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...
Multilingual family
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:...
Q&A: How will having different school languages affect the sibling relationship?
Question Hello, We are a trilingual family and our situation is quite complicated. My husband is Japanese, I am Taiwanese/Australian. We have two children a 4-year-old boy and a 7-year-old girl. I speak native Mandarin and English and conversational Japanese,...
Q&A: How to pass on two heritage languages and an additional language to your children
Question Hello! My name is Caroline and I am a native English speaker who has since become nearly fluent in Spanish. My husband is a native Korean speaker who speaks English as his second language. I have been studying Korean and am at an intermediate level....
Q&A: How to convince the next generation to maintain the family language?
Question Hello, I have a question: I have successfully raised my children to be bilingual (English and Spanish) in the United States and couldn't be more proud of their fluency in speaking, reading and writing. We spoke it at home and they only use English at school....
Granny power for multilingual families [guest post]
Today’s guest post is by Michaela Hansen, the founder of Granny Aupair, an initiative to send young-at-heart grandmas all over the world. Founded in 2010, initially the grannies were only from German-speaking countries, but today more than 1,000 Grannies of...
Q&A: How can a small bilingual child learn two additional languages?
Question Dear Coaches, I would greatly appreciate your advice regarding raising a multilingual son in the following language environment: I would like my son to speak English, Hungarian, German and Spanish. We live in the US, my husband is American and only...
Q&A: How can a single parent raise a bilingual child?
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...
Raising two very different multilingual Third Culture Kids [guest post]
Today's captivating guest post is by multilingual mother Rita Golstein-Galperin, a Career Makeover Strategist® for international women and the founder of Reinvent Yourself Club. She is a multicultural mother of two TCKs (Third Culture Kids) in Paris and a passionate...