Raising a child bilingually

cbrunsdonza said:
Also be careful who speaks to your children. I've banned the nanny from speaking English to the kids as its not her home language and my kids will not speak Cape Flats English!
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So what language does she speak to them?
 
cbrunsdonza said:
Also be careful who speaks to your children. I've banned the nanny from speaking English to the kids as its not her home language and my kids will not speak Cape Flats English!
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Surely the alternative is Cape Flats Afrikaans. Which I wouldn't think would be any better an option.
 
My father could speak 11 European languages and during WWII was put to use interviewing "refugees" into England to determine whether they were German spies. I only learnt English and Afrikaans at school and French at UCT and according to my French-speaking Swiss friend, speak French badly accent wise, so I tend to keep my mouth shut to stop him cringing. My one daughter in England who is a QC inherited her grandfather's talent of learning languages and speaks 5 fluently and did some simultaneous translations at the London School of Economics. She says English and German are the best for expressing yourself.
 
blunomore said:
Any of you done this?

If a child grows up being exposed to more than one language at the same time, do they learn the two languages simultaneously or should there be some sort of method to the madness from the side of the caregivers?
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I have, the kids need to start getting to grips with their own language first. Television and the desire to learn what mom and dad are saying to each other when they speak another language to try and exclude you from adult topics or talking about possible presents etc helps a lot.

I've found those a good combination. The kids teach themselves at that point.

If there's a lack of desire to learn they'll steer away from it (self confidence is a big factor too, so not correcting them when they do speak a different language helps a lot, the 2 usually start arguing in a different language when the one wants to correct the other... and when they switch to their home language, **** got real)
 
blunomore said:
Any of you done this?

If a child grows up being exposed to more than one language at the same time, do they learn the two languages simultaneously or should there be some sort of method to the madness from the side of the caregivers?
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I grew up with English, French and Afrikaans.

I'd recommend speaking as many different languages as possible.
 
blunomore said:
Any of you done this?

If a child grows up being exposed to more than one language at the same time, do they learn the two languages simultaneously or should there be some sort of method to the madness from the side of the caregivers?
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Been there done that. Except it was trilingually.

Its a good idea, but don't introduce them simultaneously. First one needs to be reasonably solid - after that you can pile on more languages & do the whole each parent speaks a different lang. Never mix languages within one conversation - its ridiculously difficult to kick that habit, esp if the other persons in your life are equally proficient at hopping between languages. Think carefully in what lang you speak to your husband...it'll bias things. Same for media...slants things towards English heavily.

Apparently it has quiet a bit of mental benefits in other ways (i.e. broader intelligence), but its going to make for a pretty rough childhood if the kids peers are not in a similar position. i.e. He/she will seem "slow" because he/she has to learn twice as much words & grammar to learn compared to his/her peers.

I'd also think very carefully about which language you introduce first. The one you start with will be strongest. Personally I'd go with English first - since that is what you need to succeed nowadays. Then again English is comparatively easy so if the other language is vicious (Latin, German, Chinese and to a less extent French) then I'd consider introducing that first to take advantage of the early years learning ability.

Also think carefully about the school situation: Most offer only half-assed language courses aside from the primary one. Like my school had strong English & German, but the Afrikaans was weak, the French even worse and those who wanted Latin ended up hiring a private tutor.
 
Ummm did not work well for me and my brother,we started mixing french and english together (eventually making our own language-a twin thing I guess).
 
My nephew and niece are 3. They were only spoken to in portuguese and basically still are spoken to in portuguese only by family. They started nursery school and they are learning english there and they seem to be doing great:o
 
We are teaching our kids English and Afrikaans and its working well. They took a little longer on sentence construction than some of their friends but they are catching up fast and they have two languages instead of 1 which more than makes up for the slight delay. I once read that kids under the age of 5 can pick up as many as 10 languages pretty much for free due to how the brain functions at that age. Crazy stuff.
 
Some very conflicting advice here! Some say focus on a primary language first, others say the child's brain is able to take it all in.

My daughter obviously hears English most of the time - her dad speaks English to her, the radio and TV is set to mainly English programmes.


I speak English and Afrikaans to her, but I try to focus on Afrikaans mainly.

From day 1 when I employed the nanny (whose first language is French), I told her to speak to my daughter in French. It has been 6 months now and she is able to understand the nanny to some extent and she also starts repeating some words in French.The benefit of this is that my daughter will hopefully be able to speak French with a French accent!

So we will see how it turns out :)
 
Keep it up. Like I said it can get a little discouraging when you bump into kids the same age who are already speaking one language fluently but they do catch up and then its the other parents that will be depressed because their kid can only speak 1 language instead of 3! It really does work.

Also don't mix the languages. It confuses them no end. We speak English when I am home but when I am not there my wife speaks only Afrikaans and that helps them keep the languages separate.
 
