There’s no doubt that traveling can help your kids learn a foreign language. When you want to expose your children to other cultures and languages, traveling to different parts of the world is the perfect way to get started. Traveling offers plenty of benefits. You’ll get to spend quality time with your children while learning about the history and culture of new and exciting places. Not to mention, you’ll pick up on new languages.
Why It’s Important for Your Kids to Learn a Foreign Language
Children should learn as many foreign languages as possible. Some studies show that children who know a second language can concentrate, multitask, and problem-solve more efficiently. When your children learn foreign languages, they learn how to communicate with people from around the world. It’s a great way to immerse the kids in new cultures that they wouldn’t have known about if not for your trips.
When your children get older, knowing more than one language could open the doors for them to land a good job where they’ll get paid well and have great benefits. Many companies in the United States look forward to hiring bilingual employees or even employees who can speak more than two languages.
How Traveling Can Help Your Kids Learn a Foreign Language
Traveling Is a Great Way to Immerse Kids in Language and Culture
When you’re traveling to different countries, you’re immersing kids in a new language and culture, both in real-time (versus through videos and textbooks). You’re visiting different places, such as museums, landmarks, restaurants, and other attractions that will bring your children closer to the culture in that area. They’ll hear others speaking the language of a country, and they’ll learn how to effectively communicate with those individuals when need be.
Travel is a Great Way to Get Kids to Learn
Education is everywhere, not just in schools. While your children may learn a second language at school, nothing quite beats the ability to put that language to use natively. You can teach your children new languages by taking them to areas worldwide, including New Zealand, Tokyo, Mexico, South Korea, and Japan. Your children will get to see the way these people live and what their culture is like today. Travel is a fantastic way to make learning fun for children of all ages. In fact, here are some interesting facts about learning languages:
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Luxembourg is the best country overall for learning a foreign language, followed by Sweden
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Luxembourg, Cyprus, Malta, and Spain score highest in the Language Learning at School category
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The USA placed first in the Language Diversity category, with more spoken languages than any other country in the ranking
(The statistics referenced above can be seen in detail here.)
Learning a Foreign Language in Action
My Husband Is Teaching Our Daughter Japanese to Prepare Her For a Trip to Japan
One of our dreams is to visit Japan. In anticipation, my husband decided to put effort into teaching our daughter Japanese. He wants her to have no problem communicating with people when we stop by some of the many wonderful attractions in Japan, such as Mount Fuji, Osaka Castle, and Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. Not only will she get to communicate, but she’ll understand information from Japanese tour guides while we’re traveling throughout the area.
We’ve Taught Her Spanish, Which Has Helped Her During Our Visits to Mexico
Because we have traveled to Mexico quite often, we knew how important it was for our daughter to learn Spanish. We’ve traveled to many beautiful places in Mexico. Knowing some keywords helped us communicate with tour guides and even pronouncing names of delicious Mexican meals that we often eat while visiting there. While knowing Spanish in Mexico is good, we know that she can use the Spanish she’s learned throughout her life. After all, it’s one of the most common languages spoken in the United States.
Related: Top 8 Reasons Why We Love Puerto Vallarta, Mexico
Our Tour Guide in Morocco Taught us Some Arabic, Which She Picked Up
While we were in Morocco, we spent a lot of time with a kind and helpful tour guide. He took us to some of the best places. While we visited the local markets, the guide was able to help us learn a few words and phrases. Because our guide was with us on many occasions during the trip to Morocco, our daughter picked up some Arabic language. We look forward to helping her get even better at speaking it and understanding it.
Related: Why You Should Take Kids to Morocco for Your Next Family Vacation
Traveling can help your kids learn a foreign language. They will receive firsthand experience at hearing the language and learning it. It makes for much more meaningful trips when you’re prepared to communicate with the native people. It’s the best way to provide a fun learning experience each time. Not only will the kids learn more, but so will you!
Which country do you think you’d like to visit first?
