Question Hi Family Language Coaches, Thanks for sharing so many useful tips and resources – I just discovered your website's Q&A section and I really love it! I have a question about raising a trilingual child. I was...
School-aged children
Q&A: Do bilingual parents have to choose one of their languages to speak with a child?
Question Hi, I am Wadha from Kuwait. My partner and I live in Kuwait (Arabic is used in the community) and are bilingual parents: Arabic native speakers, but we both speak English as a second language. We have a two-month-old child and are planning to send her...
Q&A: Should parents of bilingual children not speak the majority language at all?
Question Hello! We are Americans living in Kuopio, Finland (for over 10 years). We have a daughter who is almost 19 months and goes to Finnish päiväkoti (=kindergarten). I was told by the neuvola doctor (paediatrician) to not mix languages and only speak...
Q&A: Should parents raising bilingual children avoid code-switching?
Question Hello, My name is Benedicte, and my husband and I are expecting a baby boy in the next few weeks. We live in France and are both bilingual French-English. My husband was raised by an American father and French mother. I was raised by French-speaking...
Q&A: How to introduce a family language to older children?
Question Hello! Thank you for the helpful articles! My husband’s mother is Finnish, and all her family is living in Finland or other parts or Europe. Fortunately, they all speak English well so we all can communicate well. However, my parents are Korean...
Q&A: How to help a small bilingual child with the community language?
Question Hi! I am worried about my daughter who is three and a half years old. She was born in Sweden, but I raise her by myself and we speak only Dutch at our home. Her Dutch is fluent, and she has been very talkative for a long time, she speaks in long fluent...
Q&A: The other parent does not understand your language – should you speak it with your baby?
Question Hello, I’m so happy to stumble upon this website. It is lovely to see that we are not the only one with many MANY questions about raising a multilingual individual and that there is help out there 🙂 Here is our situation: Our son is 4 months old and we...
Q&A: How to support a bilingual child with dyslexia?
Question Hello, Can you please advise us on the following with regards to a 7-year-old? The boy’s mother is Australian, the father who he visits is Australian. His step father is from Pakistan and speaks Urdu, English and Arabic. The boy has been to Arabic...
Q&A: How can a single parent raise a bilingual and bicultural child?
Question Hello! I’m expecting my first child in February. I’m going to be a single parent – my son’s father is Mexican and I’m white. My son’s father will not be in his life whatsoever, but I want my son to know his culture and know who he is on the inside. I want him...
Q&A: Bilingual or trilingual – how to choose the languages for a baby?
Question Hi there, First of all, thanks for all the answers to similar questions and your effort to help parents deal with this delicate issue. I have read through several but still have some questions which hopefully you can help me with. First some context:...