Tea. thank you for the link. We have spent a happy hour playing with it while waiting for Papa to get up. More like that please!

Brioche, you seem to be in a very similar situation then me. I have lived overseas as a child so France has always being a bit like a foreign country for me (even though the place where I was was 'french' it wasn't completely french iyswim).
My parents now live in the UK because I'm an only so they wanted to be see me and their grand children but also because they couldn't face living in France when they retired!
The rest of the family is just as spread as yours (in Europe, Africa, Pacific...). Atm, there is just my gran (who is 88yo) still living in what I call 'home' when people ask the question.

I can relate a lot to the position your ds is in. We moved overseas when I was 8yo. For me it was 'home' (because it is where I have most of childhood memories) but for the 'local' people we always have been 'foreign' in some ways, incl my parents who lived there for 27 years.
Strange feeling isn't it?
I'm wondering how the dcs will feel.

Pitchounette, how much attachment do you have to your "home"? (Where your parents live?) I am English, but none of my family live there. I hate it where people ask where I'm from as I moved around a lot, even as a child - only between England and Scotland, but enough not to feel settled in one particular place. Before I moved to France I lived in Scotland. My parents live in US, and my sister has just emigrated to Australia. For DH it's much easier. His family has stayed in the same place and for him he's very much English - even though neither of us has any desire to go and live there (more because we're happy where we are than any negative feelings about England IYSWIM). Was talking today to a friend here who is half English but raised in Denmark (where had Dad comes from) and she has never celebrated Halloween. We do, but because of a Scottish childhood. I still find it very strange to see French OR English kids doing this weird pseudo-American "trick-or-treating" which is nothing like what I remember from my childhood. My kids are both British, because they don't have the right to French nationality, even though DS was born here, because both their parents are British. It STILL seems funny to me when other kids at school refer to DD as being "anglaise" because she's never lived in England, she was born in Scotland and spent most of her life in France. In terms of her influences, she's much more French, even if English is her best language. When we go to the UK on holiday they don't recognise the television programmes, don't like some of the food, and think kids in school uniform look funny.

mamaloco, your comment about being born on earth first and then being french is an interresting one. T
I always have problem when people are asking me where I come from. I can say I am french (my usual answer) because that's my nationality and that's where I am born. But I don't feel 'completely' french, nor really british or something else, more of a melting pot and tbh that it just doesn't matter!
On the other side, I have met quite a few expats who are still feeling very much french/british or whatever despite having lived for years abroad. I am not sure why (and why I don't feel like it iyswim).

Sing, I didn't want to be dismissive. I lived and worked 3 years in Japan, and that's what a lot of them told me (their cote not mine). I used to speak japanese a bit and learning the phonics was really easy as everything exist in my own language (it is easier starting with french than english). They do have a lots of sounds missings to make up and it is easier to learn it if you have heard them from a young age. Look at us miserably failling to hear/speak chinese (which is one of the richest language in the world).
I have fantastic freinds in japan and around the world and I never generalised. I do agree with Sakura that you can't compare expats and people in their home country. Most of them chose to be abroad which makes them 'atypic'.
Some people will always be fantastic at languages what ever their background is.
Multiculturalism is a chance, and you should embrassed it, it makes you more savy as a grown-up and usually more tolerant. (I met some real snobs too, not generalising)
I had debates with my japanese freinds, as I told them being french was not important as such, I was born on earth first being born in france is only secondary. They all think the contrary is true they are born in japan first, being on earth is secondary. (not that I believe in ET, what I meant is I am here as a human and there is no obvious difference between us)
To be honest I am a bit surprise that my post upset you so much, sorry about that, remember I am not an english native speaker, may be I misphrased something .
And now I am totally off-topic, sorry .

Pitchounette and annamama, THose are interesting questions.

I think that all kids have a deep need to be accepted by their peers so I fully expect English to be rejected by my kids for a few years around their teenage years. I would be worried if it was the other way round TBH i.e if they rejected the society in favour of the minority language = me.
There is great need to conform in Japanese society, but the flip side of that is that those who do conform, no matter what they look like, are accepted quite well. Being mixed race in Japan and in the UK are two different kettles of fish. While the Japanese are suspicious of foreigners, they treat any kid who speaks Japanese as "one of them"
But although mixed race kids are considered cool and cute, I don`t think the Japanese want to look western. Their ideal of beauty is so far removed from ours that its mind-boggling. Despite all the foreign media images, a "classic" looking Japanese girl in a kimono turns more heads here than any large-eyed, big-breasted beauty.

I think gender matters- the gender of the child and the gender of the "foreign" parent. I think boys identify with their fathers and girls identify with their mothers. SO my son may become more "Japanese" while my daughter may be more "western". But this is a strong generalisation! After all, if they followed their parents that would mean my son would marry an English girl and my daughter would marry a Japanese man. There are too many variables involved.

I thought Japanese people were really into western things and want to look like westerners? Or at least some young people are like that...? Are your mixed race kids considered "cooler" at all? Just curious...

I agree that a lot of stereotypes are true, no smoke without fire... but yes very important not to generalise too much. And then there's also usually a difference between people who live in their own country and those who live in a foreign country.

We're in Florida at the moment, spending some time with in-laws. I thought I'd be talking more english to DD so that they won't feel left out, but I just can't bring myself to do it at this point, it feels so unnatural! They are being quite supportive though and seem to think it's a good thing that she "talks" swedish too.

Sakura, I have noticed that you refer to your dd and other children as being mixed race (and rightly so).
Do you think that has a bearing on how they regard themselves ? ie because they are different from the outside from other japenese people, they are trying to blend even more into the japanese society (that they see as their majority culture just as well japenese is their majority language) and therefore are more likely to 'reject' the other parent culture? And because the japanese isn't as much a melting pot this is even more of an issue for them than in the british society for example?

I don`T mind generalising about cultures because after living in many countries you beging to see that, while there are exceptions, tendencies do exist more strongly in certain countries than others- both good and bad. The people themselves are usually the first to admit this. I think the important thing is to not to assume everyone from a particular culture is like the sereotype. I also think its important for people to understand their own cultural biases (I have met British people who honestly believe Americans can`T understand sarcasm!)

It is a very interesting subject though slng, your point of view is very valid and its an interesting topic.

I am exaggerating here for emphasis, but I think that the fact the Japanese society is very homogenous and the fact it has been historically isolated contributes to the Japanese belief that its race and society are unique, and cannot be understood by others, thereby contributing to the notion that other languages and ways of thinking are so far removed from them that it would be impossible to learn them properly.

I have found similar beliefs of "uniqueness" in most societies. Russian people, for example, believes they have a Russian "poetic" soul that only Russians can understand; the British believe that only they can understand sarcasm.
I exaggerate, of course, but pertaining to language, there is a definite cultural unwillingness in JApan to embrace other people and languages.

Sakura,

Are you certain that the fact that Japanese society is possibly quite homogeneous, and the fact that historically Japan is rather isolated due to its geography, do not play a more important role in the learning of other languages, than the belief that their language is somehow more superior?

I don't wish to argue about this, but I have to register my objection to unsupported conjectures and general statements that are blatantly NOT true due to incalculable number of counterexamples. It is the logician in me... And I like to think that I have not imagined all the Japanese language students and all the intrepid individual travellers and all the academics who write their PhD theses in English that I have met.

And I have a horror of general statements about any particular nationality or race ever since a shopkeeper at the Edgeware Road in London asked me if I liked money since Chinese girls liked money.

OK. This is seriously off topic now. I will go and boil my own head in silence and solitude.

T42, that's an interresting subject. That's the situation that my cousin's children are in : born in the UK from (very) french parents. I have always wondered if their 'mother' tingue was french or in fact english (They have both been to nursery since they were babies).
In some ways, ds2 is in a similar position : living in the UK but his majority language as a toddler was clearly french.

I wonder, what did they say was the outcome/issues with that configuration?

Cory, catille, thaks for that. I wud have never considered reading to a 10 ~15yo but from what you are saying this is something to consider. I think I will carry on reading for them for longer than I anticipated

Off topic, but:
The Japanese are extraordinarily poor at learning other languages. They use a number of excuses and the lack of sounds is merely one of a range of excuses they use. THe British are also poor at learning other languages compared to Europeans for exactly the same reasons as the Japanese i.e they believe their own language is superior and that others should learn it; they believe that learning languages is unecessary for life/work/travel (Japanese go on package holidays to places where only JApanese is spoken, just like the British do).
So I think what mamloco means is that the Japanese use the "excuse" of phonics amidst a range of excuses they use for not being able to learn languages well.

Sakura,

I understand that. I took a year of beginner's Japanese at college, so have some understanding of Japanese sounds some basic constructs. (But I understood that the sound of "r" in Japanese is not quite the English "l" and not quite the English "r", which some people have trouble with. Just like in Chinese the sound "d" is not quite "d" and not quite "t". But I really don't know that much about Japanese so apologies if I got that wrong.) But the "trouble to learn other language" is not a peculiarly Japanese "trouble". And to say it's "their excuse" seems to imply a collective lack of effort and sounds a bit disparaging.

slng,
Japanese is a language that has very few sounds and because people can usually only pronounce the sounds existing in their own language it is very hard for Japanese to "hear" the variety of sounds that exist in other languages.
They can`t differentiate between L and R (they say lice instead of rice!) and B and V. They can`t hear the difference between SH and S, because in their own language there are no differences.
(think of English people who have trouble rolling their Rs)
This is why its important to get kids listening to languages from an early age as I think after about the age of 7 they will end up speaking with a "foreign" accent unless they are particularly talented.

I am just back from a lecture at dds school on being bilingual on account of your Mother-tongue and place of birth not matching. It was very interesting.

I thought of BriocheDoree when the subject of children with speech difficulties who were brought up bilingually was spoken about.

It was explained that it can be a MASSIVE advantage to be bilingual because there are two pathways for the child to choose from to communicate. Thus giving more opportunities to be successful than children with one language.

"it is very poor in phonics, that why japanese people have trouble to learn other language. (at least that their excuse)."

<< speechless >>

Evidence please. Sorry but I don't understand.

Re reading aloud: my Dad used to read aloud to us well into our teens; indeed he still does it when we go home for Christmas. It's been great as a common reference thing for us four siblings: we are quite different people, with very different interests, but we do have a lot of common ground, because of the stories we have heard together.

Pitchounette - yes for the past 4 years they have had an hour a week with a native speaker, mainly studying poems and novels and doing creative writing as they don't do much of that at school here. It's been really good - much better than if I'd been trying to teach them myself.

Though the fabulous student we have had for the past 2 years has just gone back to the UK so she's tutoring DD2 by email, post and Skype!

castille are you saying that you organize for your dcs to have a tutor in english?

<<Very interrested as it is something I have been debating about myself>>

thank you mamaloco,
I didn`T realise you could get cbeebies online. I`ve heard so much about it on mumsnet. I`m going to check that link out now, seeing as DD is on my knee anyway and DS is having his nap.

Hi Sakura (what a lovely name, I wanted it for DD but got vetoed by my husband!). As you are in japan it is very important that you speack english and welsh to your DD. At school japanese will become her favorite language and it is very poor in phonics, that why japanese people have trouble to learn other language. (at least that their excuse).
The more language you hear below 5, the more easy it is going to learn other languages later on (idealy starting from birth) as your brain "connect" all the different phonics.
If you want her to have fun with English try CBeebies www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/ my daughter loves it (she started it around your DD age), it is the best web site for children (it's free and educationnal), I wish I could find something similar in french, and other languages....

I don't read to them every day - not enough time! But getting them to read to me is good too, it means I can help with pronunciation, explain unfamiliar words and gauge their level for choosing future books.

At the moment I am helping DD2 read an Agatha Christie, and at school while the rest of her class are having their English lesson she does work on the book set by our tutor.

Now that is very interresting castille. I had never thought about continuing to read to them that long but it does make sense.

I agree that a trip back to the country of the minority language once a year is very good. A shame I can't manage more than one or two weeks a year though...

"Thats not my..."books seem to be very good for my DD.

THanks Pitchounette,
Yes, they say that hearing a language at an early age is crucial for the accent. But I didn`T realise that it could also help them with the actual learning of the language in the future. That is very interesting and makes sense.
I will just read as much Welsh as I can to her and not stress too much about it. If she decides to pick it up later, that`ll be down to her. Same for DS. If they show an interest in the future (after visiting Wales, for exmaple) I will be ready and willing to teach more.

REgarding what I am doing so far with the English:
I think a trip back once a year to the country of the minority language is absolutely crucial for motivation and to get them to see the language in context.

I am developing a small library of books here, thanks to Amazon. She is 3.1 but will happily listen to stories I know she can`t yet understand, as long as the pictures are beautiful or the story is engaging. As I read I know she can sense emotion in my voice. Then as time goes on I see her using words that she couldn`T understand when I initially read the story to her, but she uses the vocab from the books at a later date. I find it worrying that almost all the English she has learned has come only from me, so I am very concsious of using lots of adjectives every day. I do a lot of describing, more than I would naturally. I don`T like the way my speech can often sound forced as I use unecessary words, but she has to learn them somehow and this is the only way.

I am a big fan of reading aloud. I hope to still be reading with my dd when she is 12 too.

RS - Here is some French fun for you...

www.cite-sciences.fr/francais/ala_cite/expositions/cite-des-enfants/jeux-2-7-ans/

I still read to my DDs who are also 9 and 12 - the odd chapter of whatever English book they are reading at the time. They love it, it's very soothing to be read to.

Also it helps them learn the pronunciation of words they don't hear much in spoken English.

