Her English has Improved

My 10 yo daughter’s English was terrible. It drove us up a wall – it was not as if she knew other languages well (Tamil, Hindi, Kannada) and English was the weak spot. No, English was her strongest language, and even that sucked.

 

In despair, during this year’s summer holidays, we enrolled her in Kumon classes. In addition, we threw in a couple of other daily measures (read a book, one-page of writing, watch a National Geographic episode). One/some of them helped, and in just two months, her English has improved by leaps and bounds.

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Though she is just 10, many of her friends are a couple of years older. Unfortunately, that means she has a teenager-like attitude already. In one of those moods, she announced that the world sucks. Upon which I helpfully asked if she planned shift to Mars, perhaps? Of course, she’d have to make some new friends there, I reminded. She immediately changed her mind, “Nah, I’ll continue to stay here only”. I commended her on her willingness to make her peace with how things were. Very mature, I added. She corrected me imperiously, “No, I am just tolerating the world. There is a big difference.”


 

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Recently, when there was no Internet, I told her to turn on the hotspot on my phone and use that instead. Then I checked whether she knew how to do that. Contemptuously, she replied, “Obviously, I do. I am not that old.” If only this superpower of the young to learn were applied in academic matters (sigh).

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With school reopening (physical presence at last), many of her friends stopped coming out to play in the evenings. I guess they’re too tired, their stamina gone after the 2-year COVID enforced online school regime. So I told her to go down and play with whoever was down there, to make new friends, even with the kids she calls losers, I needled her. She was horrified, “I don’t do losers. I have a reputation to protect”.

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As I said earlier, she wasn’t capable of such sharp (and apt) retorts just 2 months back. As I am increasingly realizing, her English has improved on that front too. Be careful what you wish for, it may come true.

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