| Pages in topic: < [1 2 3] > | Poll: Do you raise your children bilingually/trilingually? Thread poster: ProZ.com Staff
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| I was a total disaster... | Jun 5, 2009 |
I was a single mother and when my daughter was born we lived in Mexico and were in a totally Spanish-speaking environment. When I tried to speak to her in English I couldn't get a sentence out without switching over to Spanish, so I gave up and only spoke to her in Spanish.
Then when she was four we moved back to Ireland and didn't know any Spanish speakers, so once she had learnt enough English to get by, she stopped answering me in Spanish and I ended up only speaking to her in E... See more I was a single mother and when my daughter was born we lived in Mexico and were in a totally Spanish-speaking environment. When I tried to speak to her in English I couldn't get a sentence out without switching over to Spanish, so I gave up and only spoke to her in Spanish.
Then when she was four we moved back to Ireland and didn't know any Spanish speakers, so once she had learnt enough English to get by, she stopped answering me in Spanish and I ended up only speaking to her in English so she soon forgot all her Spanish.
She had three visits to her Mexican grandparents as she was growing up and each time had to start learning Spanish all over again, until we finally moved back to Mexico when she was thirteen.
So now, ten years later she is totally bilingual, but no thanks to me. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Andrea Black
United States
Local time: 17:59
German to English
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| Absolutely yes | Jun 5, 2009 |
Our son will be 13 soon and he is bilingual. From the start, I only spoke German to him, his dad only English. When he was with me and said, for instance, "dog", I'd tell him (in German, of course), "yes, Daddy calls it a dog, Mama calls it a Hund." He was probably wondering why we couldn't agree on what to call everything.... So we had a "Mama language" and a "Daddy language" and it worked like a charm. As he got older, howev... See more Our son will be 13 soon and he is bilingual. From the start, I only spoke German to him, his dad only English. When he was with me and said, for instance, "dog", I'd tell him (in German, of course), "yes, Daddy calls it a dog, Mama calls it a Hund." He was probably wondering why we couldn't agree on what to call everything.... So we had a "Mama language" and a "Daddy language" and it worked like a charm. As he got older, however, his German started to lag behind his English, as he just does not have the immersion. But at least he can communicate with his grandparents, he can read German and has a good base to build on should he ever need or want to. We'll try to keep up our yearly visits to Germany, that really seems to help.
My biggest challenge was not speaking with him in my native dialect, as I wanted him to learn "High German". As much as I love my Franconian dialect, it's not much use in business dealings.
I just really wish they'd start much earlier with foreign languages in American schools (8th grade coming up is his first opportunity, and it is limited to French). ▲ Collapse
| | | | Textklick 
Local time: 23:59
German to English
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In memoriam | Sorry, can you repeat the question please? | Jun 6, 2009 |
Well meant, no doubt, but:
Main question: "Do you raise your children bilingually/trilingually"
Optional answer "I don't have any children"
Please!:
Marketing research approach:
"If you have children, do you raise them...."
The results suggest that almost 50% of the respondents are childless, infertile or whatever (... See more Well meant, no doubt, but:
Main question: "Do you raise your children bilingually/trilingually"
Optional answer "I don't have any children"
Please!:
Marketing research approach:
"If you have children, do you raise them...."
The results suggest that almost 50% of the respondents are childless, infertile or whatever (alarming!). Let us not forget that there are other demographic considerations such as age, marital status, geographical location, how many languages the respondent/their partner speaks etc. etc.
Does this make sense?
http://xrl.us/bevorg
What more can one say? Once again, these stats tell me little, if anything at all. ▲ Collapse
| | | | carmaj
France
Local time: 00:59
Member (2009)
English to French
+ ...
| I started and gave it up | Jun 6, 2009 |
When my eldest child was born, I did speak to him in English and our English-speaking friends and neighbours confirmed he understood them. I remember one of his first words was "moon" and I was thrilled. However, when he was 3 and his little sister was born, he started going to school and did not like my speaking English, moreover I felt embarrassed to speak in a foreign language when people around did not understand, so I gave it up.
Now he is 17 and studies English at school and is quite... See more When my eldest child was born, I did speak to him in English and our English-speaking friends and neighbours confirmed he understood them. I remember one of his first words was "moon" and I was thrilled. However, when he was 3 and his little sister was born, he started going to school and did not like my speaking English, moreover I felt embarrassed to speak in a foreign language when people around did not understand, so I gave it up.
Now he is 17 and studies English at school and is quite fluent, as for his sister, she loves English, too... ▲ Collapse
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Giorgio Rinaldi
Belgium
Local time: 00:59
Member (2009)
English to Italian
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| Yes - NL and IT | Jun 6, 2009 |
Our son (almost 3) is doing well with the two languages.