On another thread, Cory mentioned she was still reading stories to her 9 &12yo.

I'm afraid I don't do anything so 'drastic', just books, lots of, magazines from France and DVDs, again lots of. But I am curious to know what you all do?

I also found that what is making a big difference when you are learning a language as an adult, is whether you have heard/talked the language as a little child.

Most people that I know who have been spoken a language as a yound child can pick that language up as an adult very easily. It seems that it is due to the fact that the brain has 'learnt' the specific sounds of that language so it makes it much esaier to learn it afterwards.
So in your case, even though you might not be able to raise your dd trilingually with welsh, hearing it as a toddler/yound child might be enough to make it easy for her to speak it at a later date (?)

If you can give her a fun taste of Welsh now, it may not be too late to become fluent later on. I work in the Modern Languages dept at our local university, and I'm sure not all those lecturers can have been bilingual from the start; yet some of them are pretty amazing. Motivation counts for a lot.

Yes, thats true about kids` ability to pick things up. I`m just a bit sad because I orignially had ambitions of her speaking fluent WElsh. But I`ve decided to concentrate on the English rather than have her give up on either and just end up communicating in Japanese.
If I can give her a taste of Welsh through books and songs that may spur her motivation and interest and she might decide to study it by herself in the future??

And yes, kids definitely downplay their abilities in front of their peers, but they tend to realise the value of the other languages when they reach adulthood.

lost this thread for a few weeks and there are so many interesting posts on here that i'm glad i found it again.

in relation to whether bilingualism is an advantage or not - i think that when children are young then they just want to fit in with their peers and will perhaps downplay there abilities in another language but i think they grow to an age (hopefully) where they appreciate the abilities they have to be fluent in different languages and to be brought up bilingually can surely only be an advantage in later life.

oldest dc is only 8 so i'm just guessing at the later in life stuff but i know when we were in the UK she played down her german and she does the same here with her english. Or maybe thats just her bashful personality.

Sakura - i think if your children are exposed to english at home and japanese out of the home then when your dc are a few years older it wouldnt be trouble to throw the welsh into the mix - dc are amazing at picking up languages - makes me so jealous!

Can I join?

I was raised bi-lingually (ENglish and Welsh) and maybe because of this I had a knack for languages and I now speak Russian, French and, more recently, Japanese. So I feel bi-lingualism is very important.

My DH is Japanese. He speaks fluent English, which is the family language, but we now live in Japan.

I have DD 3.1 and a DS. Originally I wanted them to learn English and Welsh because I wanted to transfer the cultural heritage to them. Welsh is such a rare language I felt it was a waste not to pass it on.

But now I am absolutely panicking about the English and have thrown the Welsh on the sidelines for a while. I know lots of families here whose children are mixed race with one parent a native English speaker
and the kids can`T speak English!

TO be fair, with most mixed race couples here its the man who is the foreigner so if he`s at work all day then he`s not going to be able to influence the child`s language as much as a foreign mother can. They call it "mother tongue" after all. I`ve also found it matters a lot which language is spoken between the parents.

But on the whole even kids whose mothers are the foreigners struggle a lot with English here. Most couples just give up and just go with the Japanese and treat English as a second language.
I don`t want this to happen! I want her English to be absolutely, completely fluent.

So now I am worried! And I`m going to be following this thread for advice and encouragement and motivation.

Way to go slng! I too would feel my dcs missed something if they didn't have access to the cultural heritage that was part of my childhood: the trolls and the songs and the little joke my grandmother used to make when she was coming home late from a party.

Besides, my family thought languages were important full stop. They took it for granted that as an adult I would have access to English and French and German culture, at the very least, because I would have a nodding acquaintance with those languages. I don't see why dcs should settle for less.

I don't really think about it all as "bilingualism". I am third-generation Chinese in my home country (not China/Taiwan/HK obviously!) and my parents' and grandparents' generations had to put in a lot of effort to keep our language and culture. Not being melodramatic or anything, but we are not bloody giving it up now without a fight! Of course it's worth it. All those stories and poetry! All the fun and games you can have with the language! How can it be not worth it? (But of course I'm only speaking for myself ...)

Hi Pispirispis! The immigrant kids in my class were always the cool ones! I'm sure your DD will be fine! We are in a similar situation, neither me or DH are from the country we live in (England), I'm swedish and he's american. DD has a british passport but we're not sure if she's british? Half swedish and half american? Well she can decide what she is when she's older!

We've just been to Sweden for 5 days, it was great to talk only swedish for so long! DD soon started talking exclusively swedish, for example she said "mer" instead of "more" and "hejdå" instead of "bye bye", which she has never really done before.

I read on another thread someone who said "bilinguality is overrated". What do you think of that...? I think it depends on the situation. If we for example never saw my family maybe I wouldn't feel so strongly about promoting swedish... but we go there about 5 times a year and there's no way I can have my DD not speaking the language.

pispirispis, you may find that your dd becomes your gateway to Spanish culture in years to come (just a thought)

I've never thought of dcs being bi-cultural as a disadvantage or as something that makes them stand out

but then dd has been disabled for a long time, and ds has just been diagnosed with the same condition- and disability is obviously more noticeable than bilingualism; when someone's in a wheelchair that's sort of what you see

though to be fair to dd's friends I am not sure they even notice that all that much; they seem to take it very much in their stride and always have done; so no doubt they have also taken her bi-culturalism in their stride

I don't think one has to assume that all children will be cruel- they can be much nicer than their reputation

Well, welcome, welcome, welcome new names and hello old names too!!!

I am going to a meeting tonight at dds bilingual school so the staff can tell us all about the curriculum for her year and what we are expected to do to support this at home. I am looking forward to discovering their philosophies and advice on bilingualism.

pispirispis - I am also interested in your concerns about cultural diferences and influences on social development in terms of peer relationships. It is strange... I have seen children who have parents from a different culure and language to the one around them 'melt in' wih their peers, stand out as being the particularly 'cool one' because of this and stand out as being different in a 'not great way'(children can be so cruel). All situations are potentially loaded with different degrees and types of problems.

A good question is - How do we ensure being bilingual and/or bi-cultural is infact, as it should be, advantagous to our children's social development?

RS - Do you have many French story and song CDs? They can be great fun. Also if your head can stand it you can buy the French version of electric toys such as leapfrog and talking books...

Hi, can I join in?

I recently posted my first thread here and had some lovely and very interesting replies, and then discovered this thread, and I think it's a great idea!

I haven't read it all yet, but I just wanted to introduce myself and then I'll work my way through during my tea breaks

I'm Irish and my dp is from Argentina, and we live in the south of Spain. Our dd is the only Spaniard in the family! Dd is 17 months old and I speak to her in English. Dp speaks to her in Spanish and only knows very basic English. Dp and I speak Spanish to each other. I'm a SAHM so dd is with me all day and we see quite a few English-speaking friends. Many of them have dc dd's age which is fab. I take dd to Ireland twice a year for a few weeks, and my parents and other family visit a lot, so all in all dd has lots of input in English.

Neither of us have family here, which is tough, but I guess that makes us closer as we only have each other! Integration is an issue of concern for us, as we don't have many Spanish friends and don't really get involved with local cultural events (of which there are many!) I do make an effort to speak to other mothers in the park and people are friendly, but very focused on spending time with their own families exclusively, really. I worry that it may be a problem for dd in the future when she realises how "different" we are from her friends' families, and that she may may be at a disadvantage with us not knowing much about local culture and customs...

Anyway, hello to you all!

Hope everyone had a good / bon / whatever weekend?

DD yesterday asked me for "water", then corrected herself to "vatten" (swedish). Quite pleased about that, maybe it means she knows when to use the different languages...?

Going to Sweden on Thursday for a long weekend, DH not coming, so DD will be bombarded with swedish only for 5 days!

You also have 'Tralalire' which more or less in between Pomme d'Api & Popi.

I think they are normally good quality and my dcs both seem to enjoy them.

My daughter is 18 months and likes (bits of) "Popi" which is the one before "Pomme d'Api" ...

I have heard about Pomme d'Api from various places. Must look into it as soon as dd is old enough. I am also trying with French DVDs, which are very popular at the moment.

Yeah, the best thing is if you find kids who ONLY speak the minority language... which is hard unless you go "home".

If you find a way to do that, let me know! I have a problem with that too. One of the main issue for me is that french speaking children I know of are not the rigt age group and I knonw they would use english and not french to speak with my dcs (school age children who are in effect more confortable too with english than french...)

Atm, my way to keep french nice & fun is to play with them as much as possible and to read (and read & read). They are recieving 'Pomme d'Api' and the like. they really like to recieve a 'book' through the post and see that as something really special.

Just having problems now with the 'minority language as fun' bit. DD very firmly told DH this evening that butt-er-fly is 'un joli mot' and pap-i-llon is not. (Until I added Schme-tter-ling to the conversation, when she realised that it is always more fun to side with Papa and started saying papillon.) Now realised that it is VITAL that I find some French-speaking playdates, but where, in darkest Dorset?

Hello again, I almost forgot about this thread as I've been obsessing about ante-natal testing etc... another bilingual child due in March

I've now read the whole thread from the beginning! One of the many helpful things I read was this from Belgianchocolates:

"I used to speak purely Dutch to the dcs, but now they are a little older and their language is more establised I have relaxed a bit."

That sounds good, and is probably what I'll do too!

DD is 16 months and I'm so proud of her, she's talking A LOT, swedish, english and a lot of nonsense too... I just hope she will continue to develop in both languages and she's not just doing well now when she's little.

In the book I've read about bilinguality it says that it's important to keep the minority language "attractive", ie so that the kids feel that they want/need to talk it. For example meet with other kids who talk it, read fun books, etc. I so wish I knew another swedish family nearby, that would make things a lot easier! Hopefully we'll move back to London soon, probably bigger chance of finding one there than here in deepest Kent...

Really interesting to read everyone's posts on this thread!

you should have seized that dad and not let go of him. I'd have ensnared him into coming and singing French songs with the dc. Every day even. LOL at can I just drop in any time?

he he he

That's hilarious teafortwo, I'm also calling dd a daft banana from now on. I really like that too ML

Hi. Haven't had a moment to post recently. Feel great sympathy for rural German teachers who are not used to bilingual children.

I teach in a primary school and am always trying to include the French I hear at home in my classes. I have just discovered that I have a French girl in my year 1 class. Luckily she is very shy and not inclined to shout out and correct me if I make a mistake but her father came to me last week to say that he would like to come into class and 'observe how I teacher French and could he just drop in any time?' I am amazed that he didn't hear me inwardly screaming NO NO NO NO NO and NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO (as I We compromised on NOT DROPPING IN. Please, don't ever do it to a poor language teacher who has not had time to brush up their irregular verbs.

DD is being happily bilingual, constantly making statements like 'Je veux etre avec you.', which drives DH mad but I am sure that will gradually sort itself out. More worrying to her is the fact that she has been asked to use the girls' toilet at nursery when she is Bambi who is obviously a boy.

T4T
Bless! I love that, "a daft banana" and am going to adopt it for my DC.

DD and DS were waiting on my finishing my shower/hairdrying last night for me to read their story. DD got fed up waiting and decided to read DS's story to him.

I have never heard her read before, not a book, in any language. This book was in English, up to a year ago her second, not quite so fluent language.

She just took off, and read. Reasonably fluently. I was so amazed.

When DH came home, I said, "DD can read" and he answered "when did she learn to do that?"

Canella - FANTASTIC news!!!

Today I met dd's English teacher at her bilingul school for the first time. She told me it was a big day for dd because it is the first time she has spoken English at school....(which is her strongest language???)

"REALLY???" I squalked "It has taken two weeks for her to speak to you in English???" Then without thinking I turned to dd and giggled "You really are one daft banana!!!"

The teacher suddenly realised the level of English dd is used to on a daily basis and we all had a really big belly laugh!!!

... but I do wonder if she is pretending to be not too strong in English to 'fit in' ...

so my FIL spoke to the english teacher for me (my german is poor but i suppose i could have spoke to him in english!)

plan is for dd to do a project in the english class but he hasnt sorted it out yet so for the meantime she's going to read a book at the next few lessons! think he just hadnt realised how good dd's english was! we live in rural germany - i'm sure there's not that many bilingual kids coming through the school!

When I was at secondary school, there weren't Chinese lessons (although I DO know a few schools in the UK that do chinese - DH's old 6th form does, for starters) but there were several children whose parents were from HK, who all did Cantonese GCSE...
We've been lucky. Most people we encounter are positive about bilingualism. DD's teacher this year not so much but I think she hasn't really grasped the extent of DD's language disability yet - i.e. she seems to think it's just French DD struggles with because she (the teacher) doesn't speak enough English to realise how behind DD's English is! However, there are 5 bilingual kids in DD's class - English, Hungarian, German, Polish and Dutch, so DD hardly stands out for speaking more than one language!
Unfortunately DD would never be accepted in bilingual school because she doesn't speak her native language well enough!

It's very unlikely there will be Chinese lessons in our school, so we are not going to have that problem. One thing less to worry about.

We are going to have this problem next year when DD starts German lessons at school. I don't know what they will do with her. tbh, I think that it will be good for them to have an easy class where she does not have to do much work.

If the teacher is ok with it I might give her a book to read, but she might just like to join in and "help" the teacher.

This is something I'm already worrying about - even though my daughter is 18 months old ...

Obsessive? Me? Never!

its me that needs english lesssons!!!
that should have read "whose kids"

its me that needs english lesssons!!!
that should have read "whose kids"

she's 8 - she's just gone into the 3rd class here but would be in Y4 in the UK.

