Post it! Part 2

Here are some more ideas for making Chinese more prevellent in your home.

Picture Captions!  Use Chinese to write captions for the pictures your kids draw! Don't forget to include the BoPoMo or pinyin pronunciation guide where appropriate.

Label your children's toys!  If your toy room uses any type of baskets or buckets to help corral small pieces, most likely those boxes have labels so your child knows what toys belong in which box.  Well, there is a great opportunity to add some Chinese to your home.  Ask a Chinese-speaking friend, a teacher, or check a dictionary for how to say the various toys in your boxes (think in categories like cars, building blocks, dress-up clothes, etc.).  On one side of your label write the character and its pronunciation on the other side you can print a picture that represents that type of toy.

For our toy room, I used:

• Self-Sealing Laminating Pouches (by Scotch 3M) OR baseball card (individual size) plastic covers
• Book Rings (Staples)

Both of which can be purchased at an office supply store or Walmart.  When I hung up the tags, I chose to make the Chinese character the side that is displayed (the kids can flip the card over to see the picture).  For them, it's like a mini game of Memory; "I bet this one is cars."  They started recognizing the characters before too long and I've heard them sounding out the characters a couple of times.

As a side note, the pictures are important when visitors come over and help clean up.  The tags also make great conversational starters about Chinese with kids and adults!