teaching children Finnish

mmmsherman · Post by **mmmsherman** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 6:57 am

I was born & raised in Canada, both my parents are from Finland and taught us how to speak Finnish growing up so I speak fluently. I now live in Houston, TX and I am married to an American. We have two children, ages 3 & 6 yrs old together but I find it difficult to teach them how to speak Finnish because I do not have family nearby or any support groups/friends in here. I am looking for kid friendly books/dvds/websites/software that could help me teach the children to speak Finnish...although I speak fluently, I learned the language by ear so I'm not sure how I would go about teaching it.

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Hank W. · Post by **Hank W.** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 9:08 am

Well, finding some Finnish people in Houston isn't impossible. Should be a few families around, though are the Nokia people in Dallas or Houston?

Have you tried Finlandia Foundation/Houston, Jaana Gaspelin 1335 Park Wind Dr, Katy TX 77493 281-647-9217

EP · Post by EP » Wed Apr 11, 2007 11:45 am

I learned the language by ear so I'm not sure how I would go about teaching it.

Well, so did I, and every native speaker. That is why it is called native language, you learn it naturally by ear, without thinking a second thought. What bilingual families usually do: The mother speaks her language (and only that) to children, and the father speaks his language (and only that). Children grow up bilingual with two languages. You should have spoken Finnish from the very beginning, I am afraid that now you have already lost the "native" benefit. But you can still try, you don´t teach anything, you just speak.

Københavner · Post by **Københavner** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 1:26 pm

I get the impression you just started talking Finnish to them.

The best way would have been to speak to them in Finnish since they were born. Your wife, TV, friends and school can take care of their English education.

EP · Post by EP » Wed Apr 11, 2007 1:49 pm

OK, back to the subject. Start speaking Finnish to them, they will pick up. That is how refugee children learn while playing on the yard, and they learn in just weeks, the smaller they are, the faster they learn. And be firm about it, a mommy-language and a daddy-language.

I don´t know if there are still those Richard Scarry books in stores. Through those children learn words in a fun way. And their Finnish translations are just excellent, they don´t underestimate children. For example I remember one picture of an elephant in big baggy trousers. The text under the picture always sent my kids into hysterical giggling fits (I don´t know why): "Roimahousut ovat poikaa."

Ravvy · Post by **Ravvy** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 3:56 pm

Specific to your question about available CDs, you might find the item linked below to be helpful. It is done with color cartoon-like drawings and (I think) would work fine for even quite small children. Please note that it does not do much with grammar, nor verb conjugation; it is more of a "identify the picture" with a number of different categories such as things, places, actions, etc.

This particular CD contains my all-time favorite finnish language learning phrase

: in one spot they have a cartoon picture of an octopus peeking out from underneath a bed, with the finnish phrase "mustekala on sangyn alla"

(WHAT?) I look forward to seeing my first octopus under the bed in Finland next summer!

Available on Amazon.com in the USA:

http://www.amazon.com/Vocabulary-Builde ... 81&sr=8-19

raamv · Post by **raamv** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 5:14 pm

Hank W. wrote:impossible. Should be a few families around, though are the Nokia people in Dallas or Houston?

Neither...its Irving..Texas 25KM from Dallas...

raamv · Post by **raamv** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 5:18 pm

More than anything else, I would do as EP suggests..
of course DVD and books will help, but might be difficult to find in Houston..
Order them online n ship em there..
Most useful of them might be the muumi series, ( You can also subscribe to muumi comics from Sanomat magazines:
http://www.sanomamagazines.fi/lehdetjat ... 2.asp?f=51
Aku ankka, Nalle puh and keijut lehti are also good).
BTW, there are come folks in this forum that come to TX very often..Mebbe if you are nice to them they could get you Finnish things in exchange for American Goodies...)

Jukka Aho · Post by **Jukka Aho** » Fri Apr 13, 2007 9:20 pm

mmmsherman wrote:I was born & raised in Canada, both my parents are from Finland and taught us how to speak Finnish growing up so I speak fluently. I now live in Houston, TX and I am married to an American. We have two children, ages 3 & 6 yrs old together but I find it difficult to teach them how to speak Finnish because I do not have family nearby or any support groups/friends in here. I am looking for kid friendly books/dvds/websites/software that could help me teach the children to speak Finnish...although I speak fluently, I learned the language by ear so I'm not sure how I would go about teaching it.