She'll be having english twice a week - each class is 45 mins.

She's an amzing reader - she devours books at home - she got the malory towers set for her birthday and had read them all in 10 days! think even if she took those books in or some factual books then it would be better than repeating "my name is .."

I am friendly with another english speaking family who's kids will also go to that school - so thats 7 kids between the 2 of us over the next 6 years who'll all have this problem (the age range is 8 - few months) so surely the school need to address it. Cant get hold of the headteacher to speak about it - will keep trying!

In some wasy we have the same problem at our schoo. The cds are having 'french' lessons with the rest of the class so they are 'learning' to say 'Bonjour' etc.... Atm, they are 'helping' the teacher and this isn't a major issue.

With older children, they normally use the bilingual children to support the teacher (ie doing some of the teaching work iyswim). If that doesn't work, they are taking them to another class to do somethingelse.

How often does she have an 'english class' ?

My DH went through this when he was a boy too. There was an airport near his school so he used to sit next to the window in English and used the time to look out for planes.

Thank goodness he found a passion for planes - Otherwise it sounds like quite a painfully boring experience to me!!!!

How old is your dd? Just to give me an idea what her level is.

What about starting off by suggesting dd uses the time to read in English - get some heavy weight authors in to make the case particularly strong - someone everyone knows.

Now... Slowly slowly catch the monkey she can eventually use the time to do projects in English lit and lang too.

I would suggest finding a good English teacher for home and your DD can then use the class time to do her homework for her English teacher.

whey hey its not in bold!

thanks for your advice about speaking english - will carry it on then!!

dd had her first english lesson at school yesterday!! she went to the teacher at the beginning of the class and explained that she had only come from the UK 6 months ago and her English was probably better than her German and what should she do in the lesson! the teacher said "well you can just correct any mistakes i make then!!!!"

how's that for trying to let her get the most out the lesson!! so dd spent 45 mins saying with the rest of the class "my name is ...." "whats your name?" any ideas as to how we approach this - thought she could have taken some work in with her or done some german work at that time?

Humm yes I've had the discussion with some very good french friends+who are teachers. Apparently, so and so have problem at school mainly because the parents are not speaking french (but arabic in that case, shock horror).

I have tried to explain that actually speaking 2 languages is an advantage, that speaking to them in french but badly would not help to no avail. Tbh, I though that had to do with the language to speak at home more than the bilingualism as they don't have a problem with my dcs being bilingual. I didn't think they would do the same with english, german etc...

canella, carry on with the english. Even though your dcs are fluent in english, they will loose that very quickly. A family member went abroad when he was young and after a couple of years, all the children were only speaking english to each other, not french despite the parents being french, both parents speaking to them in french and the children only speaking french when they arrived...
You might want to have a look at the 'multicultural section'. There is a thread going on about Germany. You will find lots of infos on there re the schools there and the issue of the language.

Ouch!!! This bold is really overwhelming!!!

DD's English teacher at school has a name with 'th' in - much to my delight dd pronounces it a little exaggerated but I'd say pretty well!!!

canella - I think you really need to speak English with your children. They are getting German everywhere but you will be their main English influence. A friend of mine thought her son's French was poor so stopped speaking to him in English. She only speaks to him in French now and he as a result only speaks French which is a big shame.

The headteacher at our local school told us we should do the same when I visited and asked her for advice on scaffolding dd's development in English and French when she starts school. Us speaking English at home was viewed as a disadvantage in terms of her education and she explained we should use French as much as possible in our family home. Hense the reason dd attends a bilingual school - where the teachers think a bit more like me, and view bilingualism as a massive advantage and English as something to be cherished in our family unit!

thats what i need to hear mme lindt!! i make sure they spend time most afternoons with german friends in the village and they watch german tv! i think the english we speak is essential to keep that up!

no idea why it is in bold - it really hard on the eye!

Canella
Keep speaking English with them at home. They are in a German environment and will hear enough German.

My DD started school here in Geneva without speaking any French and is doing well.

Why is this thread all in bold type? Is it just me? None of the ohter threads are.

can i join too!! (not stalking you mme lindt - honest!)

I'm also scottish , DH german - we moved to germany 6 months ago with our 3 dc (8, 5, 3).

Oldest child (dd) really good with speaking, reading, writing both languages but only really speaking english at home - dh works long hours but she does speak to him in german when he gets home.

Its my 2 ds's who need to improve their german - they're both at kindergarten every day for 4 hours and bless them they love to speak german but ds1 should go to school next year so i feel he's got a lot of german to learn before them!

someone on a different thread suggested we should speak german at home to help us all out (my german needs a lot of work too) but i feel i would be a traitor to my english language - surely they need to keep that up too?

Oh, how did I miss this thread? May I join in? I have not read the whole thread (for some reason MN is all in bold today which is rather hard on the eyes)

I am Scottish, met DH in Germany and lived there for 16 years, gave birth to DD and DS there then moved to Geneva last year so we are now heading towards trilingualism.

The DC are in local school so completely immersed in French, while I am struggling along in the weird expat bubble that makes Geneva so different to anywhere else I have lived.

I speak french to the dss when I am surrounded by english people. It has never been a problem so far, especially when they were as yound as your dc.

Now that they are older (6&4yo), I speak english to them when I want the other children to understand. Otherwise, I stick to french.

Brioche, that must be hard, regardless of being bilingual

Annamama, I usually find I speak both langs when surrounded by French people - i.e. speak to my kids in English, but then repeat in French so that others can follow the conversation. Seems a bit rude otherwise...but yes, very odd speaking the majority language to your DC (but you'll find you do it more and more when they start school because that will be a whole area of their life that is carried out in the majority language).

Sorry, to clarify, DD's language disorder has nothing to do with being bilingual. She is diagnosed with "Trouble specifique de Langage" which I think more or less corresponds to Severe Language Impairment in English. It's a neurodevelopmental delay. Basically she has severe problems with language acquisition, and on top of this we have complicated matters by moving to France where she has to learn a new language as well. It used to be that kids like DD were discouraged from being bilingual but more forward-thinking therapists are now saying that it's not a bad thing after all (i.e. that these kids will learn both langs but will always have problems in both). They've done studies in India and hispanic kids in US, for example.
DS is not affected, speaks fine, but so far mainly English (he's 26 months). Looking forward to see how he progresses when he starts school. Was so happy to bring up my kids bilingual (I speak several languages but didn't start until I was older) and it was a bit of a shock to discover that one of them will probably NEVER speak "correctly".

Hi everyone! I've just found this thread, will probably read all of it when I have more time...

I'm swedish, DH is american and we live outside London. DD is 16 months and so far she is doing really well with her bilinguality. But I'm worried that it will be more difficult later on, when she'll be more influenced by the outside (english) world... (?) We go to Sweden quite often though so that's good.

Anyone read any good books about bilinguality? I've read Raising a Bilingual Child by Barbara Pearson, it's helpful but perhaps a bit too scientific.

One more question, does anyone talk your minority language when with english people? I feel almost a bit rude doing this but I feel even weirder suddenly talking to DD in english which I never normally do.

I agree too. Language disorders and being bilingual are different matters.

What kind of disorders are you talking about?

Brioche - I speak Chinese to my children at home and school language is English. So far no problems. DS1 is in school now and DS2 is in nursery for school hours. They speak both languages, DS2 mixing more than DS1. At various points one language would be dominant, but it changes all the time. They never speak the "wrong" language to people who don't understand it though. I don't know much about language acquisition, though I thought that language disorder doesn't have much to do with multilingualism?

Today DS2 spotted a Chinese word he knows in nursery, on one of those posters with greetings in different languages. << pleased mummy moment >>

Is there anyone like us where the home language and school language are completely different? Would like to know your experiences because ours is completely thrown by DD having severe language disorder. Now watching my two-year-old, would like to know how it's SUPPOSED to happen. He goes to French halte-garderie (nursery) 1.5 days per week. Vocabulary mainly in English but plainly understands French. Guess he won't really start speaking it until school. Huge irony for us is that DH and I are both multilingual, studied modern languages. I grew up in a family where everyone spoke French or German to some extent, and so to see DD struggle is quite sad as we thought we were doing her a favour, moving abroad when she was a baby!

I am finding that reading in french isn't an issue as such with ds1. It's more an issue for him of being able to recognize the phonics in effect.
As for writting... french isn't easy (in some ways more difficult than english I think) so I am not sure how to tackle that one. We'll see when we come to it.

Re: reading/writing in the minority language. I had decided to let ds learn to read and write in English first as that's the most difficult language to get the hang of and do Dutch when he's a little older. To my biggest surprise and delight of course I discovered this summer that he can read Dutch with a little help. Hopefully the writing will follow on from that over the years.

I like the suggestion of a magazine subscription. I might do that for my dcs. Maybe a good b'day present as their b'days are just before christmas.

norktasticninja, actually I have some sort of rules re speaking french. In a day, they have to :
- have watch one DVD in french (if watching any)
- have read one book with me too (before they were school age - more difficult to do now).

It is really worth investing in some books/DVDs, the second hands ones are better because otherwise, you need to be very rich to sustain it!
I also have a subscription to a french magazine for them so in effect, they are receiving one new book a month. I know they do an english version of it. That could be interresting for you perhaps?

I'm pleased that my boys are getting to learn lots of languages with not much effort

It's easier for us as we can all speak all the languages so jumping from one to another doesn't exclude anyone.

norctasticninja I too think people should speak their native language to my dcs. I'm forever telling my aunties at home to speak Dutch to them. Even after 7 years of bilingualism, they are still that the dcs know how to speak Dutch. Sometimes I feel like I'm banging my head against a brick wall with them. It's not as if bilingualism is something unusual in Belgium <shakes head in desperation>

romana I'm equally impressed by your trilingual family. It's great if you get to do it though.

Pitchounette I'm at home with DD 3 days a week and in the weekends. The other two days shes at a (Dutch speaking) nursery. From December she'll be going down to just one nursery day though.

We hardly ever go back to the UK, DD has been once for two weeks... DM visits for a week two or three times a year and DB a bit more often.

I definitely need more English 'material' I'll see what I can arrange.

I agree about accent too (as long it's an accent from that country iyswim).I know that children are very good at picking up accents very easily. I did as a (monolingual) child in France.

Saying that, I cringe when ds1 is struggling to say some french sounds (and say them with a strong english accent). I would be deligted if he was speaking let's say with an accent from 'Alsace' (we are coming rom the south of France).

Hello everyone and welcome again!

norktasticninja, are you working or are you at home with your dcs most of the days?
At home, we all speak english (as DH doesn't speak french) and the language around us is english.
My situation is similar to yours. I am the only to give some input in french.I found that being consistent with speaking french with them (and only french to increase the amount of french they could hear), read and DVDs have been enough. We go back 'home' only once a year for a coule of weeks.
Have you try to get some books & DVDs on ebay (dot co dot uk) and have a family member to make a parcel for you?

Romanarama, I am always impressed by people who are trilinguals like you and your dcs!
Re the identity thing, my own experience is that I do feel as if I don't belong anywhere (Have travelled quite a bit too, even if not as much as you). Home is where I live at that moment in time. And to be fair, I proclaim strongly that I am french more for the dcs so that it is easier for them to have a 'relation' with the country iyswim. But I don't find it an issue as such. It is only becoming an issue when people ask me where I am coming from .

lol. Hopefully the accent will sort it's self out in time!

DP is from Brabant but we live in Zuid Holland - he's not at all impressed that DD's developed a 'hard G' rather than the soft Brabants G sound. He was convinced she wouldn't

Dutch accents can indeed be pretty atrocious - I still cringe every time I hear a Dutch football player on telly here (not so much now, as I think the SPL seems less orange these days)

Having said that - DD1 seems to have a natural inclination for a Dutch accent resembling that of 'de schilderswijk' or somewhere thereabouts - not good! (those in the know may understand )

I mean if the native language is one of the DC's languages IYSWIM.

'tis true that most Dutch people speak great English but it's often heavily accented. Because DP and I speak Dutch to one another and DP speaks Dutch to the DC it's very much the dominant language in our house/lives. So, our friends speak Dutch to the DC too.

TBH I always thought people should be encouraged to speak only their native language to bilingual DC. Is that not right?

I shouln't worry norktastic - all the completely dutch people I know seem to speak perfect English! (Maybe false impression as I only know expat dutch?)

I, by the way, was completely monolingual, grew up in the same place etc, though I always loved learning languages and can speak several.

Hello!

I only just found this thread, I'm slowly working my way through it but I'd love to join in

I'm British and live in the Netherlands with my Dutch DP. We have two DC who we're bringing up bilingually, DD is 21 months and DS 3 is months.

I speak only English to the DC and DP speaks only Dutch. DP and I speak Dutch together but I think we may need to change this although it would be a very hard habit to break!

DD understands both languages very well but only has the odd word in English whilst she's up to 3 word 'sentences' in Dutch. She has a major shortage of input in English, it's just me and a couple of programs on CBeebies in the mornings. I read to her in english too but the situation is far from ideal. TBH I'm worried she's not actually going to speak much English at all despite understanding it well. Only time will tell.

Hello, I looove this thread. I'm English, Dh is Italian, and we've lived in lots of countries, now in Belgium. Our boys, 7,5 and 3 go to French lycee. Our family-altogether language is Italian, because dh works very long hours and their time with him is limited. I speak English with the dcs. They used to speak French in lessons and Italian in the playground in Rome. Now they're at a school with a fully bilingual French/English programme, which should help with English reading and writing, and the community language is French (and Dutch, though it's not essential here to speak it). The playground language is definitely French, and most of the children at school are French nationals. I suspect their Italian will suffer a bit, but we will take lots of holidays there and get mil to come and stay periodically.