We live in Belgium.
"Papà" is Italian, "Mama" is Belgian (Flemish).
We use the one person one language approach: Only Italian with me, only Dutch with mum.
It is hard work, albeit pleasant. Because in such a case the "foreign" parent is the only one the child speaks the non-local language to on a daily basis. It means having to encourage him a lot, talking a lot to him, commenting on all new things you know... See more Our son (almost 3) is doing well with the two languages.
We live in Belgium.
"Papà" is Italian, "Mama" is Belgian (Flemish).
We use the one person one language approach: Only Italian with me, only Dutch with mum.
It is hard work, albeit pleasant. Because in such a case the "foreign" parent is the only one the child speaks the non-local language to on a daily basis. It means having to encourage him a lot, talking a lot to him, commenting on all new things you know he has not been exposed to yet... and being consistent.
But my family helps a lot, on the phone and so on. Plus he watches Italian cartoons (so DVD's rather than TV... which also allows you to select what they watch and go back to watching things you used to like as a child), I read Italian stories to him etc.
It seems to be working fine. His use of the two languages with the two of us is not always so consistent: There are times when he says something in Italian to his mum and speaks Dutch to me instead. And very often he mixes the two languages in one sentence, with some hilarious results.
When he plays on his own and talks to his toys, he does it sometimes in IT sometimes in NL, I suspect it depends on the "subject", on what comes out more easily on the spot.
And I see he does not try to speak any Dutch with my family.
We'll see how it develops. I know it can get more difficult as time goes by and the real learning process in school begins (reading and writing). He's been going to the daycare since he was 4 months and he started school this year. For the time being, I caught him saying things in IT to his schoolmates. Aah, I must have really brainwashed him!!!
And now his little sister: 3 months. So it's back to start, and we'll also see how this new presence will influence the language use at home. I know I can't expect them to speak IT to each other as they grow up. This will make IT even more of a minority language.
[Edited at 2009-06-06 08:17 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | Chamz
Germany
Local time: 00:59
Romanian to German
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| I don't have children | Jun 6, 2009 |
but I speak with my friends' children in two languages, sometimes even three. With the daughter of an Italian-German couple I speak Italian and German, with the children of Romanian-German couples I speak Romanian, German and English sometimes.
It is quite astonishing to see how the child reacts to the language switch: to one question in German I get an answer in the same language, one question in Italian and I get an answer also in Italian. Sometimes the children switch the languages in ... See more but I speak with my friends' children in two languages, sometimes even three. With the daughter of an Italian-German couple I speak Italian and German, with the children of Romanian-German couples I speak Romanian, German and English sometimes.
It is quite astonishing to see how the child reacts to the language switch: to one question in German I get an answer in the same language, one question in Italian and I get an answer also in Italian. Sometimes the children switch the languages in the middle of the sencence. Per example: (it-de) "Voglio giocare con la mia *Puppe*", or (ron-de) "Mi-ai adus *Kekse*?".
[Edited at 2009-06-06 08:05 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | Caro Maucher
Germany
Local time: 00:59
Member (2005)
English to German
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| 45.8% of us don't have kids?! | Jun 6, 2009 |
according to the current poll results, that is... I'm one of them, but I never would have thought there were so many of us without kids! I'm amazed.
| | | | Alma de Kok
Netherlands
Local time: 00:59
Member (2006)
Polish to Dutch
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| Yes... but writing skills are lagging... | Jun 6, 2009 |
We are a Dutch family, living in Poland (almost 13 years now). Our home language is Dutch, we only switch to Polish, when we have guests. Our children (14, 13 and 11) speak Polish amongst eachother.
I have been teaching them to read and write in Dutch too, with mixed results. I had to stop teaching, there simply was no time left for them to play. One of my sons loves reading, he devours books, and for him it makes no differrence if he reads Polish or Dutch. His Dutch writing skills are by ... See more We are a Dutch family, living in Poland (almost 13 years now). Our home language is Dutch, we only switch to Polish, when we have guests. Our children (14, 13 and 11) speak Polish amongst eachother.
I have been teaching them to read and write in Dutch too, with mixed results. I had to stop teaching, there simply was no time left for them to play. One of my sons loves reading, he devours books, and for him it makes no differrence if he reads Polish or Dutch. His Dutch writing skills are by far the best. My youngest has problems writing (I only taught her for about 2 years) and speaking (her sentence structure is Polish, while speaking Dutch).
The best thing of it all is, that they have absolutely no trouble learning English ( all three top of the school) and they pick up other languages very easily. Somehow they have a switch in their brains, which makes it easy for them to distinguish between languages/language systems. Other children of their class (monolingual with monolingual parents) have a lot of trouble to grasp the concept of 'foreign language system'.
