I Almost Didn’t Ask… But I’m So Glad I Did

My son is in preschool and being that no one at home speaks to him in English, he gets confused a lot in his English school. His teachers are awesome and are always keeping us updated on how he is progressing. Recently, his teacher told me that she’s been trying to get him to ask for help when he is confused. This gave me the idea to maybe give her a few phrases in Hawaiian that she could use with my son.

At first I was nervous about asking her if she wanted to learn. Though she’d mentioned to me in the past that her kids go to Kamehameha and she wishes she knew some Hawaiian, I didn’t want to make her feel like she needed to learn Hawaiian because she was my son’s teacher. I wrote down a few phrases, but I didn’t give them to her until she brought it up again during pick up saying, “if only she could speak Hawaiian…” Since I already had the paper ready on my dashboard, I grabbed it and said,

“I’m only asking because I’ve heard you mention it a few times, but do you want to learn a few phrases to say to Kamalu when he looks like he needs help?”

To my relief she said, “yes! I would love that!” with a big smile on her face. I gave her two phrases and she repeated them after me to Kamalu who looked equally surprised and happy that his teacher was speaking Hawaiian to him.

I’m just so grateful she wanted to learn. It’s how I feel when anyone genuinely wants to learn the language for the purpose of communication!

Here’s the 2 phrases I shared with her so you can learn them too:

1. Huikau oe? “Are you confused?”

2. Mamake oe kokua “Want help or Need help?” (This one is shortened from the full - makemake oe i ke kokua to make it easier for his teacher because a speaker ie Kamalu would still understand the meaning even short like that)