None of mine spoke late and they didn't mix up their languages when very little, though they do a bit now (ds3 calls his teeth his 'dents' and they all seem to have trouble with the difference between hear/smell/feel which are the same word in Italian. It's actually going really well.

We were a bit concerned about the national identity thing, especially as they were born in different countries (continents even), and we'll move every 3 or 4 years, but I think the pros outweigh the cons. So far they are very well-adjusted and nearly perfectly tri-lingual.

pitchounette My dcs only mix English in Dutch, but not the other way around. I think the reason behind them communicating in Dutch at home is similar to yours. I was a SAHM with ds and so he spoke Dutch all day. He was 2 yo before he went to any nursery. DH works away from home and we have Dutch au pairs (to help with their Dutch language), so I suppose Dutch is the main language at home. I do correct them when they mix their languages, but they just seem to be ignoring me I do know that they'll speak 'pure' Dutch if they have to, so I'm not worried about it.

oricella WECOME on this thread!!

Belgianchocolates, the dss are quite good at not mixing languages (but I also probably have spend quite a bit time 'correcting' when they were little...).
ds1 (6yo) hardly does it now, has never done so in english - his strong language. ds2 (4yo) is still mixing, mainly french words in his english but I am sure school will sort that one out lol.

I think the reason they are speaking french to each other is because they were with me most of the time when they were little so french was the language of communication. It then stayed. What is interresting is that ds1 is seaking mainly english when playing on his own (imaginative play) esp when he is playing with 'Thomas'. But ds2 plays in french.
Now ds1 was at nursery as a baby whereas ds2 wasn't so I suppose that explains it.

pitchounette My eldest 2 are 5&7, the baby is 4m. I live in the UK, which is why it has really taken me by surprise that they communicate in Dutch. They also speak Dutch to the baby, which is really cute.

oricella your story was funny. That reminds my of my ds, who does things the other way around. He'll take an English word e.g. hot dog and ask for a heet hond to eat Sometimes when he does that sort of things it takes me a minute to click what he's on about. Dd1 doesn't do that for some reason.

I was talking to a half Dutch mum at a m&t group yesterday and it made me really sad when she told me that her Dutch mum had never spoken Dutch to her. The woman wasn't sad about it. She told me that her mum had made the decision because she'd heard that children end up not speaking either language properly, which is off course a myth. My dcs might have been a bit slower learning to speak and their vocabularly in either language is slightly less than their peers, but overall they must have more words. They do mix languages at home, but I noticed my ds making a real efford to only use Dutch words when he was visiting his cousins this summer. I think at home they know they can be a bit more lazy as I'll understand them, but they know that their 3&6 yo cousins don't understand English.

Can I join too? Dutch mama living in Scotland with two DDs (nearly one and nearly 3). I speak mostly Dutch to the girls - and DD1 has great understanding, but speaks back mostly in English. We're working on speaking back in Dutch - and I hope that onces DD2 starts to talk they will start talking Dutch to each other too.

One of the things I find most amusing is situations where (new) Dutch words, sound like English ones she already knows; the other day we were playing a game, and I really didn't get why she started chattering about there being no birds all of a sudden - until it struck me I told her it was her turn, which in Dutch (beurt) sounds very much alike.

Nice to meet you all

Re bilingual school - my nearly 12yo DD is in a bilingual section of a normal school, and yesterday she said she definitely preferred the lessons taught in English by English speakers because the teachers are so much nicer and a lot less bossy!

The differences in teaching style can be vast.

I have been starting to do some reading with ds1 in french and have come to realize that he can't pronounce some of the sounds properly . He would really benefit to spend a few months in France and have some cousins the same age to play with. Which will not happen as I am an only child!

Belgianchocolates welcome!!
My 2 dcs are speaking french to each other too much to my surprise. Now that ds2 has started school, I am not sure it will stay like this though.
How old are your dcs? Are you living in Belgium?

DD had her first day at her bilingual school yesterday.

On the way to the ice-cream stand (a first day at school treat) she said "Mummy I am Fr-wench and I am in-gerlish."

Hi. I've ventured into the bilingual section for the 1st time in jonks and stumbled upon this thread. If you don't mind I'll introduce myself and if you do I'll still do it anyway

I did try to read the whole thread, but 9 pages is just a little too much at this time of night. It's a great idea though to have a chat thread to share experiences. It gives one a better idea of all the individual varieties of multilingualism around.

I'm raising my 3 dcs bilingually. Although 1 is a baby and doesn't count yet. I used to speak purely Dutch to the dcs, but now they are a little older and their language is more establised I have relaxed a bit. Especially doing homework just doesn't go without using English.
So basically I speak Dutch to the dcs, DH is English and doesn't know Dutch so he speaks English. And funnily enough the dcs speak Dutch to eachother exept during imaginative play. They do mix their languages, but I learnt to be relaxed about that thanks to the book "growing up with 2 languages" and after observing them play with their Belgian cousins who are monolingual.

There, that's me.

Bambi

National identities are so yesterday. We are international (and cross-species in some cases ) citizens now.

Welcome Racingsnake !

Hi there. Haven't got time to read through this all now - I should be working, but just wanted to introduce myself and join in.

I am English, my DH is French but has lived in England for 15 years and is totally fluent. We live in England and our dd is bilingual, mainly speaking French. DH always speaks French to her, I usually speak French to her and she speaks mainly French to us, sometimes mixing languages. My French is not bad, but I frequently get genders, etc wrong.

I know that I should speak English to her - this is the received wisdom, as I am frequently informed, or she will learn my bad French. However, I am half German but did not grow up bilingual (although my German is now pretty good) and I talk to other families in our area who say that the dc refuse to speak French / Spanish / whatever at home, so I want to make home life basically French.

We have DVD's, books etc in both languages but encourage French and are looking into getting French and German satellite TV when our analogue is turned off in the near future. Cost is a factor, though.

People have recently asked me if DD feels French or English (she is just 3). Since she actually believes that she is Bambi at the moment it is not an issue.

Oh please please let me share a conversation I had with dd while we were making a plum cake today....

(DD pokes her finger in the sugar)

Me - Are you being a little naughty? (Giggle giggle)

DD - No (Giggle giggle)

Me - Are you a good girl?

DD - No (Giggle giggle)

Me - So you must be in the middle, like me?

DD - No!

Me - I give up. What are you?

DD - Urrrmmm.... well...I AM..... English!!!

MIFLAW, I am very far away, in the NE.

Oh yes - cricri - you and I will have to do something too I am likely to be in Suffolk at Christmas - maybe we can do your zoo! ... but it has occured to me it is a must that my dh comes along too - as I am English so dd just speaks English with me which isn't quite what you are looking for <giggles at how long it took me to realise this!>.

CriCri

let's stay in touch then and see if we can sort something out. We attend a French-language palygroup on Saturday mornings in Crystal Palace if that's any use to you and I know there is stuff going on in Blackheath and Greenwich too.

Glad you like the blog - tell your friends!

Pitchounette - where are you based?

I would love a bilingual school .....

Everyone in my dds school is bilingual or want to be or have parents that want them to be bilingual because it is a bilingual school! Is anyone else sending their children to a bilingual school? - If yes - I am really interested in how it is all going?

BD - congrats on getting your gold dust speech therapist! It is the first time I have ever ever heard of a year waiting list for anything in France - s/he really must be absolute 100percent solid gold!!!

Umm there are a few bilingual children in the school where my dcs are going, incl one in ds2 class. However, the teachers always seem astonished when I mentioned that cartoon characters ds1 prefers would not be known by his friends because they are french (puzzled look from the teacher when I say I am reading french books in french to my dcs... or when I mentioned that I am playing 'I spy' in french and not in english with them).

I think that ds1 starts to see his bilingualism (??) as something special (in a positive way).

Cricri, it took a long time for ds1 to realize that some men could speak french...

Here I can't say there is a circle of french people as such even though I actually now quite a few of them, 2 of which live at walking distance from our house. However, both of them have children of a different age than mines (either younger or older). The older ones would probably just speak english to them anyway so not a lot of help re speaking french this way.
I have been thinking of putting a small ad and organize a meeting, at least with adults, just for the opportunity to speak french. It might be a good way to meet other french people in the area. I am sure there are some as they sell 'Le Monde' at our local tesco! The problem is just to find them

Tfor2, bilingual speech therapists, esp. ones who are covered by SECU, are gold-dust! DD has been seeing an English one up until now (NOT covered by SECU) and finally this September, having been on a waiting list and only accepted because DD has a "real" problem not just a bit of a delay, she's finally going to start seeing a bilingual one.
CriCri, DD is fortunate in that she's not the only bilingual child in her class at school (altho' the only English/French bilingual one). Really does help them understand the difficulties!
MIFLAW, I think the website you are thinking of is France in London

Thanks for the welcome everyone!
MIFLAW SE London isn't too far for us and DH's mum lives in Swanley so we're regularly in that area. I'll contact the Institut Francais - didn't think of that! I did find a good website before DD arrived - Multilingual families in the UK - which aimed to put families in touch with one another but it doesn't seem to have been updated for ages. You also have to join and when I applied to join I never had a reply so I guess the site isn't working anymore unfortunately. I love your blog by the way - very interesting!
*Teafor two* We live in Colchester so probably not a million miles away from you!

CriCri

I'm in SE London which probably isn't much use to you (depends on how desperate you are ...)

In the mean time, have you tried contacting the Institut Francais to see if they hold a list of groups? There's also a French in London site somewhere but I've forgotten what it's called - anyone else able to help?

Happy to help in any way I can.

S

BriocheDoree - How is it finding a bilingual speech therapy in and around Paris? I once came in contact with a very passionate one and now feel perhaps I should have put her on my radar rather than loosing her phone number because I feel she maybe a rare bird... am I right or are they actually quite easily found?

Cricri - welcome, welcome, welcome!!! Where in Essex are you? - When I am in Blighty I am Mid Suffolk based so could be close if you are on that side of Essex and MIFLAW whose dd is closer in age to yours than mine is in London (I think) if you are more the London side of Essex... there might be someone here with a French/English family closer to you than either MIFLAW or I but my brain has just turned to cotton wool.

Hi, I've just happened upon this thread and wondered if I could join you all.
Our family's background: I am bilingual FR/EN and DH is English. We live in the UK (although I'm currently posting from France ) DD is 10 months old and I speak exclusively French to her and DH English. My French-speaking mum and sister live near to us in the UK so there are other French speakers around DD but we also do a lot of activities where English is the only language spoken. At the moment I think French is dominant for her as she hears me speaking it to her all day long but I know from my own situation that this will balance out in time. And hopefully she'll quickly realise as I did that not all women speak French and men English
It's great to have a thread to share our common experiences and it's interesting to read of issues which will crop up in the future for my DD. My main concern at the moment is to find other French-speaking children for her to mix with but there don't seem to be that many where we live (Essex). We come to France twice a year and have friends here but I'd also like her to meet other French speakers in the UK. Fortunately we know several other bilingual families so she'll realise that her situation is not unusual, which was not the case for me when I was little as I was considered something of a freak at school!
The Guardian article was really interesting btw and also the various links. Have any of you joined the Familingua group - it was mentioned on a MN thread a while ago and I joined but it's still quite a small group and the meet-ups seem to be mainly in West London.
Sorry about the essay

Funnily enough with a severely language impaired child, I find it much easier to be in France than in England. Over here people just hear DD speak English with the odd French word and assume she doesn't speak much French. It's among English speakers that her inability to communicate correctly really stands out. Here, we just appear "foreign". In England, we get odd looks because people notice straight away that DD is "different" (you know, she's a 5-year-old that speaks like a 2-year-old) but then they can't work out how on earth this "odd" child speaks this weird baby mix of English and French. Over here they all accept her because they know she's not French.
OTOH, so much easier with DS, who already switches quite happily and he's only just two! (Nice to see how this bilingual thing is SUPPOSED to work )

Oh Pichounette I know exactly what you mean!

I was once in a restaurant with my bilingual dd, DH and SIL because of me being there with only L plate French we mainly spoke in English.

A group of women behind us started speaking still in French but with really strong silly English accents and basically really taking the mic out of our Englishness...ha ha ha so DH and SIL switched to their strongest language - French and spoke very loudly indeed just long enough to create a stunned silence behind us!!! [bite lip and snigger slightly emotion]

lol!

I need to be honest, I am finding it much easier to deal with my two here in the UK because I know few people will understand what I am saying so can't be too judgemental. The other side of the coin is that I am finding it very hard when I go back to France ...

I remember a couple of years ago, we were in a harbour looking at ships. ds1 was going on about boats like a 3~5yo can do. I started to explain they were fishing boats blabla. A guy came next to us. Obvioulsy overheard me speaking french (and though 'Bah, one of these tourists'). Cue for ds1 to answer me in english. You should have seen the face of that guy! He was totally puzzled and obvioulsy could not comprehend that ds1 could speak both languages. It probably became even worse when I then turned round towards DH and started speaking english to him!

I am finding that the ability to swap from one language to the other has become totally normal to me. But that most people find that either fascinating or difficult to get their head around. So we have had a lot of very puzzled people around us when they heard either me or the dcs going from french to english just like this.

Try these (thankfully in English): "Mummy, why is that lady OLD?" (pointing to an old Mallorcan crone of about 90 in the shade!) and in the supermarket, a tall man of West African heritage and VERY dark skin walks past and he shouts and points, "BLACK, Mummy!" (Eek, this is when you run down the tinned tuna aisle, dragging toddler and hoping that nobody English-speaking picks up on the fading South African accent!)