I'd say just see how it goes and adjust your approach accordingly. If she takes in 1 language quickly and fluently, move onto 2. Or if she's struggling with 2, cut back to 1. Main thing is she must be able to read and communicate fully when she goes to school or she'll struggle.
 
The reason why I said focus on the primary language first so they have a good grip on it is because:

le mouton (or whatever)

if she doesn't know the english, it's going to be hard for her to translate the french to english (or afrikaans)

I think what you are doing is spot on, you need to give her a few quizzes during the day to keep her sharp though (I did that with math so they can learn their time tables properly because whatever the teacher did wasn't working)

Like, "Mommy can't remember, whats sheep in french!?"

etc
 
AcidRaZor said:
The reason why I said focus on the primary language first so they have a good grip on it is because:

le mouton (or whatever)

if she doesn't know the english, it's going to be hard for her to translate the french to english (or afrikaans)

I think what you are doing is spot on, you need to give her a few quizzes during the day to keep her sharp though (I did that with math so they can learn their time tables properly because whatever the teacher did wasn't working)

Like, "Mommy can't remember, whats sheep in french!?"

etc
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Quiz her?? She is 16 months old, she can only say a few words :) We're far away from quizzes, we're just laying some foundations here.
 
blunomore said:
Some very conflicting advice here! Some say focus on a primary language first, others say the child's brain is able to take it all in.

My daughter obviously hears English most of the time - her dad speaks English to her, the radio and TV is set to mainly English programmes.


I speak English and Afrikaans to her, but I try to focus on Afrikaans mainly.

From day 1 when I employed the nanny (whose first language is French), I told her to speak to my daughter in French. It has been 6 months now and she is able to understand the nanny to some extent and she also starts repeating some words in French.The benefit of this is that my daughter will hopefully be able to speak French with a French accent!

So we will see how it turns out :)
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It's an interesting question. Have you thought about buying some books on the matter?

I've grown up in a 100% English household and I like to think my English is quite strong. Most of my bilingual friends who have Afrikaans parents can understand English perfectly but their vocab can be a little lacking, and sometimes if i want to use particular words they won't understand. At work it's even worse, I have to seriously watch what I say because 90% of the office is Afrikaans. There was a huge fun fare the other day when I used an English word that no one had heard of before.

I would say ground your child with English as it's the most applicable language. I find the most interesting to be what language people "think" in. Most of my bilingual friends think in their home language (Afrikaans) and then translate as they speak. This can introduce lot's of grammatical and contextual errors and doesn't have a very good portrayal in a professional environment
 
My wife is Afrikaans but speaks english so well most people are surprised to hear she is actually Afrikaans. She also found the thinking thing interesting as she used to think in Afrikaans but while studying eventually switched as most of her reading and communication by that stage was switching to English. Now our house is first language English but we still speak some Afrikaans and when at Ouma's house we speak mostly Afrikaans. I had many friends growing up in Middleburg where they literally had two first languages. They where so strong in both it was impossible to call the one or the other a second language. It always seemed to happen in households where one parent was the one language and the other parent the other one. That is basically what we are aiming for. Our kids will have dual first languages and will hopefully pick up a 3rd in school.
 
In my experience with my boys, esp the older one, because it was hard for me to be consistent in one language it confused him a lot. I speak English to Hubby as he is actually British English and cannot speak much Afrikaans. Then when he is at work or even in the other room, I spoke Afrikaans, which meant the Daniel never really settled in the languages. He really struggled and it caused behavioural problems because he could not express himself properly. Now we decided, by the advise of a family member who has been there as well, to mainly speak English. We are a month in, and the difference is amazing. He is nearly fluent in English now. It is wonderful. I am all for speak two languages or three or how many ever, YET, I think it is very important that the person who speaks say English, then speaks ONLY ENGLISH, and so forth. It is so important for them to be really solid in one language - esp for school. If they arent solid in speech by age 5, I think they will struggle far too much.

My feeling is @Blunomore - start her on two languages, but be consistent, and if she struggles, no harm in getting her solid in one language. Not all kids are linguists, I mean I hear of kids who are not even 2 and they are fluent in both languages. Play it by ear, as with everything in parenting.
 
AcidRaZor said:
The reason why I said focus on the primary language first so they have a good grip on it is because:

le mouton (or whatever)

if she doesn't know the english, it's going to be hard for her to translate the french to english (or afrikaans)

I think what you are doing is spot on, you need to give her a few quizzes during the day to keep her sharp though (I did that with math so they can learn their time tables properly because whatever the teacher did wasn't working)

Like, "Mommy can't remember, whats sheep in french!?"

etc
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You'd be a much happier man if you could start a family and have your own kids. You have any idea how much joy they give you?
 
blunomore said:
Quiz her?? She is 16 months old, she can only say a few words :) We're far away from quizzes, we're just laying some foundations here.
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Yea, that's why I suggested making it fun. Like those silly books that goes "A cow goes moo. A sheep goes moo. A duck goes moo" etc
 
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