We try to let them spend a few weeks in Holland every year, and of course we encourage Dutch friends and family to visit us. We watch Dutch televison (subtitles instead of 'lector') and almost never Polish television. Their Polish language skills are above average, which is somewhat surprising, as they don't have much contact with that language at home. ▲ Collapse
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Textklick
Local time: 23:59
German to English
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In memoriam
Caro Giese wrote:
according to the current poll results, that is... I'm one of them, but I never would have thought there were so many of us without kids! I'm amazed.
As I stated above, it's not 45.8% of "us" but rather 45.8% of those who chose to vote.
How many of the rest of "us" did not respond or were busy eating, drinking, sleeping, changing nappies, feeding children, translating - or for that matter even procreating?
Hence the apparently alarming figure being non-representative.
| | | | Serena Warlu (X)
Local time: 00:59
French to English
| Anger and anguish come out in French | Jun 6, 2009 |
I made a concerted effort to speak English to my daughter from the day she was born. I am English, her father is French and we live in France. It worked well until she began to learn to read French. She was finding it difficult and I had to switch to French to help her with her homework.
Now we both find it hard to talk in English. I find myself slipping back into French after a few sentences.
Last summer we were on holiday with my parents and had been speaking only En... See more I made a concerted effort to speak English to my daughter from the day she was born. I am English, her father is French and we live in France. It worked well until she began to learn to read French. She was finding it difficult and I had to switch to French to help her with her homework.
Now we both find it hard to talk in English. I find myself slipping back into French after a few sentences.
Last summer we were on holiday with my parents and had been speaking only English for more than a week. My daughter disappeared with her cousin for more than two hours. Despite the fact that I wanted my parent's back up as I told her off, I found that I could only express my anger and anguish in French.
I'm trying to make up the lost ground by encouraging her to read in English. If anyone has a ~ 10 year old, I can recommend "Seriously Stinky Trainers" by Anne Fine! ▲ Collapse
| | | | | bilingual children is an asset | Jun 6, 2009 |
I don't have children yet, but I definitely plan to raise them bilingually. Not only it positively affects the cognitive functions, but is also an asset for the future - in my opinion, bilingualism is quite a desirable quality in employment.
| | | | airmailrpl
Brazil
Local time: 19:59
Member (2005)
English to Portuguese
+ ...
| My dogs are bilingual | Jun 6, 2009 |
My dogs are bilingual - my wife speaks to them in Portuguese and I speak to them in English and they apparently understand everything that is said to them - if they chose to pay attention to either of us.
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Michael Harris
Germany
Local time: 00:59
Member (2006)
German to English
We agreed to strictly talk our native languages with our daughter from birth on and she picks up German from the surroundings (therefore, trilingual). It is amazing how much they do understand. Sometimes when one of asks a question, she replies in the wrong language, but we are really surprised how good it runs.
[Edited at 2009-06-06 18:07 GMT]
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we intend to raise them trilingually
Hebrew and Russian are a must. It is better they know these challenging languages from home...
Italian they will learn from the grandparents and we also intend to use it as a "secret language" at least till they'll start understanding it
English they will learn anyway (school, music, movies)
hope this experiment goes as planned... ... See more we intend to raise them trilingually
Hebrew and Russian are a must. It is better they know these challenging languages from home...
Italian they will learn from the grandparents and we also intend to use it as a "secret language" at least till they'll start understanding it
English they will learn anyway (school, music, movies)
hope this experiment goes as planned... ▲ Collapse
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I spoke only English to my son right from the start, to be sure he had a good grounding in English before the Italians got at him....
He did hear Italian in the home and outside, but rarely from me, so when he went to nursery school he had only a small command of Italian. But by the end of a month or two he was chatting away, occasionally inventing words of his own by sticking a vowel at the end of English ones.
Twelve years later his sister arrived and we went through it all again, ... See more I spoke only English to my son right from the start, to be sure he had a good grounding in English before the Italians got at him....
He did hear Italian in the home and outside, but rarely from me, so when he went to nursery school he had only a small command of Italian. But by the end of a month or two he was chatting away, occasionally inventing words of his own by sticking a vowel at the end of English ones.
Twelve years later his sister arrived and we went through it all again, she too went to nursery school with minimum Italian and soon picked it up.
Meanwhile my sister in Austria did likewise with her two kids, who are bilingual in English and German.
So when the whole family gets together English is the lingua franca.
They are both grown up now and my son has a Romanian wife, so I wonder how the next generation is going to manage... ▲ Collapse
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