Ah, children and their international charm ...

Love that my DS speaks English to me while living in France, especially when he shouts out loud 'look Mammy, that lady's going to have a baby' while pointing to a very overweight 80ish year old!

Just found the time to read that Guardian article too. Good to hear from somebody who´s been there and done it all to know how they might turn out!
I really like the idea that my kids (hopefully) won´t know how to insult me badly in English....it really doesn´t hurt so much if they shout at me in Spanish! (Just have to remember to watch my own use of naughty words when under duress!)

jessia,
I taught my dds to read when they were 4.5 and still had one year to do in maternelle in France, before starting to read in French at 6. It was very successful I think. (I'm currently doing same with my DS who's nearly 5).

We used the 100 easy lessons book mentioned here already. It sounds like a pushy-parent book, and looks like one, but I found it perfect. We started in July after a few days holidays and will stop when he goes back to school next week. He'll have completed about 75 lessons by then.

It really doesn't confuse them.

Pitch,

I am at the other end - Wieliczka near Krakow, in the south.
You reassure me: I was thinking that perhaps if I try to go it alongside preschool I will do her irreparable damage and she will never learn to read in English!! She is a bit of a perfectionist so if she can't read something first time then the book gets flung on the floor and is "stupid"...

WECOME ON THIS THREAD!

My experience so far re reading :
- you can teach letters at the same time in both languages. For me, I have treated it as if they were shapes which obvioulsy have a different 'name' in different languages.
- I have strated to teach ds1 to read in french. He has started last sept in english. This is bliss because most of the thinking on how to blend sounds/syllables together to make words is already there so it's making things very easy. Other people have just left their dcs to it and they have 'just' learn. I personnally prefer a more hands on approach, at least with ds1, ds2 is a different keetle of fish

Where about are you in poland? I lived next Gdanz for more than a year and really enjoyed poland & Polish people.

Hello all,
How have I only just discovered this thread?? (disclaimer: haven't read it all yet, but will plough through gradually.)

We are a bilingual family: I am British but live in Poland with Polish DH and 2 DDs (4 and 5.5).
DH and I communicate in Polish because my Polish is fluent whereas English doesn't come naturally to him at all. I try to speak only English to the girls, though I am finding that as they get older and more involved with friends, preschool, etc., there are increasingly situations where I have to speak Polish (e.g. when we have their friends round), and so to my horror I occasionally find myself throwing in sentences in Polish when there is no need.
The girls are far more fluent in (and prefer) Polish but have no real problems in English, and as yet rarely refuse to say things in English (if they address me in Polish I suddenly come over all hard of hearing and that works wonders ). We have loads of books in English, some DVDs and CDs, but they find English on films (e.g. Shrek or other feature films) hard to understand.
They began to talk relatively early for bilingual kids - both had a few words at 10 mths, DD1 in simple sentences (though complete mishmash Polglish!!) at 18 mths.
I am very interested in people's experiences teaching kids to read. As yet DD1 can't read in either language. She starts formally learning the letters in Polish in preschool this year, though she knows about half already I would say. She loves being read to but protests at attempts to teach the letters in either language so am going easy on this, but I wondered if anyone has experience of teaching the letters concurrently (preschool in Polish, me in English). The prevailing opinion seems to be that there should be at least a year in between starting one and starting the other, but can it work concurrently?
Sorry for such a long post...

I really like that arcticle. It made me smile. I can relate to a lot of what he says.
Not sure about the swears words though.
ds1 has picked up some very informal words from cartoons (probably ained at older kids) very eailsy (actually too easily). For me the issue is more that they don't havw the context and the social barriers so they can't know that these words are suitable to use let's say with freinds but not with grand parents iyswim.

I have also notice they have been in bilingual schools. That IS a big help.

<<Goes back to dreaming that such a thing would exist where I live>>

Welcome aboard!

Hello all

So glad I happened upon this here! I am an English-speaking South African, married to a Spaniard living in Mallorca!
Just to complicate matters, they speak Catalan AND Spanish here and are completely over-the-top protective of the Catalan so ONLY speak it in schools, etc. Hubby only speaks Castilian Spanish, so it´s fun at times when we get school circulars brought home...ahem.
From word go I have been adamant that my littlies (3 and 1) must have perfect English and have been very strict, speaking only English when I address them and hubby only Spanish. It´s worked so well and at 2 years old my lil´boy could already translate....ie "Mummy says CAR and Papa says COCHE"
Mallorca is a melting pot of many cultures and there are heaps of "mixed" families. One thing I´ve noticed -and this is my working theory (!)- is that if parents mix up their languages and don´t stick strictly to one, the kids CHOOSE a language and refuse to speak the other(s). They understand all but respond in chosen one. My advice to anyone starting out is to be a bit pigheaded and even if they speak to you in the other language, always respond in your chosen one...don´t mix!
3 year old addresses dad in Spanish, schoolmates in Catalan and me in English...so easy for him!
Am really enjoying reading everone´s experiences, keep going!

That was a bit long ...

I read the article too. It was quite interesting. But I'd like to know just how bilingual the children are. I wonder if they read English as well as French novels, watch English as well as French films, and can eavesdrop as effectively on English and French conversations ... (That's my criterion for how good your command of a language is - if you could eavesdrop on and understand people sitting behind you then you are pretty good, since you would probably not have much context and clues like facial expression and gestures.)

"... while they speak English perfectly fluently, their accent is a bit characterless and neutral"

Neutral is fine. Characterless!? What does that mean? I do keep wondering what sort of accent my children has and will have. I sometimes wonder what accent I have ... I have been mistaken as all kinds nationalities myself ... But I really don't see that as a disadvantage.

"...never really had the chance to master the use of day-to-day swearwords or even the really good insults – words that you need to "feel" in order to use properly."

Hmmm. I only started swearing in English late in my twenties, but I'm sure I do quite a good line in swearing and polite insults these days. All you need is watch a few films, read a few choice novels ... You can learn these things quicker than you can unlearn them ...

"none of their friends had apparently made much reference to it."

So far that is my experience too. What is also interesting is what my children make of other children speaking a different language to their parents. They notice it but don't seem to be bothered by it. DS2 notes that his French-English friend's mother is called "maman"...

"effective bilingual family" - sorry I was distracted!

I like how easy and naural Charles Timoney makes it sound.... what do you think of the article?

www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/aug/15/bilingual-family-french-children

I have just come across this rather relxed but seemingly effecive family article. What do you think?

I think I just went to www.YouTube.fr and searched for Leo Popi and it "popped" up (pun intended - sad but true.)

MIFLAW, I have just checked your blog. How did you find the song of 'Popi' on YouTube ?(Alert, I am a complete novice ie I have never been on that site bore!)

Pitchounette

Only just considered your question really, but my initial instinct is, wouldn't the same be true if they were monolingual? And yet we all know that monolinguals "outgrow" (for want of a better word) such mistakes.

So I'm sure bilinguals do too.

I was checking this thread today to see if someone had come back and found ...loads of posts that I wasn't expecting. Just as well because I though I had scared everybody with my complicated question lol!

T42, thank for you answer! You are probably right. They should get it right at some point. I suppose that I am worried because I now have to correct myself saying things their way ie not correctely (I mean the structure of the sentence, sometimes articles or 'des chevals' instead of 'des chevaux' etc... ). So I have recently decided to work on my own french and read in french much more than I have done for a long time.

I don't know what I have done for them to speak in french together (except that DH is starting to find that v annoying as they speak a lot in french even when they are with him on his own). Probably it is coming from the fact that they were mostly with me when ds2 was little so it became the 'home language' for them more than english - and despite the fact DH doesn't speak french. However, ds2 starts reception this september so I expect all that to change.

lol at your dd saying 'her car' for the car of her grand dad. My dcs do exactely the opposite in french, using the english rule instead of the french!

Ok Pitchounette - My feeling is - but I have no experience of this it is just my feeling....

We all know of the child who shows someone he is not happy by stomping his feet and sticking his tongue out and cries "Me want teet diiiie" but few of us will know of any adults that do this. Gradually as he grows he learns that this method of communication isn't completely effective and it changes without us being aware it has changed it just slowly dies away. This is because the child has slowly refined how to put the point across.

There are a variety of factors in play - a desire to conform, peer pressure, adults modeling acceptable behaviours and reactions to undesirable behaviour.

I think it is the same process happens with verbal communication but it is perhaps more subtle. We use the way we can best put things forward to begin with and then slowly and steadily refine this (e.g My dd has refined how she asks for milk from 'Milt' to 'milk' to 'milk, please' to "May I have some milk please"). Your job is to offer some scaffolding towards this refinement.

You need to make sure your children have as much access and opportunity to 'get French right' as possible in as many ways possible. However, you OBVIOUSLY already know this - if they are speaking together in French you must be really making a brilliant job of providing lots of French and we all want to know all your secrets for getting them this far!!!

I think your children's French will continue to go from strength to strength and instead of worrying about errors they are both making you should of course repeat back sentences in the correct way but please also smile and find these little errors charming 'baby/children's talk' that will be gone in a blink of an eye but you will hold in your heart for the rest of your days!!!

<note to self - never ever ever ever try to write a post especially an op using a.... SUFFOLK accent!>

So... where were we on this bilingual stuff...??? Anyone feeling brave enough to answer P's question??? - I am still thinking about it... I have a few ideas and want to see what you all think once they can form sentences...

Over here pronouns are making a remarkably strong appearance in dd's idiolect - AT LAST!!!

Interestingly, in English, she is yet to establish that 'his' is for when something belongs to a male and 'her' is when something belongs to female.

Cue dd waving off her Grandfather as he starts his drive to work explaining "Grandpa goes to work in HER car..."!!!

Too buzzy drivin' em tractor, eh? Take 'em combine into Cahn'erbury, going up BIG city!

aaaaahhh - butt it waznt me wot whent to grama skool!

It was your opening post that did it, where you made out your family were basically the Archers. "E gows to grammar school" etc - so I just assumed you were a 'e rather than a she ...

<Waves at her royal foociness Cies!!!!!! Nice to see you here.>

Hang on MIFLAW - while I have been imagining you as undoubtedly a hippy urban lesbian you have been thinking I am possibly a man!!!! Ha ha ha ha ha ha - gotta love t'internet!

Just to confirm I am of the female sort...

!!!

Thanks Oopsa. Keep the faith ...

Am slowly getting used to the idea of me as a trendy lesbian.

Are you a man too, T42?

Thanks everyone for your help. I was sure I was doing okay by DD but MIL put the spanner in the works as usual.

MIFLAW - your blog is fab.

You're planning to call your baby a good doggy wog?

By mod I mean "parka wearer and Northern soul listener" rather than "blade-carrying pier brawler" ...

Just posting to say all these stories are inspiring me. I'm currently pg with pfb. DH is Spanish and we live in Spain. We're planning an OPOL set up.

I have one question. I always thought I would find it really unnatural to speak to my baby in Spanish, but we got a dog about six months ago and I do all the "who's a good doggy wog?" type cooing in Spanish for some reason . Do you think I'll get the same urge with the baby?

< Oh heck 'former mod seaside dweller'- T42 re-adjusts her brain in regards to MIFLAW for the second time today!!!!>

Thanks for support re blog - v kind! In touch with nature? Don't know about that. Former mod and brought up a seaside dweller, certainly ...

MIFLAW - I am already a massive fan of your blog... it is briiiiilllliiiant!!! Have you got an apple? If yes maybe you could use garage band to record and publish Piaf's first words in French and songs and poems too rather like petiteanglaise does with tadpole...

www.petiteanglaise.com/

I thought you might be amused to know... [giggles emotion] - it took me a while to adjust my brain to you being an 'in touch with nature' (I am guessing from the very efficient looking coats) man type and not the urban hippyish lesbian type I had in my mind when chatting with you on this thread and a few others I have bumped into you on!!!

OOPSA - A dear friend of mine speaks Greek, Arabic, English and French. She had her children in France so she only knows how to speak about babies and birth fluently in French.

Most bilingual people feel more comfortable in one language than another in particular subjects. Elephants are obviously easier to get in Afrikaans!!!

Another example is - I remember when I was teaching a class of mainly Urdu and English speaking children generally they could use the language of school very fluidly in English and the language of home very fluidly at home. However, generally, they had no idea how to say subtract or pentagon in Urdu or maybe for example they would only come across the words 'saucepan' or 'duster' in English for the first time ever if the word was used in a text used in literacy hour.

What seems a bit weird to me is... my daughter has a dolls house and although English is the stronger language of our home she plays solely in French when playing with her dolls house!!!! The only reason I can think of is that she has named the little people after a family she speaks with in French (they speak French and Chinese) they speak French with her in real life so why on earth would the doll versions of them be speaking of all languages English???

DD starts school in September ALL tips for pushing home language as much as possible are VERY welcome indeed!!!

Pitchounette - still pondering your question. I'm told that DS2 has a "better" accent than DS1. How that came about I have no idea. I don't think they make the same mistakes ... But they make strange mistakes in English as well... I'm going to be optimistic and say they'll grow out of it ... And stop asking difficult questions.

Oopsa - my experience is that what you describe is completely normal and you are not "confusing her brain" at all - in fact, what you are doing is using the most widely approved (though not the only) means of fostering bilingualism, ie one-person-one-language (OPOL). If anything, I would advise speaking Afrikaans to your daughter whoever is present - you can always paraphrase or translate to your husband; or he can work out from context what you are saying; or he can accept that, in the context of speaking to a one-year-old, it's probably not that riveting for him anyway!

