"Immersion" means "diving in". The entire environment in which children play is immersed in the foreign language. Children encounter the foreign language in a natural way - literally taking a bath in the language, soaking it up. This method is most successful and thoroughly researched learning and teaching method for foreign languages in the world. It is scientifically proven that a child learns more and acquires skills faster in the first three years of life than at any point thereafter. The brain grows quickly. It receives new signals from the environment through all its sense organs, which must be correctly orientated. The learning process is constantly in motion. The more frequently stimuli are encountered, the ber their influence on the child’s mind. The more they’re accompanied by positive experiences, the more successful the learning process is. Parents cannot influence the physical development of a child’s brain, but they can stimulate and promote mental development. Parents must be careful in this period to offer the right things at the right time, and not to overwhelm the child with distractions. The sooner one exposes a child to a foreign language, the better. They absorb the melody and accent of the foreign language. Children will soak up the foreign language like a sponge. If they already know a few English words by the time they enter pre-school or kindergarten, their self-confidence will be strengthened. They will have connected a great experience of success with the English language and will more easily begin to build up their vocabulary.
How can I provide an immersive English environment for my child?
Since birth, your child has been surrounded by your native language. He or she already knows how to speak and understand it just by being exposed to it by family and friends, in and out of the home, through radio and television and through teachers during this early stage of mental development. He or she learned without even trying. Imagine trying to teach your child English in the same way - you might try to raise your child in an English-speaking community. You spend weeks or months in England or America so that your child will see and hear only English and begin to pick it up. You might try to provide days of exposure to English with special teacher. But these options are not all realistic, and they require you to thrust your child out of his or her home environment and force it to learn. "Discover English with Ben and Bella" provides you with a better model: hours a day of immersion in English for your child at play.
How does "Discover English with Ben & Bella" provide an immersive environment?
“Discover English with Ben & Bella” is an integrated program of DVDs, CDs, books and activities providing animated cartoons, live-action song and dance videos, sing-a-longs, stories and games. It follows the saying: One builds a tower with bricks; a language with words. In their first years children learn their mother tongue by connecting the things they see with words their mother say. Mothers instinctively repeat the names of things several times. If, for example, a mother gives her child a ball to play with, she says, “Look, a ball! Here is a ball!” If the mother doesn’t want the child to forget what she says, then she says it loudly and repeatedly. She says it with emphasis: “Be careful, hot! The oven is hot!”
The animated videos of “Discover English with Ben & Bella” follow this principle exactly. The English words spoken when the associated objects are shown, and then repeated. For example, Bella says “Look Ben, A Cow! A Cow!” At that moment you see a brown cartoon of a cow on the screen. The same principle applies in the scenes in which the children dance. The lyrics match the actions, making meaningful connections with the new language. And so after a while the children automatically sing the English words and understand their meaning. In addition, the children are immersed in a completely new world, in which everything takes place in English. They take a language bath, and have a lot of fun, which only increases their success learning the language. This is what immersive learning is all about.
To see, hear and sing the English language, as well as to play, paint and dance – so that all senses are engaged and children have fun. Each child can discover English like its mother tongue with this multi-facetted product. They learn through play with the product, by repeating the words, singing and dancing. This learning environment is enhanced by the accompanying activity and sticker books. The additional activities and puzzles keep children involved in Ben & Bella’s world even when they aren’t watching or singing along, and you will be able to play along, quizzing your child on the English names of the characters and objects depicted. It doesn’t matter if parents do not know English themselves, they can just point to something on the page or in the puzzle and ask their children to name it. By playing along (or watching, or even singing along) with their children, they can dramatically deepen the immersive experience and make the program even more effective. And they might learn English, too.
http://benandbella.com/
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