Question Hey, I decided long time ago that I would want to make my possible future children multilingual. I have lived years abroad (English was and still is my study and work language), but recently moved back to Finland. I'm a native Finnish-speaker, but...
Q&A: How to motivate a school-aged child to speak the family’s minority language?
Question Hi, I have an 8-year-old son who had speech problems when he was little. He did not really start talking until maybe two. I was forced to choose a language for his speech therapy classes, I chose English. My problem now is that he understands Spanish...
Q&A: How far behind can parents expect a bilingual child’s second language to be?
Question Hello, I have a three-year-old daughter who is bilingual. I speak exclusively English and my husband speaks exclusively Czech to her (since birth). In a typical day, she is exposed to about 70% English and 30% Czech. She listens to music and looks at...
Q&A: How is a baby’s language development impacted by a nanny’s language and accent?
Question Hello We are a Greek family living in Lausanne, Switzerland. We speak Greek at home and French at work. When my wife will return to work after her maternity leave, our daughter will be 8 months old. We plan to hire a full-time nanny until our daughter...
Q&A: Changing the language parents speak with a 1-year-old – is it too late and how to do it?
Question Hi there, I would like to ask for your advice. My husband is Portuguese and I am Hungarian and we live in England. Our daughter is almost one year old, and we mostly speak to her in English. She does hear conversations in both other languages, when we...
Q&A: How to pass on two minority languages in a multilingual environment?
Question Hello, My name is Maria, I am Italian and together with my Libyan husband we have a 10-month-old son. Together we live in Malta, where our son was born. Our common language is English, since I do not understand Arabic and my husband doesn't understand...
Q&A: Does a parent “mess up” a 2-year-old’s language development by speaking a non-native language?
Question Hello My daughter and son-in-law have four daughters ages 8, 6, 4 and almost 2. "Dad" knows some Italian having lived in Italy a couple of years. He thinks he should have been bilingual with the first three daughters. He speaks only Italian to the...
Q&A: Is it normal for a bilingual toddler to go silent?
Question Hello! My husband and I are Spanish living in Ireland. My toddler just is two years of age and goes to crèche three days a week three hours per day. We use Spanish all the time with him and let English language to come bit by bit trough his experiences...
Q&A: How to reintroduce a minority language to a speech-delayed child and a younger sibling?
Question Hello, I am German and, my now, ex-husband is English/Australian. The kids spend half of the week with him and the other half with me. I used to talk German to my son from birth onward, but when he was diagnosed with a speech delay which was luckily...
Q&A: Should parents always speak their native language with their children?
Question Hello I work in a school and we have concerns about a child whose English vocabulary is very limited. Her mother (who is native English speaker but who spent part of her childhood in France) speaks to her in French at home. Father is absent so French...