If you have discussed elephants with your daughter in Afrikaans and your husband has not discussed them in English, then how can she be expected to respond to the English word? When she learns it, she will.

We have been going through animal noises recently (daughter 18 months) - initially she only responded to "que dit le serpent?" in French and "what does a monkey say?" in English - because I'd spoken to her more about snakes and her mum had talked more about monkeys. In a matter of minutes, we made her bilingual on both these animals and she now answers correctly (and very comically) whichever language she is asked in.

HI

Yes we are in the UK keep language up once she starts school is one of my worries! But we are lucky that my parents have moved to the UK too so she is often surrounded by the language completely. Yes my MIL is monolingual and I think my speaking a differnet language to DD just irritates her as she can't interfere!

Hi, if you are at home with her during the week, I expect she is just getting more varied and more intense Afrikaans input, so she knows more vocabulary in Afrikaans than in English. I am sure it is absolutely no problem at all.

Are you in the UK? If so, when she begins nursery or school, any gaps she may have in English will soon be filled, possibly then the problem will be maintaining and further developping Afrikaans.

I think it's nothing to worry about, honestly. Presumably MIL like many English speakers is monolingual and just doesn't know about multilingual development from her own experience.

Can I ask a question? My DD is 11 months and I am South African and speak Afrikaans to her at home, DH is English and is learning but only speaks English. When we are alone I speak to DD in Afrikaans and DH speaks English when we are all together we speak english or DH feels left out of our conversations. DD has started saying a few words in English and I repeat them in Afrikaans to her. We are having a problem with her understanding some english words though - We were playing with her zoo the other day and DH asked her to get an elephant and she looked at him confused then I asked her to give an elephant to papa in Afrikaans and she immediately gave it to DH. Is this normal? My MIL thinks we are confusing her brain. It doesn't seem to be effecting her speach at the moment.

In a similar spirit to Teafortwo 9plugging the gap with relevant news) can I publicise my (higly relevant) new blog?

It's at

papaetpiaf.wordpress.com/

and it's brand new.

Thoughts welcome.

S

Oooooh - it is a bit quiet around here!

So... while we wait for Pitchounette's answer I will tell you some of my news... We are in England for a bit and it is lovely to see dd chatting to the neighbours, playing with her cousins and paying for the shopping for me and feeling really at home here. I am very proud of her!

lol, children are good at creating complex situation aren't they?

Pitchounette - that is a really interesting question.

[ponders]

Btw, how do you handle this type of situation :

ds1 & ds2 are still speaking french together (miracle!!) but ds1 is still mixing the genders/structure sentence (ie using the english structure when speaking in french). So ds2 hears a lot of french but not spoken 'correctely' iyswim and is learning the same mistakes his brother is doing.

Are these mistakes something that they will both eventually outgrow or are they going to last?

teafortwo thanks for the link!

I will read it (already had it on my wish list). I do know that I will have problem with it in some ways though. Probably due to the french approach to learning

I think that in some ways anyone learning a new languages is also learning about the culture just because things are not said in the same way (like gender used in french for 'things' or the use of the 'to be' and 'to have' is different from one country to the next). This all reflect a certain vision of the world.

I agree with frAKKINPannikin though. Being bilingual isn't the same as being bicultural. I would love my children to have a sense of belonging with France so going back on holiday to the same place is something that I am trying to do as much as possible. My problem is that I, myself, don't really feel I belong there (have travel too much and lost that feeling a long time ago) and the only reason for me to go back to that town is my own grand mother. There is no other family there anymore so feels a bit of a fraud to talk about it as 'home' iyswim.

At the moment, I would say the most important input is me, my parents who live close by, then books/DVDs/DCroms. I am not sure whre to put our annual 2 weeks trip to France. I don't think it's where they really learn to speak french better but it is going a long way to make them see that it is a usefull way to communicate, they associate it with having a great time ... So probably also really critical to keep their 'interest'.

My Mum started to teach me English when I was about 6, for no deeper reason than a love of English literature. There was never any question of my "becoming" English- though looking back over the years, I see how it started then . The assumption was that we would then go on in the same way with French and German and Italian, which to some extent we did- but it is that early contact with English that has really shaped me. Not that I thought of myself as half English then, or thought I would ever become English,but it started then. Gradually I became less and less of a tourist. I was all set up for falling in love with an Englishman, it was bound to happen.

Hard to learn the language without taking in the culture at the same time.

I think you can bring a child up bilingual without having a sense of belonging to another country/culture - there are plenty of bilingual children I know in Paris who are completely and entirely culturally French but speak perfect English - so visits to a country where English is the native langauge aren't important for them. My charge feels no affiliation to England or any other anglophone country. He is entirely French. In fact his 'Frenchness' is probably exacerbated by being bilingual and having had English nannies! I think, however, he will grow up being more comfortable in an Anglo-Saxon culture than his classmates who only have linguistic English input because, much as I respect and integrate into French culture, there are probably some things which are, and will always be, entirely English!

For my own children I want them to be bilingual and bicultural. In all likelihood they will be trilingual as we'll be living in a third country or moving around a lot so visits to both France and the UK are going to be important for them linguistically and culturally. Other English or French speaking countries will be nice to visit, as tourists (in the same way I would visit Canada or America) but their home cultures will be more important.

Re: going with parents/alone/with siblings or friends - for my as yet unborn children I will encourage visits first as a whole family, then to their grandparents as siblings, to friends they might have there alone and I would like them to feel able to invite friends with them if they continue going to visit family as teens. As older teenagers/young adults I would encourage them to spend time in both countries, either for university or working, in order to get a real sense of belonging and to really immerse themselves in the language and way of life. I suppose they will inevitably feel that they belong more to one culture than the other but I don't know which one that will be yet! I suspect we will have a more Anglo-saxon culture at home but DH2Bs French extended family will be more important than my (small and dysfunctional) extended family.

T42

From my perspective, visiting a Francophone country is vital - but I might think that because I am not native myself (so I want to be absolutely certain that there are native models in my daughter's life, even strangers, in case I make the odd mistake) and because such trips are potentially cheap enough to consider every year and/or to combine with family hols.

As my daughter is not yet 2 she will be going with me for the foreseeable, but equally I can imagine a time will come where she will travel with or to friends and I will stay at home.

As for the multicultural aspect, in principle I think she should have access to them all, but with one predominant one (in our case, France, as the culture I know best) to provide a "default" position - but, in practice, Canada seems too expensive and Burkina Faso too risky so most of our travels will probably be in France, maybe with a bit of Belgium and Switzerland thrown in as and when.

While we're not in France, we watch a lot of French children's DVDs, listen to French pop together, read a lot of French children's books and attend a (multicultural) French-language playgroup once a week. The goal of all of these activities is the same - to broaden her exposure to the language, but also to validate it - she needs to be aware that French is a language that other people speak too and that it fulfils all the same social and cultural functions as English, even if she happens to know fewer French than English speakers at the moment.

teafortwo: interesting ... Certainly Mandarin is spoken "natively" in quite a few countries... I haven't thought very deeply about this, and perhaps don't really intend to. For better or worse we are here now (and travel back "home" is only feasible once every two years or so) and we shall make our own identity. Here the things that makes us us in this language are I think, me, stories, family relations we have visited, Chinese-speaking friends, perhaps in that order of importance.

interesting post teafortwo

for my children, the sense of belonging fostered by our twice-annual trips to Sweden are definitely the single most important thing

when we are here, other things that help to root them in that culture are (in order of importance): books, talking about holiday memories, dvds, phone calls to family members, and the internet

Pitchounette Sun 12-Jul-09 21:14:56 Add a message | Report post | Contact poster

"Cory how difficult is swedish on a spelling point of view?
My concern with french is that there are lots and lots of exeptions and lots and lots of rules (that are not always followed). So I am not sure you can let it happen naturally."

well, as somebody who taught myself both French and English spelling through reading books with a dictionary in my room at night, I am not convinced that it can't be done

Swedish is fairly regular with the exception of a few sounds (the y-sound and a couple of others) which are spelled in several different ways

I was wondering....

What are all your views on the importance of visiting a country where a child's usually non-native language is native? How often and how long do you think children should visit if at all?

In your experience is it best to always go with a parent? Or is it best to go alone or with friends or siblings once past a certain age?

Also - What if the other language is spoken in many countries - do you think we should take advantage of this and travel say across all the French speaking lands of the World if living in Birmingham but speaking English and French or should we be focusing on a sense of 'belonging' so instead or perhaps as well as this should we encourage an affiliation with one place where perhaps language will bloom because the child feels very deeply a part of the place, people and culture along with the language they all speak?

Also - if financially, politically, culturally etc visiting the other country is tricky - what can be done to give a sense of the other place where the non-native language is the normal language to converse in?

"Well I think I am already labelled as pushy"

....

I think, in terms of learning to read, a mixture of formal learning of reading and writing at the same time (see www.amazon.co.uk/How-Children-Learn-Penguin-Education/dp/0140136002/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1 247902210&sr=8-1) and all the 'natural' 'free' stuff cory speaks of is a recipe for complete success!

Well I think I am already labelled as pushy so it won't be new lol.
I really do like your summary of it and I think I will sort of implement it with them and see how it goes.

I am absolutely not convinced about the dcs learning to write in french naturally. Perhaps it's because I have learnt the 'un-natural way'? I dunno.

lended?

Pitchounette - I can't find a reference. A friend lended me the book ages ago but it seems to have disappeared from the world. They do sell the "How to teach your baby to read" books on amazon, but nothing about writing ... Beware though you will be labelled pushy and threatened with hell fire, as MIFLAW said.

I don't think it matters about exceptions and rules. Don't think that's how children learn a native language, but I may be wrong. Many children do learn to read and write and do all kinds of unnatural things naturally.

Cory how difficult is swedish on a spelling point of view?
My concern with french is that there are lots and lots of exeptions and lots and lots of rules (that are not always followed). So I am not sure you can let it happen naturally.

slng I like that approach! It seems to fit very well with working with children at home. Do you have a book/ref about it?

I did think about just letting it come naturally, but decided that perhaps Chinese script is sufficiently different from the how-you-call-it alphabet-based languages the children would encounter daily to warrant a separate attempt. I've even bought the soft calligraphy pens but the daunting thought of the combination of black ink and small children has delayed their introduction ... But I have a cunning plan - I'm going to borrow how-to-do-Chinese-ink-painting books from the library and we'll learn together ... Actually am quite excited about it, since I don't know the first thing about Chinese ink painting.

Dd has learnt to write naturally in Swedish; just from reading the language and writing to friends on her internet forum. Wouldn't say her spelling is perfect, but it has improved a lot.

For writing I follow a bit of the Doman approach:

1) keep a diary (well, we write every now and then) where I record what the children want to put down in writing. This way they understand what writing is all about, as a means of expression. The children like it and fight over who gets to dictate first ...

2) I gave DS1 a "special" book (actually a WH Smith blank A4 size notepad but cover decorated by stickers and such) where he writes a Chinese word/phrase a day and draw pictures. He chooses what he wants to write (mostly car-related). At first I tried to ask him to write the easier words, but soon realised that to him there is no such thing as easy and difficult words. If he wants to write something he wants to write something, and after about 1 year of haphazard writing he has learned most of the fundamentals anyway. I conclude that all this simple-to-complex progression approach is not necessary when teaching your own child, because a child who is interested will achieve more, and also because you can afford to do very very short sessions more frequently since you are stuck with them anyway. DS2 is desperate to have a go and I've promised him (for months now ) a book of his own. He asks about how to "make" words, and sometimes I write them for him to trace. Doman approach believes that writing is a form of expression and if they want to trace let them trace.

3) Teach them to read, since writing is meaningless unless you can read what you write.

As far as I am concern, our approach of the Doman approach is
1) very short sessions (I never spend more than a couple of minutes telling them words,
and I never ask DS1 to write more than he wants to, though he does spend hours drawing the corresponding pictures.)
2) frequent sessions (but we are quite slack on this)
3) follow child's interest.
4) never bore a child.
5) respect child's intellectual ability.
6) only "teach" when everyone is happy.
7) always stop while the going is good.
Goodness! That's long-winded. Hope it makes sense ...

What is the Doman approach?

The french way of learning is based on phonics only or on syllables. They are expecting the children to be able to read within 3 months (ie by december).
In practice, the main difference compare to here is with the Jolly Phonics etc... Because the word is always cut into syllables and the children are reading very little until they have seen most of the syllables and then well, they are just reading. So no reading books like the ORT etc...
I have fiund a game based on that that is working really well with ds1. I hope that, at the rate he is going, he will be able to read (sort of) by the end of the summer.

<< Pitchounette dreams and dreams not to have to read again and again and again>>

Writting for me is more of an issue because the way to approach it in France is sooo dry.

Annie, I treated letters the same way than shapes and taught them to the dcs in the ssame way. Doing that hasn't been an issue even if some letters really don't have the same sound in french and in english.

MIFLAW - Yes, it's all coming back to me. I did briefly scanned that thread and dismissed it as being irrelevant, since we are doing Chinese and it seems rather unlikely that it is going to "disadvantage" my children socially. In fact the children seem to keep this aspect of their lives quite quiet, though DS1 apparently scribbled something for his friends in school recently and telling them that it's Chinese for something... Goodness knows what it was and what anyone made of it ...

Besides who is going to teach them if I don't?

