A friend of mine has an enthusiastic French-loving 14 year-old son who is keen to continue his language learning outside the classroom - not in a pushy-parent way, but in a 'why can I only learn French according to my timetable?' sort of way. I said I could come up with ten fun, interactive, multimedia ways to keep French fresh in his mind in the evenings, weekends and holidays, and thought I would share them with the world - just in case there are other parents (or Language Assistants!) in the same situation. First and foremost though, here is the Why Study Languages? site to kick-start the enthusiasm.

As the job market gets increasingly tougher, each job requires a decent set of skills (independent thought, adaptability, critical thinking, conference speaking), usually accompanied with a foreign language. How can you, as a parent, motivate your child to keep up with their language learning, in order to help them get a leg up on the job market later on? Here are a few pointers, from parents and teachers.

So, your son/daughter is about to go off for a year - what better way to say good luck than investing in a couple of leaving presents? With all the choice out there, it's difficult to know where to start... Are you a sensible parent who is always on hand with plasters and suncream? Perhaps you love buying the latest gadgets and use your child as an excuse to splurge? Maybe you are eager for them put their language skills to the best possible use when they are abroad. Or maybe you just want to buy something silly which you can have a chuckle over. Never fear, we here at ThirdYearAbroad have trawled the internet to find you the best presents to invest in before D-Day!