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Languages for my children | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| patuco Diglot Moderator Gibraltar Joined 7017 days ago 3795 posts - 4268 votes  Speaks: Spanish, English* Personal Language Map | Message 9 of 32 28 December 2005 at 2:25pm | IP Logged | ||
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I've heard of a similar situation. My friend's cousin spoke to his daughter in English, Spanish and French and she didn't start talking until she was three. She was taken to the doctor who told them that she was confused with so many languages. However, most Gibraltarian families speak in both English and Spanish to their children and by three years of age, you can't shut them up! Perhaps two languages is the "limit" although somehow I doubt this since there must be other factors involved.
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| solka Tetraglot Groupie Kazakhstan Joined 6550 days ago 44 posts - 61 votes Speaks: Kazakh, Russian*, Turkish, EnglishC2 Studies: FrenchB1, Japanese | Message 10 of 32 30 November 2007 at 2:03am | IP Logged | ||
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Glorawish, could you please update us on your baby's success?
I am also expecting a baby now, and want to teach him the languages I know. Well, situation for Russian and is Turkish is simple: it is the Mom's and Dad's native languages. But we also speak English pretty well, and definitely want our child to learn it, and I am not yet sure how to introduce it. Of course, there is an option of finding English-speakers around us and make sure the child talks and plays with them often. But is there the best way of introducing the third language just by the two of us? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| FlorentT Triglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 6322 days ago 119 posts - 120 votes Speaks: French*, English, Italian Studies: Portuguese, Flemish, German, Hindi | Message 11 of 32 30 November 2007 at 2:41am | IP Logged | ||
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I don't know if Gloria will return to the forum since she only posted once...
Raising multilingual children is indeed an interesting challenge, but is worth trying to achieve. I recall that when I lived in Australia many years ago the children of one of my father's colleagues, who had learnt English natively since they lived their first years in the US, could pick up again English in no time after several years of interruption as they went back to France after reaching fluency. Children have amazing abilities! My personal point of view (so not backed up by any books or articles) is that teaching your children a language that you are not natively fluent at probably will not help much if not seconded by the right environment. I speak English and Italian reasonably well, yet I didn't initially speak to my children in English or Italian because I believe I do not have the right accent and fluency that I'd like them to pick up if they were to be really bilingual or trilingual. I was influenced in this decision by witnessing a former colleague of mine who insisted in speaking English to her boy as she wasn't able to register him for the British School here, and she had a terrible accent - I found that weird at best, and probably not much help for the kid. I should ask her how he's doing now on English BTW, haven't done that - which is why I am saying this is my personal opinion which I welcome anybody to disagree with. I believe that languages are not difficult to acquire if you have the right motivation, and school system has improved a lot to help at least in the French system. I was talking about the right environment. My daughter goes to a French School in Belgium and they are strictly applying the latest French education programmes that require languages to be taught as of kindergarten. In France, that's very difficult because even though this is compulsory, the current lack of qualified teachers prevents most schools from doing it. So she is in primary school and has 6 hours of English, 1 of which is not a language course but a normal course taught in English by native speakers. With this environment, I have started talking some English to her, because I believe I am helping now. And since she likes languages, she wanted to do the Italian class in the after-school hours so I am gladly speaking Italian to her as well. My son will go to school next year, and will enter a bilingual kindergarten class, either in English or German - so as of next year, I will start talking English or German to him. So in a nutshell, I'd teach children the languages you know natively, and for languages you don't know natively (everyone has a different definition of "near native" of course) would wait to create the right environment leveraging the right schools or outside school activities if at all possible. Edited by FlorentT on 30 November 2007 at 2:44am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Hencke Tetraglot Moderator Spain Joined 6896 days ago 2340 posts - 2444 votes Speaks: Swedish*, Finnish, EnglishC2, Spanish Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 12 of 32 30 November 2007 at 3:42am | IP Logged | ||
It is well known that children who grow up with more than one language tend to develop their language skills a little later, after all there is double or triple the amount of information to take in and process. But generally it's just a matter of taking a little longer to get to the same level, without any other ill effects. Being able to start off with more than one language is well worth the slightly longer wait. Another thing is the parent-child relationship, where it is important to have very direct communication at many levels. The child might instinctively detect there is some kind of fake going on with a parent speaking to them in something other than their mother tongue, even if they are fluent. Language is an important part of our identity too. It's probably fine to switch between languages and get a bit of practice in all the other ones, like playing a game, but stick to one of them, preferably your mother tongue, as the main one. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| solka Tetraglot Groupie Kazakhstan Joined 6550 days ago 44 posts - 61 votes Speaks: Kazakh, Russian*, Turkish, EnglishC2 Studies: FrenchB1, Japanese | Message 13 of 32 30 November 2007 at 5:04am | IP Logged | ||
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Thank you for your replies.