The crawling stage is also coming back to me. Things progressed slowly at one point or the other, but since we are not doing any exam or competing with anybody, we just put it on hold for a bit and then return to it when everyone is happy again. It is the most gloriously stress-free and happy way to learn anything.

Pinocehtte - DH reads to the girls every night, and DD1 can tell the difference between "mummy words" and "daddy words". But because of the whole different alphabet thing, we're not too sure when/how to start her on Hebrew reading and writing. She'll do a bit at syagogue Sunday school but we'd probably want her to learn a slightly higher standard of Hebrew than they learn there. But I'll wait until she's a little more confident with the English alphabet first....

No no no.

I said that I was using it and invited constructive advice.

Amongst all the soapbox experts and the "you're going to hell" merchants one woman said that her own parents had used it on her and it had worked. In fact, it had worked so well that she had stuck out at school and her social relations with peers had severely suffered.

I decided this was probably not going to happen to us but, just in case it did, I put the programme on hold (plus it was getting hard to hold newly-crawling infant's attention, big red letters or not.)

MIFLAW - are you referring to me? We use the Doman approach to teach reading and writing Chinese. Best thing ever.

I tried to teach daughter as a baby using Doman's method (ie 8-12mths) but stopped because I got a lot of flak on this site and then someone said it had worked too well for her and turned her into a friendless freak (I perhaps paraphrase slightly ...)

Will definitely try again when she is a little older though (2? 3?) as feel that reading in French will add to her vocab and increase the number of "models" she has.

What IS the French method? I'd love to know.

Can I ask if some of you have already started to teach their dcs to read and write in their second language?
I've just started with ds1 and so far it seems to be the easiest thing in the world. He is catching the different syllables very easily (I use the french way to teach him how to read in french if that makes sense). Hopefully it will continue.
But what about writing?

One nice story this week. The school asked us to review all the details (tel, adress etc) for both ds1 & ds2. Well apparently, they are both white-british as an ethnic origin but both only speak french at home . I am not sure how they think this is working lol. So for the second time, I have corrected it all, especially the language at home bit. I am still wondering if the problem is that there is no space allowed for 2 languages on their computer system because it is a such very weird thing to do

Still here.

Still enjoying, too, the word "Russianist" meaning someone woh is anti-Russian. When I was studying Russian at uni we were known as the Russianists .... Though I suppose if one spent any length of time in Moscow one could be a Russianist in both senses ...

Terrified.

Where is everybody gone?? Did I scare you all?

lol it's not all that bad

ah gotcha Annie but you answered it then anyway!

I am feeling a bit relieved that I don't live in a francophone country tbh reading this thread. I dunno about my accent in French, presumably absymal if my French teacher at school was anything to go by.

I found they all understood me just fine when I was buying something from them (they nod encouragingly all the time like dp with a dc learning to walk); but otherwise for some reason not unless they were men on the prowl and they seem to understand well enough too. Strange altogether.

I don't think, TBH, that one can ever truly "run with the herd" again if trying to be a bilingual family with children. There are too many differences, too many shifting priorities and too many things you can't take for granted. That's what caused me, very briefly (perhaps a week) to bottle it when my daughter was born and go back on my decision.

But then i thought, who wants to run with the herd? As herds go, it doesn't look very exciting ...

ZZZZ - apologies for the delay in replying... and now I'm not even going to answer your question for fear of being accused of being Russianist!

Well said... I'm standing by, and waiting for the terrible twos... Whilst chatting to my son in French...

Best to stay out of the ring with people like that.

In my experience, you can never win against genuine, single minded idiocy.

It used to annoy me now I just think it's funny. Last Friday we were at a friend's wedding and my niece was flower girl (she's one, remember? and only learnt to walk a couple of months ago). That was SIL's idea of course - the bride doesn't want children and there were no other kids at the wedding. But as my niece is too little to understand what being a flower girl entails, my SIL had to hold her by the hand and show her how to spread the flowers. To do that she had to lean down to her level. So the bridal procession went like this:
- my niece, looking cute but somewhat puzzled
- my SIL's not unconsiderable backside, clad in pink
- the bride and her dad, looking classy but with a slightly lopsided smile
- the (classy, young, pretty) bridesmaids.
I had never seen a bridal procession quite like that...

Pillowcase

Have you tried a riposte along the lines of, "yes, it must be so much easier for children who only speak the one language but she seems to be muddling through"?

Mouette, you're making me laugh with your niece stories. I have a SIL who is ultra competitive, but in things that don't interest me, like who has the best dressed kids, whose kids appear more often in teh local newspapers looking sparkling like they've been bathed 3 times a day (they have!)

When it comes to bilingualism she just puts her head on one side and asks if they're ABLE to keep up in class through FRench etc. Like she pities me and them. She'll learn though!!

Pitchounette: that's a good idea. I've started to say things to DS in French, then repeat them in English for DH (that way he can see I'm generally talking nonsense and he isn't missing much!) DH is not into languages either! But in his case he genuinely doesn't need French - except when we go to the village shop and the lady there keeps chatting to him in French!

MIFLAW: I knooooow, I knoooow. She's one - of course she's behaving! I await the toddler years with interest... Ooooh please let her mother take her again to a wedding or some such occasion and parade her around as usual, and oh please please let the tired, overexcited child throw a MEGA tantrum. Ooohhh am I being evil? But with her it's always: "Oh I breast fed her exclusively for 6 months" (I bottle feed), "I don't let her have a dummy during the day" (I'm a big dummy fan me), "It's a good thing we feed her sooo healthily" ('cause my son is big for his age), etc, etc. Plus I don't take DS swimming, or teach him sign language (French plus English is enough for him to deal with!) You do end up turning a little bit evil...

Mouette, another thing that seems to work is to translate for the person who doesn't speak the language at least some of the time (if not all the time).
That's what I do with DH (even if not that regularly). And DH is really not into languages. He actually started to learn french at school but refused to make any effort as 'he would never need it'. Something that makes everybody laugh especially his mum seen as it has turned out

"perfect behaviour" at 1 year old? Beyond futile and meaningless.

I know! I know! I will make a point of chatting to him in French when we're at one of the family dinners she likes to organise so that she can talk for 2 hours about her daughter's swimming classes, sign language classes, pretty dress, perfect behaviour, and generally her all-round perfectness (I like the kid, by the way - just wonder if she will not grow up to be very vain!) Oooh that will so annoy her. Just like the christening - we're Christians so will get our son baptised - she's not so her dd will not get a big day... Hnyyaaar hnyaaar hnyaarrrh.

Childish? hell no! There is nothing more satisfying than beating intensely competitive people without appearing to try - which is exactly what will happen if you go for "proper" bilingualism (ie no explicit lessons, just speaking the language consistently around and to the child.)

Doesn't need to be an issue that your husband doesn't speak French - as long as he gets over feeling threatened when you do. Just keep reminding him that your child's dominant language is likely to be English, but with really good French on top as a "free gift".

Thanks Pitchounette and MIFLAW - the issue is probably that dh doesn't speak or understand French at all and has no incentive to do so at the moment because everybody in my (French) family speaks perfect English! My mum is actually British by birth, although has been living in France for over 30 years, my sister and brother in law are professors of English! But I had a chat to dh about it and he's going to try and learn a bit of French so as not to feel left out... He understands the benefits of bilingualism. Plus I confess that my sister in law (not French, dh's brother's wife) is sooo competitive and keeps going on about all the marvellous things her daughter does (she's 1 year old)... I am sneakily pleased my son could grow up bilingual and have that advantage! Childish, I know...

Mouette

My situation is a bit different in that my partner has pretty good passive French - but, especially at first, I made a real effort to speak French that she could understand when she was in the room so that she didn't feel excluded (eg I would go easy on the subjunctives, use verbs that she would either know or could guess from the context, made sure I spoke about things that were happening there and then so she - and our daughter - could relate sound to sense, etc.) Whether she would have minded if I hadn't done that I can't say, but she has been very tolerant of the whole thing so far. The adult ego is a delicate and wonderful thing ... I think it's also now clear that our daughter's English has in no way suffered and I laid it on thick about the advantages (not just social, but intellectual) of bilingual, and so my partner's attitude is now v positive towards Junior's bilingualism. It's definitely something that adds rather than detracts, IYSWIM.

Mouette

My daughter probably says about half a dozen French words and twice as many English words but seems to have a fairly even understanding of both languages - it would be amazing if it was any different as, once she leaves our house (or, on Saturday mornings, French playgroup) it's solid English all the way, all around her. In fact, in my sane moments, I'm amazed she says as many French words as she does! (This morning she started saying "beaucoup" and had another go at "chameau" after a month off - it's now "amo" instead of just "mo". Double whammy - v proud!)

Pitchounette - I know what you mean, of course. English is very hard on spelling and techincalities too - I think in our system we just admit defeat!

We have our first bilingual misunderstanding today - DS2 wants me to take him to see the wolf (he said this in English). It took me a while before I realise that's because his brother is going to a picture gallery and the term for picture gallery in Mandarin contains a sound like wolf (also in Mandarin). What a relief. Don't know where you'd find a wolf around here.

MIFLAW, compare to here (UK) children are expected to have/do spelling test up to age 15~16yo as well as grammar (not just verb, adjective etc but also structure of the sentence ie subject, verb, and all the different type of 'complement' attached to the verb - sorry can't translate all that in english). That's what I mean by a huge emp[hasis. It doesn't mean that people actually know how to spell when they arrive at Uni. I personnally think one of the reason is that french is b* complicated on that point of view but now I may be biased

Mouette, I can totally sympathize with you as DH doesn't speak french either.
I found that DH french has improved a lot since ds1 was born so he is not totally 'out' when I talk to the dcs.
I would suggest he is getting more info on being bilingual. It is possible that your dc first words will be french but as you say there is no way he/she will not be speaking english!
Perhaps show him some of the threads on here to put his mind at rest?
How is he getting on when you are going to see your aide of the family?

"The emphasis on grammar and spelling is SO SO strong in schools too."

I think Caen and Nice have been missed out by the Ministry of Education then if the (university) students I used to teach and socialise with were anything to go by.

I seem to remember my girlfriend in Caen (who went on to do a maitrise in sociology) misspelling "tant pis" in a letter once ...

pitchounette,
Like your Swedish example, I know an English/French girl here who's about 19 or 20. She babysat for us for a while. She came here when she was 4 or 5 so has practically no memory of England. So, when she arrives here with her perfect English and quite a strong regional English accent, I can't help but say things like "so how often do you go home?" and "are there other English kids in your class?". But to her she's not English at all, she just happens to speak the language at home.

Mouette,
I think your Dh will just have to invest in a linguaphone or similar ; By the way I think it CAN be an advantage having parents who don't speak the other language well. It can help the kids make a proper distinction between the 2 langs and not slip foreign words into the other lang.

Miflaw,
Yes I hear you on the Parisian waiters. I suppose they deal with so many tourists all the time - and probably quite a few foreigners who are attempting to use their 5 French words badly, and just want to speed up the process a bit, then don't know how to react when you DO actually speak better than them...

Hi all
This is all very interesting... I'm French, my husband's English, we live in London, and I'm trying to speak French to my son as I would like him to grow up bilingual. My family in France are very keen that he should speak French (if only to communicate with the local kids when he holidays with his French family).
But my husband doesn't want me to speak French to him when he (my husband)is there because he doesn't speak French and feels excluded... He even worries that DS will only speak French and not English! Daft as everybody here except me will speak English to him...
Anyone else had that problem?

The issue here is the more the fact that french people are very protective of their language and speaking correctly is not an option there. The emphasis on grammar and spelling is SO SO strong in schools too.

Add on the top of that that regions are very important to people there too (There has been a lot of problem recently because they change the number plates on the cars. The new ones do not have the department code on so you can't tell where the car/driver is coming from. Ther had to add the option of having it add on the side of it because of the outroar (sp?) it caused).

I was surprised though by the comment of a (grown up) woman I met. She had beeing brought up bilingual in the UK. Her swedish was good enough to be taken for a 'native' (ie her accent was perfect). For her it was actually a problem because everybody thaugh she is swedish so expected her to know all the small details of swedish life which she doesn't. She was therefore feeling unconfortable when going back to Sweden. And she was feeling she wasn't fitting in in the UK either... Made me think about my own dcs and how the will feel about being both english and french (well as DH puts it probably 80% english and 20% french but still...)

That's what I cannot bear. It's so provincial.

Of course - and, as I say, it was a (mostly!) light-hearted generalisation.

But, just in my experience, although I would guess 90% of people who I speak to probably guess I am not native, it is only Parisians who react to that by speaking to me in English, even though my French is better than their English. It seems, at least, that everyone apart from the Parisians judges me on my competence rather than whether I was born in l'hexagone ...

Miflaw,
French people among themselves will certainly have a 'reaction' when they hear another regional accent. (Don't we all?) My DH has Parisian French but I don't think he's been shunned or laughed at down here in SW France. His knowledge of rugby won him a popularity ticket.

I find the mix of people around here is amazing. I know of very few people who came from our town even one generation ago (let alone 2 or more). Most people when you scratch the surface have Spanish/Italian etc parents/grandparents, or have migrated here from another area of France. I'm always astounded to realise that some of these people feel as foreign as me here. And some find it harder to integrate - it's easier for me to break the ice by asking questions about how the school system works, a lady who's just moved here from Lyon can't ask such obvious questions.

That was meant to be light-hearted, btw - apologies to any Parisien(ne)s here, I'm sure you're lovely!

As a non-French person who has near-native competence in French, I have to say that in my experience it is not the French who are snooty about accents, just the Parisians! If non-Parisians pick up my accent at all, it is normally to say how almost unnoticeable it is, or how charming it is (in the case of my Caennaise ex - perhaps she was biased ...)

