Back To My Roots: The Philippines (Part 1)
Many Dads out there (including myself) are ‘first-generation parents’ which means that they were born in North America and their parents were born in another country. As a first-generation Canadian, one thing I want my children to have is a connection to their roots; to know where their grandparents have come from, their stories, their language and their traditions.
How can this process be made easier and how can we help other Incredible Dads connect their kids back to their roots?
Introducing the Back To My Roots article series!
This is the first in a series of articles that will help Incredible Dads all over the world connect their children Back To Their Roots and help their kids appreciate where their ancestors have come from so that they can have stable cultural roots from which to grow.
This article will be about the Philippines with other cultures to come soon! We’ll start off with the Basics (geography, numbers, days of the week, etc.) with Part 2 bringing you even more information you can use to teach your kids about their roots!
Philippines – The Basics
Books
We’ve found a couple of excellent children’s books written in English with Tagalog words, customs and other things your kids should know. Order from your favourite online bookseller and enjoy! And yes, we do have all three books at our house already!
My First Book Of Tagalog Words: Filipino Rhymes And Verses by Liana Romulo
Filipino Friends by Liana Romulo
Filipino Childrens Favorite Stories by, you guessed it, Liana Romulo
Colouring Pages
One of the easiest ways to introduce the Filipino language and Filipino customs is through colouring pages. Here are some pages for you to print out and start with!
Tagalog Bible-Based Colouring Pages
A few more Philippines Colouring pages
A Crayola colouring page of the Philippines
Geography
The Philippines is really a collection of over 7,000 islands. There are three main regions to the country of the Philippines: Luzon in the North, the Visayas in the middle and Mindanao in the South.
Here’s a map to show you where it is in the world and a map of the country. Take the time to show your kids where, in the Philippines, your parents originally came from.
Where the Philippines is in the World
Map of the Philippines
Language
If you’re like me, you can understand a lot of Tagalog but you have a hard time speaking it… ok, we really suck at it…
Well, one of the easiest ways to start your children speaking Tagalog is with the numbers, days of the week and months of the year. We’ve even included some videos from TagalogLang.com to help you with the pronunciation!
Numbers:
isa – one, dalawa – two, tatlo – three, apat – four, lima – five
anim – six, pito – seven, walo – eight, siyam – nine, sampu – ten
Days of the Week
Lunes – Monday, Martes – Tuesday, Miyerkules – Wednesday
Huwebes – Thursday, Biyernes - Friday, Sabado – Saturday
Linggo - Sunday
Months of the Year
Enero - January, Pebrero - February, Marso - March, Abril - April
Mayo - May, Hunyo - June, Hulyo - July, Agosto - August
Setyembre - September, Oktubre - October
Nobyembre - November, Disyembre - December
We could keep going and going… but that’s for Part 2 where we’ll summarize the history of the Philippines, talk about the flag, the culture, other sites to check out, common phrases you should be using around the house … lots of fun stuff!
So get going with the information above and Part 2 is on its way! To make sure you don’t miss it, consider subscribing to Incredible Dad via email (located at the bottom of the website)! It only takes 30 seconds… I’ve timed it!
Images – Roots picture from Roots picture Madmoiselle Lavender (Flickr), used under Creative Commons License, World Map from NationsOnline.org, Philippines Map from © Eugene Alvin Villar, 2003, sample pages from Filipino books courtesy of Amazon.com and respective authors
Other Posts That Might Interest You:
- Back To My Roots: The Philippines (Part 2)
- Hilarious Filipino Video Tutorials
- Incredible Family Trip to Myrtle Beach and Washington DC – Part 1
Tags: Back To My Roots, Books, Colouring Pages, School, Tips, Videos
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I enjoyed that article. Really well done. What’s interesting is that the basic language of Tagalog is very unique sounding. However, the days of the week are almost identical to Spanish. Isn’t that interesting?
Keep it up buddy. Take care and let’s chat soon.
Thanks for your support and comments Irfan! With respect to the language, that’s what happens when you’re conquered by the Spaniards for a while…
Best of luck with your own site/articles. Love your last recipe at http://www.examiner.com/x-26858-SF-Indian-Food-Examiner~y2010m1d21-Perfect-comfort-food-for-the-season-lamb–coconut-milk-stew.
All the best!
My daughter’s summer assignment is to write about a country in the world, its culture, its people, its language and so on.
She decided on the philippines when we saw a lady on the street and she said that she was chinese and I asked how she knew that and the conversation developed and I told her that not all people who look like the lady are from the china.
She became quite interested and has had fun so far learning about and looking at photos of eagles and so on.
In researching learning tools your site has come in very handy.
It has been rather nice to see and use your resources and enlightening to know that there are many similarities in the hardships some of the urban areas of the philippines have to my country of origin Nigeria. How much we take for granted. I have enjoyed learning more. and shall definitely pass on as much to my daughter who is six now.
Thanks.
Thanks for your feedback! We’re taking the learning to the next level as we’re planning on going to the Philippines this year. Good luck with your daughter’s assignment!
it’s fine all it needs is the teaching of filipino
Good idea… We had a hard time finding a good Tagalog class for Book Boy and Ballet Girl. We found one at a school on Saturdays but there were just too many kids in the class from different grades. Any ideas?
I have two children with my Venezuelan husband, so we speak a lot of (Spanglish) in our home. I picked up Spanish within 2 years and I speak and read and write just as good as any local there. Unfortunately, I grew up speaking English but I can understand Tagalog when I hear it but I can’t say the same about reading/writing/speaking. That’s why I want to re-learn Tagalog, and about my country so I can teach my children their roots. I really like your page. It’s a good start.