It has been a year and a half since our son started to go to kindergarten by bus. Except for the too hot summer months when we hide in the shade of a tree playing name-the-car-games, we have made a morning reading routine out of waiting for the bus. Looking back at the first time I wrote about this, it is easy to see how much our little boy has grown, both in size and knowledge.
Learning to read has been our ongoing adventure, in the early days exploring sounds, forms, shapes, and more lately putting together whole words and sentences, trying to make sense of what is written. My son is curious of everything, so it has come naturally for him to gradually expand his knowledge of Swedish. I try to plan Swedish language activities for him every day and and since September we are also participating in Swedish school online every week, and seeing other Swedish children learning Swedish has also been a boost in motivation for my son.
Sometimes I feel that being the only Swedish speaker in our son’s everyday life is quite challenging. I am often the only source of Swedish, so the sound bath of language that would be natural were we living in Sweden, is sometimes reduced to a dad nagging about getting dressed so we won’t miss the bus. It is a good challenge though, it keeps me focused and I try my best to keep the Swedish part of our life as alive and as varied as possible. We listen to books and music, we watch Swedish television, we talk to Swedish relatives and friends, we sing, play Swedish games, write notes and shopping lists. And we read, so but back to our bus-waiting – before going to the bus in the morning, our son chooses a little pocket picture book from a shoebox. When we arrive at the bus stop, I sit down on the little concrete fence foundation in the street corner (I have started to bring a seat pad, so it is quite comfortable), my son sits on his push-bike, and we take turns reading from the book. It has become a fun routine and before we know it the bus comes and the kindergarten day kicks off.