Kleinkonzert 3

This evening it was Mozart's piano sonata no. 11 in A major.

J especially liked the 3rd movement, the famous "Rondo alla Turca."

Frechheit 1

After a verbal tussle J says to me, "Stimmt's oder habe ich recht?"

This is a favorite phrase of the BFG in the German translation (Sophiechen und der Riese). I myself use it with J quite a bit and he probably has it more immediately from me.

Media update 294

Listening: Torben Kuhlmann, Lindbergh: Die abenteuerliche Geschichte einer fliegenden Maus (44 min.)

This is a fantastic audiobook, actually a Hörspiel, very high production values and a really great narrator who does all the roles. J really loved, by the same author and producers, Armstrong: Die abenteuerliche Reise einer Maus zum Mond. This one is just as good.

2016
Total audio: 36.36
Total video: 29.12
Total gamplay: 5.40
Age 6.10.28

L2 reading 3

I've now started working with J on L2 reading. He is already quite far along. When in Austria I got a few of these books, in which the syllables are marked in different colors (the Silbenmethode): 

I was initially skeptical concerning this method, but it really seems to work well. I'll be ordering more books like this once we're through the ones I bought.

Also, J likes to read the things that he and I have written together, and he likes to do it over and over. Today we wrote a little more on his World of Warcraft "mouse people" (the Murinae / Murinen), and at the outset he wanted to read—with Gustav—everything we had written thus far. 

Pooh-Immersion / Pu der Bär-Dauerberieselung

In our house, we more or less have Winnie The Pooh audiobooks playing loudly at all times whenever J is at home and at leisure. When it's my wife and J, it's the English version narrated by Peter Dennis. When it's J and I, it's the brilliant translation & narration by Harry Rowohlt. When it's all three of us, it can go either way. 

The result is that we are all able to work Pooh-quotes into our daily conversation, and J is able to do this in both English and German. 

Just the other day he used the word "angenommen" in this kind of sentence (not an exact quote, but similar):

"Angenommen, ich mache das: Was würde passieren?" 

This usage occurs several times in the Pooh stories, for example in ch. 8 of The House on Pooh Corner:

"Angenommen, ein Baum fällt um, wenn wir direkt darunter stehen?" [sagte Ferkel]. "Angenommen, er fällt nicht um," sagte Pu nach sorgfältigem Nachdenken.

Subjunctives 2

I have always consciously and liberally deployed the various subjuctives and J uses them frequently and accurately. 

Today he said the following: "[Die Lehrerin] dachte, ich hätte den Laptop nicht geschlossen, aber ich hatte ihn geschlossen." 

Puppets and piano practice 8: Kleinkonzerte 1 & 2

I'm working on starting a new routine, which is to sit down with J and one of the puppets and watch musicians performing. 

Last week we watched piano arrangments of two pieces J loves: "Edelweiss" and Grieg's "Morgenstimmung":

Today we watched Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata":

J pays more attention when Gustav is paying attention. Also, I take this as another opportunity to work on musical vocabulary in German with J. I got tired of constantly looking up stuff on the internet, so this summer I bought a little music theory book in Vienna. (My musical training preceded my beginning German, so I never learned German musical vocabulary in any complete or systematic way.). Here's the one I got: