I decided to ask this question in homeschooling as I feel that people here might be able to give me a more long-term view of this.

My 4 year old daughter is a Japanese/English bilingual. Even though we live in Tokyo, until recently she has been "stronger" in English. She is uses only English when talking with me and also joins in with my ESL lessons for Japanese kids. She can read the alphabet and enjoys writing letters (and her name).
She has just started Japanese kindergarten this year and has learned a lot more Japanese and has just started to recognise Japanese letters.

Her kindergarten is pretty relaxed (which I love) and she won`t be formally taught any kind of reading or writing skills until the end of next year, when she will be 6. Once she starts elementary school she will start learning Japanese letters in earnest.

She WILL NOT be taught to read or write English at school (although she may have a minimal amount of foreign language-ie English- instruction)

Basically if I want her to be able to read and write in English it will be my responsibility to teach her.
I am wondering if home-schooling parents could give me some advise how best to do this.
As she has just started kindergarten this year and she has a LOT of new things she is learning, we haven`t done anything formal for a while.
I read to her every night and she loves to make cards or shopping lists and try to write down people`s names or food items. She does like trying to recognise letters in signs while we are out.

She is really interested, so I wonder if I should do some formal structured things with her now. I also wonder if I should be giving her some handwriting work to do to help her form her letters better.
Should i take advantage of this interest now to teach her....or just let her do what she wants for the moment and not worry about teaching her anything for a while.

Also any suggestions about how we should continue as she gets older. What should I teach...when and how should I teach her.

Any help and advice apreciated!!
just to say....I am not worried about teaching her to speak English. She speaks English as well as a monolingual child her age, and we have Lots of native English speaking friends. The problem is - where do we go from here?

1. Get her a playmate that speaks English, maybe someone you know from the US embassy has an English speaking kid?

2. Talk english in front of her all the time. (I'm assuming your husband is fluent in English). Get her Sesame Street DVDs in English, keep it running, and hey, which kid doesn't love SS?

3. Get her baby books in english, and read them to her, and encourage her to read them herself, ask questions in English, and after you both have read the book, you *have to* encourage her to relate the story to you, in *english* and in her own words.

4. So the drill is, for at least 3 years, you speak 90% english at home, cos' she speaks 100% japanese at school anyway.

My parents both worked when I was a child, and our mother tongue is not English, but I was always read bedtime books in English, and was surrounded with English story books, from Enid Blyton books, to Tin Tin, and then classics.

I would buy a phonics program and start with that. She sounds interested in learning to read, so you might as well go with it. You can always do handwriting too, if she is interested. Just move along at her own pace. There's no hurry, particularly because her education for the moment will be in Japanese. If she gets tired of it after a while, you can always stop and come back again when she's ready for more.
Check out http://www.homeschoolreviews.com
I personally will be using the Peace Hill Press products (http://www.peacehillpress.com), "Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading" and "First Language Lessons." There are, however, plenty of other programs out there, so check the Homeschool Reviews site and see if anything there appeals.
As for what to use in the future, well I can't help there. You'd need to tell us what your future goals for her English development were. The Well Trained Mind forum hosts an "Afterschooling" board for those like yourself who are supplementing their child's education out of hours, but perhaps there are other such groups online. I wouldn't know, since I haven't looked at them. I believe there are a few others on the above mentioned forum who are stationed in Japan as well.

You are already doing a really good job. The best thing you can do for her is what you are doing already. Making lists and reading together is really great. Just keep teaching her on the side, after she learns the letters, have her learn the sounds too. After she learns the letters, have her write them too. Don't be picky with her hand writing being perfect just yet. I live in California so let me refer you to our state standards; www.cde.gov. I believe that is it. It shows the standards for each grade level. The standards are what are expected of children by the end of the grade year. It is a good base to work from so you can see what other children her age are learning. You will use them to work on throughout the year. Keep reviewing concepts until she has mastered them and then move on. Good luck!