her future. 

We are using Duoling (it's free), but I'd like to supplement it with some cartoons, TV programs, and such.  It's not total immersion, but something I understand still helps tremendously.

I am wondering if anyone can recommend a youtube channel, or perhaps specific shows I might find out there on the interwebs somewhere that are in German, but aimed at children, or at least, family oriented.  

Also, if anyone other bilingual people have any advice for teaching her (and myself) a foreign language, it would be much appreciated!

Aroura

[Longhorn]

Sorry, can't help with materials, just general tips for learning languages that I'm sure you've already heard, like speak from day 1, try to name things during the day and jot down the ones you don't know (but 20 max), check and memorize them. Listen A LOT, and read as much as you can too. And all that

[I_am_not_mafia]

I've been trying to read comics in German because it's visually appealing and keeps my interest compared to a wall of impenetrable text.

My dad is a native German but he never spoke German to me at home so unfortunately I'm having to teach myself at the age of 40. I'm currently using duolingo myself to improve my grammar. I still use memrise but I think I have enough words now (almost 5,000).

The sense of reward from learning a language comes when you use it or understand something. My theory is that children aren't actually better at learning a language, they're just not expected to know as many words and so have less to learn. So whether it's a child learning their native language or an adult learning a foreign language, a good way of learning a language is to read books and watch television where the language is very basic.

A colleague of mine is a computational linguist and when I worked with her she taught herself Swedish by borrowing another colleague's children's books and working her way up. When I had some German lessons in Munich the first thing my teacher told me to do was to buy a book. So I bought the Hobbit. There's also the Harry Potter series because they start off as children's books as well.

Having a pen-pal is also quite useful, although nowadays with the Internet you can go on discussion forums and find people to converse with.

[Longhorn]

Oh by the way, anki is a good program for memorizing vocabulary. Not sure if your daughter would like it, but it could be useful

[abaris]

Also, if anyone other bilingual people have any advice for teaching her (and myself) a foreign language, it would be much appreciated!

Aroura

In my case it was mostly books, tv shows and movies that helped me learn english. You could show her the German version of Sesame Street (Sesamstraße). It's the American franchise, only with German actors and most of all in German. I just checked that there are a lot of clips on youtube.

[Angrboda]

There are services on the interwebz for pairing German speakers learning English with English speakers learning German, via skype/email/etc. Continual practice hearing and speaking is important. If you can find a German roundtable where people get together and speak only in German, that is useful as well. A lot of them are organized by colleges and universities. And check meetup.com for a German language group near you.

[Alex K]

Many shows you might know exist in German, you might select one that she knows and watch some episodes in German.

If you are looking for a native speaker to exchange some silly emails in German with and answer all kinds of questions concerning the language or culture, you can pm me if you want and I give you my email

[TheRealJoeFish]

Many shows you might know exist in German, you might select one that she knows and watch some episodes in German.

I watch Futurama with French audio occasionally.  I've seen every episode (of the original run) approximately 25 to 30 times, so it works really well as a listening aid because I know what everyone's saying

[Aroura]

Thank you all for your help and advice.

I let her play on the Sesamstraße website after lunch, and she loved it! We also watched some simple nursery rhyme songs on youtube. Her favorite show is Teen Titans Go! I wonder if I can find that in German?

These were all great suggestions, again, thank you.

[abaris]

Her favorite show is Teen Titans Go!  I wonder if I can find that in German?  

If that's the show, I found at least one episode.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wbr92Tw8YuQ

That guy has a lot of toon shows in German.