Some suggestions:

The works of Mauri Kunnas – Highly detailed picture books with anthropomorphic animal characters (a bit like the books by Richard Scarry!)
The Moomin videos and Moomin picture books, audio books, and the original Moomin novels by Tove Jansson – see this and this for more information.
Elina Karjalainen’s Uppo-Nalle books – stories about a teddy bear who is sometimes a bit somber (and also a bit of a poet!), and a dog called Laulava lintukoira (“singing gundog” – don’t ask!), a girl called Reeta, and their adventures.
Hannu Mäkelä’s “Herra Huu” novels – somewhat kafkaesque children’s stories about an adorably pathetic little, lonely man who is terribly shy, and not at all that courageous, but who would very much like to appear scary, at least in the eyes of children!
The Rölli movies: (1) (2) (3) – Rölli (pictured on the right) is a bit similar character to Herra Huu, except that he is a troll and lives in a forest.
Poika ja ilves – a movie about a boy and a lynx. There’s an evil poacher, and, well... just watch it!

There are some Finnish online bookstores and DVD stores that will deliver abroad. You may need to make sure that you have a multi-format DVD player, though – one that is capable of playing back “PAL” (576p/576i) formatted DVDs in “NTSC” (480p/480i), and preferably one where region code checks can be disabled. (The cheap Chinese players usually have these features. You might want to take a look at here.)

Jukka Aho · Post by **Jukka Aho** » Fri Apr 13, 2007 11:50 pm

Jukka Aho wrote:Some suggestions:

More of the same:

Picture books
Classic children’s books (Page 1) (Page 2) (Page 3)
Easy reading
Music
Nursery rhymes and poetry for kids
Books on CD
CD-ROMs
Books for older kids
Non-fiction (hobbies, nature, science)

Jukka Aho · Post by **Jukka Aho** » Sat Apr 14, 2007 12:07 am

Jukka Aho wrote:More of the same:

Let’s add this as well:

Kid-oriented websites in Finnish

mmmsherman · Post by **mmmsherman** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 4:50 am

I'd like to thank all that replied to my request for help in teaching Finnish to my children. I would love to continue getting more responses, I didn't realize how much stuff was out there! Awesome!

Thanks again, Michela

Jukka Aho · Post by **Jukka Aho** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 2:23 pm

Some websites with a bit more “edumacational” theme than the ones I mentioned in the previous messages:

Arin aapinen
Henrin aapinen
Kaarlo Karhu
Satunetti – Fairy tales read aloud (in MP3 format)
Uuno
Luki-Luukas
Tavataan taas!

As for pay material, you might want to check out these as well:

WSOY:n oppimateriaalit / Esiopetus – WSOY is a Finnish book publisher. Click on the link Äidinkieli ja kirjallisuus (Mother tongue and literature) on the sidebar, then Salainen maa (“A secret country/land”), and you’ll get to the Salainen maa product family with Finnish text books, exercise books, picture books, fairy tales, music CD / song book, packages of laminated cards with words and pictures – and even hand puppets! These are primarily aimed for Finnish preschoolers. Here’s a summary.
Otava / oppimateriaalit / esiopetus – Otava is also a Finnish book publisher and this is their line of Finnish-related material for preschoolers. Click on the links in the right sidebar, below the heading Sarjat (“Series”). Check the red sublinks for each series on the left sidebar as well.

Some suggestions as to where to buy and search the stuff from:

Keywords for googling around:

lastenkirjat – children’s books
satukirjat, sadut – fairy tale books, fairy tales
"lasten videot", "lasten CD:t", "lasten DVD:t" – children’s videos, CDs, DVDs
lastenlaulut, lastenmusiikki, lastenäänitteet – children’s songs, children’s music, children’s recordings
oppikirjat, koulukirjat – text books, schoolbooks
oppimateriaali – educational material
aapinen – ABC book
esiopetus – preschool-level education and educational material
sanakortit – word cards
äidinkieli – mother’s tongue (usually another word for “Finnish” on the Finnish websites!)
harjoitustehtävä – exercise

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