In preparation for our big trip to the US, we decided it was time for our two boys to start learning English. The kids are pretty excited about this, and looking forward to the lessons. Yesterday, we started by learning the names of six animals in English: cat, dog, bird, fish, snake and mouse. IsraeliDad made them some cards with the pictures, and we played a game of “Which card is missing”. They had fun, for about 10 minutes, which I guess is the attention span of Dan, who’s not even five years old yet (birthday coming up next month!).
That isn’t to say that they don’t know any phrases in English. You see, the latest addiction is to playing Warcraft 3 – a fairly advanced strategy game involving building and managing a small medieval town (if you’re human that is, it could be an Orc settlement, a lofty nightelf camp or a ghoulish graveyard of the Undead). Our kids mainly play as humans (in the game, that is, irl they often behave more like orcs). Since the game is in English, they’ve picked up on the most important phrases orated by the game characters.
And so, at the ages of roughly five and seven, these are the phrases my kids know in English:
“We need more gold”
“Build more farms”
“Not enough wood”
“Our town is under attack”
“Yes, Sire”
As they progress in the game, I expect them to learn the more advanced “I live to serve” and “for honor!” that the knights recite, but for now, their armies are made up mostly of footmen 
At first we thought this isn’t the right English for a visit to the US, but IsraeliDad commented today, that they can already do diplomatic work over there with these phrases. We’ll just say we’re from Israel and they can say: “Our town is under attack – We need more gold”.
on Oct 6th, 2008 at 6:12 pm
well……your english is pretty perfect…….just start speaking to them in English….mind you…i speak to my kids in english and they answer me in Arabic!!!!! how annoying is that!!!!!!!
melissa qubtis last blog post..back to school……..again!
on Oct 7th, 2008 at 2:09 pm
LOL – the diplomatic approach is hilarious. I agree with what Melissa said. While growing up in the US, my parents used to speak in Arabic to my sisters and I, and we’d respond in English. We didnt become fluent in Arabic but we learned to handle ourselves well.
on Oct 7th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
My written English is ok – thanks to three four years of studying English Literature in Tel Aviv University. My accent is far from perfect. Not just accent even, it’s more in line of the pronunciation issues typical to Israelis. After an entire year in the pronunciation lab, I could finally tell apart the sounds of “ee” and “i” in listening, but I bet you can still catch me talking about “the piss process”