Some things parents of bilingual children experience seem to be universal. As a parent of a bilingual or multilingual child, you become more aware of your native language and you may also consciously try to improve your own skills. In today’s world, there is an infinite number of things parents can potentially worry about or feel pressure for. Adding another language to that brings a new dimension to parenthood. You have to ensure that your child gets enough exposure to all languages and be on a constant look-out for language resources. To make up for the lack of materials, you probably end up being more creative than you thought you would ever be.
Question I am Egyptian so I speak Arabic and my husband is Italian. We speak together in English but we don’t speak English with our son. In his daycare they use English and Arabic and a little French. My 3 year-old son is speaking both but he is much, much better at...
Question: Our children have grown up learning both family languages and they are now teenagers. We are happy they can speak both languages, but are horrified by how much they mix the languages when they speak to each other. When they speak to people who only speak one...
Question I would like to hear what your thoughts are about this: Languages: minority language (ml) - Spanish, majority language (ML) English Strategy: One parent, one language (OPOL) Country: USA Child: 1 year old Let’s say we found someone who could babysit our kid 4...
Question Hello, I will soon become a proud grandmother to my son's first child and I wonder how I could help in teaching him Finnish. My son knows conversational Finnish but his strongest language is English and his wife speaks English. They would very much like their...
Question I have a dilemma - we are a bilingual couple, my native language is English and my husband is German. I have studied German so I am more or less fluent in it having spent a few years in Germany. We live in the US and none of my husband's relatives live here,...
Question My sister has a friend whose daughter speaks German (from her father), Afrikaans (her mother) and English (kindergarten). So I know it is possible. However, I am going to be a bit of a devil’s advocate and pose some alternative viewpoints: 1) My wife was a...
Question I have 3 and 5 year old children, with whom I speak the minority language, while they speak the majority language with their father and at daycare. They understand and speak my language without problems, though they use the majority language predominantly. My...
Question I come from Italy and my husband is German. We live in Germany. Our son is almost 1 year old and I only speak to him in Italian. The question I would like to ask is as I am likely the one who is reading to him, is it ok for me to read to him in German as well...
Question I am an Arabic speaking mom of a 2 year old. I left my country a year ago (when my son was 1) and moved to Turkey. Because I had to work I had to send my son to a daycare (all the staff was Turkish-speaking) and he spent about nine hours there. My son hasn't...
Question My husband and I are both native English, but we're trying to bring up our daughter bilingual (French). I speak French (BA Honours degree), although my French is by no means perfect. She's now 16 months old, and I've spoken French to her since she was born....