Tutoring Triplets

When they were born, I visited them in their incubators at the hospital. Like a fairy godmother, I promised my cousin to tutor them....in two years. Those two years passed so quickly, especially considering they are three girls and keep their parents very busy.

The babies grew in a house of hospitality and feast. They slept to the sound of their parents hosting, night after night. No white noise to trick them, just the boisterous festivities below. I visited them frequently, with my children, always impressed that three girls, born the same day, with 2 syllable names ( Ava, Vida, Tara) can be very different in looks, size and personality,

These girls are born to Iranian parents but their father has a French nationality and his linguistic skills have only endeared him more to us, adding another thing we have in common (he is a great fan of Roger Federer and follows World Cup Soccer too!). I therefore promised to teach the girls French, considering they will attend a French lycee later.

I purchased the famous "passport" books which is the classical approach to additional home tutoring in France. They are in Toute Petite Section, which is a very formal pre-kindergarten with the demanded skills in pre-handwriting and vocabulary and early mathematics.

I know as a fact that every 2 year old has an attention span of 20 minutes maximum. I bring my own magic markers, fat and colourful for their little fists and the book is full of stickers. I like to take them one by one, because I excel in private tutoring. However, the sisters want to sit together and it eventually becomes a classroom method instead, as I talk to them simultaneously.

Every weekly session consists of a page and a half, each page contains 2 new words. How we laughed at the word "confiture" meaning "jam". Who wouldn't call it a simple "jam"? We also practised the essential pronounciation of "croissant", a la francaise.

I am enjoying every moment of bonding and I hope the tutorials will last a dozen years.