Jonathan the language expert.

Growing up with two languages is complicated. Growing up with two languages that are very different from each other, like Hebrew and German, which also have gender differences in words, is doubly more complicated. And even so, Jonathan is slowly getting the hang of it, and he can even read… My husband makes gender mistakes in Hebrew and one day he got scolded by Jonathan, who protested that he is not a girl! “What do you think I am, daddy, a girl?” and yet he tends to use the female format himself…I am sure one ay Jonathan will also be correcting the gender mistakes I make in German, but we are not there yet…

He is just getting the hang of putting words together into sentences in German, but as time passes he becomes more sue of himself. When his German grandmother came to visit, he was fully capable of informing her that he was not yet tired, when she told him it’s time for bed. Recently he went to get his father’s assistance and informed him that his little baby sister is crying and daddy should come now please. All in perfect German, with correct grammatical structure. Other times he uses German words but in the Hebrew order of a sentence, which is the other way around…something like “I no want”.

 Another manifest of his understanding of language is that he not only recognizes all the letters in Hebrew, he is able to read all the names of the children in his kindergarten group. He is also learning to recognize the Latin alphabet with the help of a free app in my new touch cell phone…ah the marvels of technology. It is needless to say that Jonathan is slowly improving his skills on the home PC and playing computer games in now a major pastime. He loves to share his excitement in the game and have me watch him play. Boys and their toys…if at the age of 4.5 years the boy already has access to a computer and a touch cell phone, the ipad cannot be far off and the TV console too…if the ipad did not cost the half of the average Israeli salary, Jonathan would probably be the proud owner of one, just like some of his friends…