Question Hi! I have been subscribed to your newsletter and blog for quite some time and it has been very helpful! Thank you so much! It’s great not to feel alone in the journey of raising bilingual kids. Little background: I have two kids 5 and 3 whose majority language is English. I am a […]
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 times a week (28 hrs). She is a ml passive […]
Parents who want to bring up their kids to speak more than one language can learn a lot from families who have been successful at bringing up bilingual children. However, I also think that a great deal can be learnt from those parents whose children grew up to be monolingual, as well as from adults […]
Some time ago I wrote a post on what you need to consider when you want bring (back) a family language into your child’s life. I also wrote a piece on motivating your child to use the minority language and become an active bilingual. Many parents have asked me to follow up with some practical […]
As the benefits of bilingualism are getting more widely known and the old myths about it dispelled, more and more parents decide to pass on the family languages to their children, giving them the gift of an additional language, fantastic! But what if everything doesn’t go to plan and your baby grows up to be […]
When I tell people what I do and what my book “Bringing up a Bilingual Child” is about, I regularly get to hear comments such as “That’s great!” followed by “Oh, I wish I could speak my parent’s language.” It would be so beneficial for parents who are hesitating whether or not to pass on […]
Most advice for parents raising bilingual children is based on the presumption that there are two parents actively involved in the upbringing. What if you are a single parent and don’t have the support of a partner – can it still be done? This is a question that has been put to me quite a […]
Today I am starting a four part A-B-C for all you parents passing on your languages to your children – or maybe you are planning to do so, but haven’t quite made up your mind yet. A is for Advantages The list of benefits that accompanies being bilingual is long, ranging from the obvious one […]
Is the statement “First generation speaks, second understands and third loses the language” really true? Are third generation immigrants bound to lose the language of their family’s home country? Is it even possible to keep passing on the language from one generation to the next? Should you even try? In many cases it is sadly […]
I have mentioned the term passive language skill a few times time before in my posts: if you have a passive knowledge of a language you can understand some or most of it but you are not able to communicate in it yourself. Mostly there has been a bit of a warning attached to passive […]