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Negative side of growing up multilingual? | ||
Tags: Heritage Language | Multilingual | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes  4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 9 of 20 15 December 2012 at 4:23pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Every now and then, we hear complaints that someone's mum was told, for example: "don't teach him your native language, or he won't speak good English". Assuming this happens in an English-speaking country (typically USA or Canada), that's not actually a problem - in reality, if one doesn't live in an immigrant bubble, their English will be fine but they won't be able to handle academic topics in their other native language.
The people who give this (stupid) advice just generalize too much from what they see, without realizing that most people in the US who speak poor English do have a native language that they speak well. (or well enough for the level of education they have...) The thing is that adults see how easily kids can learn to communicate with their peers and may not realize that actually going to school will be much harder. It is said that even before the age of 12-13, it will take a kid 3 years or so to catch up with those who've been educated in this language from the beginning (probably more if we're speaking of acquiring a language with a complicated writing system). So basically, the parents should be responsible enough to have a long-term understanding of the situation. If the family is going to live in three or more countries while the kid is 6-16, then (if different languages are spoken there) in one of the countries they should seek for an opportunity to get the kid schooled in a familiar language - or school him/her in English from the beginning even if it's not a native language, because almost anywhere in the developed world you can get educated in English. Also, while English is important in general, the opinion of the kid should be taken into account starting from the age of 10 and especially starting from when the kid has been for a couple of years in his second country. Will he want to come back here to study at university or to work? 12-15 is the age when a lot is possible, so that even if the family has to move to a third country, the kid can continue improving his level in the language. While English is the most important language in the world, it won't necessarily be the most important language in the kid's life. for example: -possible langs: Spanish, German, Portuguese (in this order between the ages 6 and 16). get the kid educated in Spanish in Brazil/Portugal. (the kid won't be able to reach the needed level in Portuguese fast enough) If Spanish is not the native language, find a way to continue schooling in German and/or make sure he keeps his Spanish alive while in Germany. -possible langs: French, Mandarin, English. if one of these is the kid's native language, get him schooled in it from the beginning. if not, English or French. -possible langs: English, Russian, French. if English is the native language, teach the kid French as a second language from an early age, then school in either English or the local language depending on what the kid can handle. if Russian/French is the native language, make sure the kid doesn't lose it. school him in English when he's not in a country of his native language. Edited by Serpent on 15 December 2012 at 4:39pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Avid Learner Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4662 days ago 100 posts - 156 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: German | Message 10 of 20 15 December 2012 at 4:28pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Thanks everybody for sharing your own experience and thoughts, it's very interesting. For the record, I would not be against raising a child in more than one language myself, but would want to make sure he's a master in at least one.
He had been to school in French since he started; I don't know his whole background story, but it didn't seem he was the most motivated student. I think it's stating the obvious that a motivated individual (unlingual or multilingual) has much more chances of reaching an advanced level, but if you start behind and don't have the confidence, perhaps it's harder to feel that it's worth the effort.
I fail to see how I made such a generalization.
What I was trying to ask was: can it be that *some* people simply need more exposure than others (at home, with their peers and at school) to maximize the chances of getting that good education? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| justonelanguage Diglot Groupie United States Joined 4462 days ago 98 posts - 128 votes Speaks: English, Spanish | Message 11 of 20 15 December 2012 at 4:45pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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A lot of people I know don't teach their children their native language so that they can "do better" in school here in our monolingual part of the US. However, I think being bilingual definitely outweighs any possible temporary increase in academic success as a child.
My two cents: I spoke pretty much exclusively Chinese as a child and when I first went to school I didn't know any English at all. I had trouble with pronouncing some letters! However, within about a year, I believe, I caught up with my peers and English is now my native language. Ideally, I would have been spoken to in Chinese after entering school, but for circumstances out of my control I couldn't speak/learn it any more. :( Two languages, IMHO, is not unrealistic nor too ambitious at all. The child learns the dominant language at school and is spoken to in another language at home. Or, the parents can do the one language, one parent system. All of my relatives are bilingual due to being spoken to in our family language at home. Another option: child goes to an immersion school that is taught in the non-dominant language or a school that is half A, half B language. To be fair, I do know a family that has children that speak two languages (or 3?) but don't seem to master either....however, I don't know their exact situation. Weird.
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| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 12 of 20 15 December 2012 at 4:46pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 13 of 20 15 December 2012 at 4:54pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
The kid may end up struggling with his native language the way his parents struggle with English. But it's better than not speaking it at all. (PS it's kind of annoying how you put the quotes at the end of your posts. the quotes are for showing what exactly you're replying to and they are useless when one has already read your post) Edited by Serpent on 15 December 2012 at 5:04pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Fuenf_Katzen Diglot Senior Member United States notjustajd.wordpress Joined 4369 days ago 337 posts - 476 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Polish, Ukrainian, Afrikaans | Message 14 of 20 15 December 2012 at 5:43pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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That particular problem seems more noticeable in writing than in speaking, probably because we can filter out a lot of speech, but awkward written sentences are quite noticeable. I also imagine that it would be more likely for this to occur if the individual is only exposed to a small group of people speaking the language, instead of a large community. This is probably the reason why for awhile, parents would send their children to Saturday classes in the heritage language; so they would have a more academic knowledge of it and be able to express themselves just as well as they could in English.
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| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4707 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 15 of 20 15 December 2012 at 7:53pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I've seen families where the heritage language was not mastered at all and I've seen
families that moved all over and the whole family ended up speaking about five languages well. In such cases it depends more on the education and the willingness to learn. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| justonelanguage Diglot Groupie United States Joined 4462 days ago 98 posts - 128 votes Speaks: English, Spanish | Message 16 of 20 15 December 2012 at 8:27pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Thanks for the headsup about putting quotes at the end; I didn't realize it was worse this way! The research I've seen says that the monlinguals are faster at the start in many aspects of language but that the multilinguals catch up quickly, and sometimes advance in some language categories. (speaking, writing, listening, reading) Maybe immigrants want to assimilate because they came to the new country to make a living? (I.E, they were poor) Thus, they want their child to just speak English? Another topic is that of receptive bilinguals; people that understand their family language like a native but don't speak. That is better than not knowing another language but you have to speak.... 1 person has voted this message useful |
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