My eldest son is learning more Chinese these days. Besides him learning it academically in school, I try to let him learn through his topics of interest. One of his interests is Plants VS Zombies. When he was 4 years old, he started liking Plants Vs Zombies. On his 5th birthday, his aunt and cousins got him his first few Plants and Zombies soft toys and he was so happy that time.
This year after his Chinese New Year, he got some angpaos (which are actually money in red packets as blessings) and he was happy as he is starting to learn the value of money. He asked if he can spend a small sum to buy Plants Vs Zombies soft toys to expand his old collection. He wanted to buy more but we explain that we can choose not to spend everything at one go and we can learn to save. So finally we agreed with 5 more and he went choosing.
He has been watching some videos and learnt their names in Mandarin Chinese, which I am happy about as we are in the midst of learning more Mandarin. He can remember their names quite well so I thought maybe to help him have more interest in Chinese, this may help.
So he bought these:
BLOOMERANG 回旋镖射手
PUFF-SHROOM 小喷菇
WINTERMELON PULT寒冬西瓜投手
PHARAOH ZOMBIE 太阳神僵尸
KNIGHT ZOMBIE 士兵僵尸
Check out his collection now!
He used to have 6 of them: Conehead Zombie, Duck Zombie, Peashooter, Snowpeashooter, Sunflower and Bok Choy. He also learnt all their names in Mandarin Chinese but I cannot recall their names now hahaha.
Added 5 more.
And there are now 11!
He was so anticipating the arrival of the new ones as I purchased them online. I was surprised that he did a countdown in the form of a checklist as I told him they may arrive in 10 days since they come from China. He marked the days off patiently everyday. He was telling me, Mummy, it is already day 8, so near to day 10 already!
To his surprise, they came at day 8!
Beside that we are exploring some new apps for learning his words and also 拼音 (sound and formation of Chinese words) which comes in playing and interactive ways. School holidays has started and I intend to let him play and learn in this 3 weeks time.
I HOPE HE CONTINUES TO LEARN LANGUAGE INVOLVING HIS TOPIC OF INTEREST. I AM ONE PARENT THAT IS OKAY FOR HIM TO EXPLORE CHINESE LEARNING INTEREATIVE APP TO HELP HIM EXPLORE THIS LANGUAGE. After all, I think language learning should be made fun. I know schools may have to stick to a certain system but additional ways like this is always a bonus to us!
