This week’s topic is another manifestation of bilingual living: translanguaging. If you look up the term in Wikipedia, it is described as “the dynamic process whereby multilingual language users mediate complex social and cognitive activities through strategic...
Question Hello, I am from a Gujarati family and till graduation I studied in Gujarati then I did my MBA. My wife's name is from Rajasthan and till graduation she studied in Hindi, then did her MBA. We have a 3-year-old daughter and we are planning her education. We...
Question Hi! What do you recommend doing when your bilingual child is refusing to choose the minority language as a subject in High School? My daughter says she can speak it and doesn’t want to start with the basics and would hate the other pupils asking her for...
Question Hi, I was reading your article about bilingualism. I hope you could help me. I'm Filipino and I have an 8-year-old daughter. We talk to her in our language (Tagalog) and of course in English. I would say she has had trouble before with her speech. Even now...
Question My husband and I are Russians but currently leave in England. Both of us use Russian at home, and since we have been in UK for over 10 years, we are fluent in English. We have a small baby and wish our baby to speak both languages. We are not going to place...
Question Hi there, I am hoping you can give me some advice. I am from England however I live in Brazil and I have a son Josh who will be four in July. My husband is Brazilian and our home language is English. Josh has for the past four months been attending a private...
How to prepare your little bilingual for school? What to do if you get a response in the wrong language? Should you follow the teacher's advice to drop your home language? These are some of the questions that Marianna Du Bosq from Bilingual Avenue and I answered...
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...
Every child is good at something and as parents we love seeing our children do well. Bilingual children have an added advantage in different situations in their lives – and they often get really good, and – depending on their personality – sometimes cheeky with their...
So you have successfully passed on your language to your children and they are happy to talk your language with you. Maybe they have also spoken your language amongst themselves up to now. Then the language pattern changes and they switch to the majority language....