Many native English speakers often move abroad and start families in non-English speaking countries. When that happens, they retain their knowledge of English, but their kids don’t know it at all. If you know English but your kids don’t, it’s understandable if you want to get them lessons. English is a useful and widespread language that can open many professional doors, plus, it can help you and your child communicate better.
If you’re concerned that your child will be starting to learn from scratch, don’t worry. It’s easy to find tutors and teachers who specialize in English lessons for beginners.
Where Can You Find English Lessons for Beginners?
English is a complex and many-faceted language, so you can’t just jump into it in the middle. Like the song from The Sound of Music goes, “Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start. When you read, you begin with A-B-C…” So that’s really where your child needs to start if they’re learning English from the beginning—from the basics.
The issue is, if you live in a country in which English isn’t the official language, you may have a hard time finding qualified tutors who offer English lessons for beginners. If this is the case, you can turn to the internet for help.
Eurekly hosts many online tutors who offer private tutoring sessions to both adults and children. You can find tutors who specialize in various areas of expertise, including teaching English for beginners or as a second language, advanced English, literary English, English to help pass standardized tests, and more.
Can Online Tutoring Help Your Child Learn English?
Online tutoring is a great way to help your child learn English, whether they are starting from scratch or know how to read very rudimentarily. Online tutoring has several innate benefits:
- Personal attention
- Customized lessons plans and goals—focus on speaking, reading, writing, or all of the above
- There is a large selection of online tutors, so you can choose one who offers lessons at times that are convenient for you
- Competitive rates
- You can learn regularly or schedule lessons on the fly
- No travel required
When you choose online tutors from Eurekly, you get the added benefit of free trial lessons, which most tutors on the site offer. Free trial lessons are a huge perk in that they allow your child to see if they work well with the tutor in question, and you don’t have to put down any money upfront.
How Many Times a Week Should My Child Learn with an Online Tutor?
There’s no definitive answer to the question of how many times a week your child should learn with an online tutor. It depends on many factors:
- Your budget
- Your child’s innate language learning ability
- Your child’s motivation
- How much your child practices on their own
While all these factors play a role in how quickly and successfully your child can learn English from a beginner’s level, the bottom line is that the more they put into it, the more they’ll get out of it.
That being said, your child’s motivation needs to come from within, because that will influence how much they pay attention during tutoring sessions and whether they do all the follow-up homework as well.
If you only have the budget for one lesson a week, your child can still learn English successfully. Just ask the tutor to prepare practice work that your child can do on their own. You can also help by speaking English with your child as much as possible since exposure to a foreign language can help in learning it.
According to an article entitled “The Impact of Exposure to English Language on Language Acquisition,” exposure to a foreign language has a direct impact on language acquisition. Therefore, when you give your child English lessons and offer as much exposure to the language as possible, you are giving your child all the necessary tools to master the language.
Is Learning Online Helpful or Harmful to Children?
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, children have been exposed to much more screen time than before. Many parents wonder if learning online is bad for their children since it increases their screen time.
While there are certainly pitfalls of too much screen time, Western Governors University cites some of the benefits. These include:
- Helping kids learn
- Increasing their multitasking abilities
- Preparing them for future careers in tech
- Better visual-spatial development
- Improved problem solving and decision making
If anything, online learning is a good use of screen time, whereas watching TV, playing video games, or chatting on social media are poor uses for children. So when you give your child English lessons for beginners online, you don’t need to worry about the pitfalls, because the benefits are so much greater.