I guess I will still try to talk to my baby in English a little, but supplementing it with communication with other kids, and books and videos. By the way, regarding the effect of not speaking your mother tong to the child on the relationship. I was raised in Russian by a Kazakh-native mom and Russian-native father. I have never felt anything wrong about it. She only used Kazakh in the kiddy words like baby chick, or other baby animals (the Kazakh way of saying sweetie and honey to children). Also, my cousins all spoke Kazakh when they were little, and I got used to using Kazakh with babies. I can accidentally start speaking Kazakh when I see a baby, even in the US or Turkey, and even though my Kazakh is far from being perfect. So, I guess it's a matter of habits. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| dancinghobbit Diglot Newbie United States Joined 5658 days ago 9 posts - 11 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 14 of 32 02 June 2009 at 6:09pm | IP Logged | ||
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Can anyone cite any studies that suggest that there is something wrong with speaking to your child in a non-
native language? By ASSUMING that it's bad, you could be robbing kids of a serious advantage! My dad spoke to my sister in Spanish beginning before she was 2 years old, although his native language was English, and he did not know Spanish very well. His accent was very good, but his grammar was horrible (he had picked Spanish up as a teenager working in Mexican restaurants). He should have brushed up on grammar before starting this project, but I still think it was better than nothing. Clearly my sister's Spanish now (she is 12) is no better than his grammatically, but her accent is good and she speaks with a certain natural comfortableness which he does not have. If she were to study Spanish formally now, I believe she would have a very large advantage over a completely monolingual person. Another friend of mine who is a French teacher spoke French to his daughter, with good grammar and a so-so accent, and although she inherited his accent, she has always been able to speak very comfortably with natives. I say, why not do the best you can?? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| cordelia0507 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5840 days ago 1473 posts - 2176 votes Speaks: Swedish* Studies: German, Russian | Message 15 of 32 02 June 2009 at 6:24pm | IP Logged | ||
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I just think this sounds a bit unnatural. This member has left the forum so I will say it as I see it: She is not from these countries herself, she doesn't live there and she isn't married to someone from there.
I have some doubts whether it is the right thing to do. I think it would be odd for the child and probably for her too. Not to mention her husband! She says she's in the UK and there are plenty of French nurseries and schools here. A more 'normal' thing to do would be for her to simply enroll her child in a French school and then support them as they start learning French in the natural way that all young children learn in school. I know people who learnt French and German in exactly this way after their parents sent them to the French and German schools in Stockholm. They speak it like natives and got excellent schooling to boot -- without the strangeness of a parent who is speaking a completely alien language to them. Edited by cordelia0507 on 02 June 2009 at 6:26pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Russianbear Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6777 days ago 358 posts - 422 votes 1 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, Ukrainian Studies: Spanish | Message 16 of 32 02 June 2009 at 7:45pm | IP Logged | ||
Well, I don't know if it is fair to say French and/or Russian are alien languages, since the OP mentioned she was near native in those languages. Once you are that good in a language, you don't think of it as alien, even if you don't live in the country where it is spoken and are not married to a native speaker of the language. Edited by Russianbear on 02 June 2009 at 7:54pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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