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1. It’s only a matter of time before Mandarin becomes the most widely used language in the business world and the Yuan (Chinese currency) is the business currency of the future. When most transactions are happening in Yuan and business conversations in Mandarin, learning the language would keep your child current with the future world economy.
2. Learning Mandarin is like opening a gateway to a new world. It will help your child secure a job, start a business or network with well-known businesspeople.
3. Mandarin is the primary native language in China, Taiwan, Singapore and Malaysia, as well as being spoken by people around the world. So your child can comfortably work, study or do business in these places. Nearly all multi-national companies that are headquartered in America do business in China, so learning Mandarin would be an instant boost to your kid’s career, as he or she would have an edge over monolingual English speakers.
4. Learning Mandarin will give your kid an insight into the five thousand year old Chinese culture and history. Language is a roadmap of a culture; it tells you about how the people originated and where they are heading to. This cultural knowledge will be invaluable in any interactions with Chinese people.
5. This language will help you prepare your kid for the future and also make him more competitive. Learning Mandarin will also help him or her to meet new people, improve your work skills, and develop personal relationships.
6. A different language is a window into a different world view. So if your child learns Mandarin, he/she will simultaneously learn to look at life from a different perspective. This versatility is essential in today’s global culture.

I conclude by saying “The limits of your language are the limits of your world, so spread your wings and extend your world.”

The post 5 Reasons to Teach your Children Mandarin (Chinese) appeared first on Conversation Piece.

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It’s important in today’s global world to know more than one language. English is a good choice to focus on achieving fluency in if it is not your first language, and there are many reasons that I would recommend learning English as a second language. Five of them are listed below.

1. As you probably recognize, English has been accepted as a regular language for communication throughout the planet. Therefore, expressing your thoughts in English gives them a higher chance of being disseminated. English is the best medium to showcase your thoughts and ensure the widest level of understanding.
2. Learning English can also provide you with a lot of employment opportunities, as English is a common language within the business world. There are many who graduate each year and have a relatively low chance of obtaining a job, which is primarily due to the lack of fluency in English. This is seen as a handicap and growth inhibitor for many employers, particularly multi-national corporations that offer the most desirable job opportunities.
3. Technology is growing at a very fast pace, and the majority of the gadgets are based mostly on English as a default language, so knowing it is essential in those fields in particular. For the current generation, who have grown up with technology, it is that the key to everything and most work is done using technology. It is impossible in this day and age to avoid technology or its main medium of communication, which is English.
4. English is also a useful skill if you have any plans of going abroad for studies or business because it is used in most of the countries to some extent. To study abroad prospective students must take a test which is referred to as TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language) or IELTS (International English Language Testing System), which certifies that you have a decent fluency in English. Only those with a high enough score on tests such as these will be admitted to American, British, Australian, and Canadian universities, as the primary language of instruction in these places is English and the universities need to be assured that the students they admit are capable of keeping up with the work and performing competently.
5. Lastly, English allows you access to a wide range of data as many books, especially scientific and academic books, are written in English in order to reach a broader population of readers than would be possible in a vernacular. As a matter of reality, most of the famous news channels are being telecast in English. Therefore, in this current world, English is for many a compulsion rather than an elective skill. As English is everywhere in the globe, it would be foolish not to try to learn English as a second language.

Other excellent choices of languages to learn, if English is your first language, would be the others that are most spoken around the globe, such as Chinese, Hindi, Arabic, French, Spanish, and German. Of course, you may have personal or business reasons for learning any number of less widely spoken languages, but the key point is that one language is no longer sufficient for anyone in today’s global climate.

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There are a number of different prepositions in English grammar and each has specific uses. It can be really confusing for learners of English as a foreign language to keep them straight. Additionally, many native speakers of English do not use prepositions correctly, which can be doubly confusing. There are more than one hundred basic grammar prepositions in the English language, but this post will focus on a few representative ones. Most prepositions locate subjects in time or place, so they answer the questions “When?” or “Where?” There are, of course, exceptions. Prepositions, as it says in the name, are positioned before (pre-) the descriptive phase. In basic English grammar, this is called the “prepositional phrase.” Other languages may use post-positions instead, which would come after the descriptive phrase. This series will describe basic English grammar prepositions and give examples of the correct way to use them.

The simplest English grammar prepositions answer the questions “Where” and “When” in a straightforward manner. I have put the prepositions in each sentence in italics.

Example 1

Where should I put the date on this letter?

In a business letter, the date should come above the salutation.

(This means that the date comes first on the page, followed by the greeting.)

Example 2

Where is your son?

My son is at home with his father.

(So the son and the father are not with the mother, wherever she is, but are at their house together.)

Example 3

Where are my socks?

They are behind your underwear in the top left drawer.

(So the top left drawer contains both socks and underwear, and the underwear are in front of the socks, hiding them from you.)

Example 4

Where is my library book?

It is in the stack on the table, beneath the novel I am reading.

(So there are a number of books on the table, stacked on top of one another. The novel I am reading is on top, and you have to pick it up and look under it to find your library book.)

Example 5

Where are my glasses?

They are right beside you, on the night stand.

(The person is likely in bed, and set his/her glasses down on the table next to the bed the night before.)

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Photo Credit: Francisco Osorio

As a student and sometime instructor of foreign language, I have learned a few things over the years. These tips assume that you want to work on all four aspects of learning a foreign language (reading, writing, listening, and speaking).

1. Repetition is key. If you hear a word or phrase you don’t recognize and want to learn, ask the person who said it to repeat it, spell it, and explain it. Then try to use it yourself sometime in the next 24 hours.
2. Write everything down. If you are trying to learn vocabulary, it is not enough to just read and reread the list of words and translations. It’s been proven that we remember things better if we actually write them down. On paper, with a pen or pencil.
3. Use the script. I’ve studied three languages that do not use the Roman script, and it makes all the difference to use the script. Working with Romanized transliterations will detract from your engagement with the language and also with your pronunciation.
4. Watch TV. Or films. Or listen to the radio. Whatever. Even if you only get 10% of what’s going on or pick out a word or two here and there, it’s worth it. The benefits are huge. Learning a foreign language requires that you get used to the cadence and flow of the target language as well as the sounds that are not present in your native language.
5. Talk to someone monolingual (or willing to pretend to be monolingual). At least on occasion, you want to remove the crutch of resorting to your native language. If you always talk to people who are fluent in both languages (which has its own benefits, as I will discuss in part 2), you will be tempted to ask for clarifications. Instead, use your limited vocabulary and sentence structures in the target language to explain things. It will take patience on the part of your conversation partner, but will help you out a lot.

Click here to continue to Tips 6 to 10.

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