But I've had waiters in Paris who speak rubbish English try to take my order in English as soon as they pick up the accent. I generally just ignore them and keep speaking in French until they take the hint.

Is that because the Russian accent is not easy on the ear in Hebrew Annie or because they just generally are not that keen on the behavíour of Russian immigrants? Your dc are still really very small, I am sure you can get the accent sorted if you want to (via DVDs and holidays and so on).

I agree, the French are very precious about accents. I was looked down on because I re-learnt most of my French in the South and therefore had a Nimoise (as opposed to Parisian) accent when I moved to Paris. Thankfully I'm a fairly good mimic.

The ability to do a variety of accents is good, but it's important to know the 'standard' one too.

Wow, I didn't realise that people in other countries could be so funny about accents! Being English-speaking, which of course comes in a million accents, I'd never really thought about it. And because there are so many new immigrants in Israel they're used to weird accents too. Like I said before, they love an English accent. It's just the Russian one they're not too keen on...

This is completely true.
I live in rural France and DH speaks French with an Irish accent. It is incredible the number of people who lose interest half way through a sentence because DH doesn't speak fast enough. DH's French is very good and fluent BTW. Also some people genuinely cannot understand if a word is pronounced with a slightly different emphasis.
Very frustrating.
I speak English with a French accent and I never had a bad experience while living in London (10 years).

Pitchounette - I know what you mean. I've met French people who refused to socialise with French Canadians because "they speak funny", and Chinese people who looked down on Malaysian Chinese because we have "appalling pronunciation". If you go by these rules half the world would be beneath contempt because they speak funny by someone else's standard. In this day and age surely we cannot be still holding on to this kind of imperialism! I must say I have no patience with this kind of attitude... While certain languages may sound cuter than other languages with certain accents, surely the main thing is the ability to communicate. Bah humbug and all that. << Rant over >>

I think it depends on the country tbh.
Here, I have a french accent and it has never ever been a problem. The most I get is 'Where are you coming from? Your english is sooo good!'. It has never been a problem for work (I even did some cold sale over the phone and it worked!).
On the other side, France ... well they are much more difficult. They are so attached to French, having it 'right' (vocabulary, grammar and accent) that having a native accent is important. I remember very well how I excluded some english people, totally bilingual, because of their strange accent... That was before coming to the UK. I would never do that now but most of my friends still would (hence the fact it's so difficult for me to go back to France with DH who hardly speaks french. Few people are willing to make the effort).

It's one thing being incomprehensible, and another thing having a "funny" accent. In my world (academia) one learns not to take accents too seriously. In fact it seems more important to be able to write well (holding up Joseph Conrad as example ... He must be sick of being held up as an example by now ...). Since my main "ambition" for my children is that they will be able to enjoy Chinese novels I try to be more relaxed about their accent. It's not that I don't try to influence their accent - of course it's better to be comprehensible than not, and arguable it's better to have a more "prestigious" accent, if there is such a thing, than not. But one can only do what one can in one's situation, IYKWIM.

Israelis always think English accents are hysterically funny (they're more used to American), and think DD1 is the cutest thing ever when speaking English. I know my accent is dreadful when I speak Hebrew, but then DH's accent is awful even though he speaks English completely fluently.

I do need to find DD1 some Hebrew-speaking friends, but Israelis are a little thin on the ground here! There are some at synagogue, but everyone speaks English there.

She needs more Hebrew exposure than just DH. I think it's better when the 'foreign' parent is the primary carer, so at least they're hearing the second language all day, instead of just evening and weekends.

Oh well, she'll get there eventually!

Thanks for the welcome!

I think it is important to be able to be taken seriously. Your accent may tell us something about you and will change depending on the environment you are in to suit it more....

... but if, like me in French, your accent makes you sound cute (I wish) , comical (tick) or difficult to understand (double tick) then it is a big disadvantage especially in professional situations.

I can't make my mind up about accents. For one thing, one's accent changes. Even native English speakers sometimes adapt their accents to their audience. (Remember Tony Blair's cringe-worthy accent when talking to the youfs? But ime that's quite normal. Willing to be proved wrong.) I certainly speak differently to different people, especially if I am in conversation with fellow Malaysians. Also most of the world probably speak English NOT with an English accent ... Does it matter very much, this "native accent"? Who's "native" anyway? Also, more importantly for one's sanity, can it be helped in our environment? Clearly it's nicer if you can have a "nice" accent, but should we beat ourselves up over it, especially if it can't be helped?

<<Waiting for someone to bash me over the head for spouting heresy. >>

AnnieLobesender,
My dd was like yours (with French) and it was only when we came to live in France (she was 3.10) that she started speaking (after about 2 months of absorbing all around her). I don't know how long it would have taken had we stayed in Ireland, but I believe it would have without a doubt.

Do you have any Hebrew speaking visitors (with children?), I think once she makes a little pal, things will improve rapidly. Certainly from hearing all the stories here there's nothing to worry about, she'll get there, WITH the accent!

Welcome AnnieLobeseder !

At that stage, I don't think it will have an impact on her accent.
What I am finding the most difficult is the increase the exposure to the 'second' language. The difference was obvious between ds1 who wnet to nursery from 6 months old (english is his primary language)and ds2 who stayed with me most of the time (french was his primary language).
But this doesn't seem to have any impact on their accent.

Just joining in. I'm English, DH is Israeli, we live in the UK. I speak English to the DDs (3.10 and 1.4), DH speaks only Hebrew. While I can speak Hebrew, DH and I speak English to each other but I know we should speak Hebrew more often. Firstly so I don't go completely rusty, and also so that the DDs hear more of it.

Anyway, DD1 understands everything DH says but only speaks English at this stage. She's getting more interested in speaking Hebrew though. She keeps asking DH how he says various things, and we try to make sure she repeats the word back, so she's picking up the vocab slowly.

We go over to Israel to see DH's family every year, and each year we hope that DD1 will start to speak Hebrew as it's a couple of weeks of total immersion for her... I speak Hebrew too (albeit badly!) while we're there but apart from the odd word, it hasn't happened yet.

I just hope she'll start speaking Hebrew soon. I'm concerned that if she starts speaking too late she won't ever speak it with a native accent.

Now that is interresting. Over correcting is certainly an issue but it has never crossed my mind that it could be counterproductive as teaching them the wrong thing!
The thing is I know I am correcting too much to UK standard. But as soon as I go back to France, I know that I am doing the same than most french people (who would have no hesitation to correct even an adult). So I am not sure what is right to do or not (my gut is telling me it's more to do with culture difference but on the linguistic point of view I don't know).

why can't I do italics/underline etc?
why

_like my friend whose son said "thingers" (because she told him off for saying fum for thumb) until he was really very grown up_

excellent!

Cory -

<Reaches into the back of my mind to my student daze...>

I think the average English speaking child when speaking just English does not pronounce all sounds correcly until they are aged five or six but use ommision or substitutes e.g lots of blends (st, pl, dr, str,tr,fl, fr... etc)and a few initial phoneme sounds like r come later and cerain blends come surprisingly late. Many very high ability five year olds say peas for please, fawor for flower, dwink for drink and stwarbewies for strawberries. I am sure it is the same in all languages.

I think one of the traits of bilingual children's parents is we over correct (I know I do) because we have such a mission for them to have good .............. (fill in your language that isn't spoken in he wider community) skills.

I made a very silly mistake with over correcting this week...

There were two mice on the TV. "Look Mummy mouses" dd screamed which is completely normal for her age. "Oh yes but they are not mouses though they are MICE." I hissed. (the shame)

Fast forward three or four days and dd and I are book shopping. She picks up a Maisy Mouse book. "Look Mummy it is Maisy. Maisy is a good little MICE!" Dd proudly announces then coninues "... "not mouse mice, ok?"

I was mortified - if I had left her to it she would have probably worked out the rule when she was ready and now I am afraid she will say 'mice' instead of 'mouse'for ages, like my friend whose son said "thingers" (because she told him off for saying fum for thumb) until he was really very grown up.

pillowcase
No, we're not in a Breton-speaking area. DD speaks in French with her French granny (once a month) and I think children speaks in French between themselves at school.
DD (2.5) has a good vocabulary in both languages and makes 4/5 words sentences but she does mix both languages consistently.

My LOs speak Mandarin with a definite accent, but don't know what that is ... though occasionally they'd come up with a perfect sentence perfectly pronounced, usually some indignant protest. That brings tears to my eyes.. Is that normal? Someone once pointed out that DC's Chinese has an English accent, but stopped harping on about it when I pointed out to her that her and her LOs' English has a Chinese accent. (Claws out when necessary .)

Yes and I would say that at 2.2yo she is still very young. Some monoligual children don't say much more than that anyway so with 2 languages to learn you need to leave her some time. She can understand what you are saying so she is obvioulsy picking up a lot.

<<Now goes to hide because she has done exactely the same and got all worked up about things that were totally normal>>

Had to respond to that, summerfruit - "bateau is one of daughter's (17mo) only wrods in French and she only knows it in connection with that song - don't think she actually knows what a "bateau" is! V cute.

She pronounces that v clearly but she calls Trotro (as in l'ane Trotro, trop, trop rigolo!) as "Go go!" Don't think it really matters at the moment as long as I know what she means ....

Cory, I have done the same re using adult standard. Most people in France tell me they are amazed on well the dss speak but the only thing I seem to pick up are their mistakes... Realized however how wrong this was last time we were there. ds1 started to play with a little boy of a similar age at the beach and I then realize that the way he was talking wasn't that different than ds1!

It also reinforce my idea that I really need to find ways for them to mix with french children. (They are all much younger so won't be able to correct them iyswim)

Hi Ladies !! Hope you dont mind if I join !! I'm French and dh is english..I speak to dd in french (she is 2.2 years old)..she understand all I'm saying but doesn't speak..says mamam, tries to say Bateau as in the song Bateau sur l'eau but says BAPO..is it normal or should I be worried ?xx

castille,
funny about the little notes.

Mine play together in English mostly, but when they're playing a specific game it might be in French, but the instructions are still always in English. e.g. "je vais à la cantine, tu veux manger..... NO, Let's pretend we're already at the canteen, OK?......Bon, tu veux des tomates?"

teafortwo,
totally agree on the reading and the vocab. I know an Eng family here where both parents are Eng and they're all well-read etc. The vocab the son uses is amazing and he's only a year older than my DD.

slng,
I would have loved to have grown up with several languages like you. Hope all our kids enjoy their langs as you seem to.

Breizhette,
I'm sure you won't have to worry about her picking up French, it'll be all around her/on the TV etc. Is the area you're in totally Breton-speaking? Do they frown on French a bit, or is it an easy-going mix of languages? Do you know any other kids there in the same situation (English at home, Breton at school)?

cory,
I agree about measuring their development against an adult. Sometimes I feel guilty about how little reading I do with the kids, they read well but are not big readers. But then I try to remember how much they are doing dealing with 2 (or 3) languages, school work, sports, music etc. They're bloody fantastic really!!

pitchounette,
I suppose picking up the correct structures comes with mixing with other kids/people. I think mine correct themselves very quickly when they hear another kid say it properly. At the moment I'm tormented with their use of reflexive verbs, or the mixing of 'ourselves' and 'each other'. But I know my correcting them won't improve it, but a quick correction from their cousin will.

teafortwo, I think definite connection between reading for pleasure and vocabulary

I think it cuts both ways: dd has a great talent for language, so has always picked up vocabulary really easily; this makes it easier for her to read, so she reads more, so gets a better vocabulary- it's a circle

as for ds, he does find learning much harder; not just a bilingual thing; it's the same in all school subjects

also, his Swedish hasn't been improved by the fact that both of the two little boys he plays with in the summer are a) late speakers b) much younger than him; dd otoh has had the advantage of a highly verbal and well educated cousin her own age

his main two mistakes are word order (forgetting to reverse the subject-verb order in a sentence that starts with a word other than the subject, which you have to do in Swedish) and gender (learning new words and not knowing the gender).

but he is getting better

one thing I have learnt is not to give up and assume a situation is written in stone- ds's Swedish has improved a lot this last year (as has his school work); also listening more carefully to small Swedish children has made me aware that some of the things I thought were "wrong" in my dcs speech are actually normal developmental stages; because there are no other Swedish children around on a day to day basis, I tend to measure dd and ds against an adult standard, which of course is not very relevant

I am the only Swede I hear on a day to day basis- so I was getting my knickers in a twist because a little boy was not speaking like a middle-aged academic

teafortwo - yes, I definitely see the benefits of reading. DD2 is an avid reader in English, and although she was only 5 when we came back to France and now speaks French more readily than English, her vocab in English is really good. She writes a lot too, nearly always in English, and her spelling is pretty accurate too.

In fact it's odd, although my DDs speak to each other mostly in French, the little notes they often write to each other are nearly always in English.

I have notice that with ds1, even though it's still me reading to him. What is making a very big difference are games and CDroms. I got a few 'Toboclic' (It's some sort of magazine on CD format with interactive story, games and lots and lots of explaination about history, geography, arts etc...) on Ebay and he has learnt a lot of vocabulary from them.
Interresting to see that it makes little difference about grammar though. I am wondering what does, except for spending a lot of time in the other country. Both of mines are obvioulsy borrowing grammatical structures from english when they speak french, which drives me mad because the sentence is quite often grammatically right but still 'wrong' iyswim. I have also notice that I don't heard that sort of mistakes anymore, probably because I, too, have integrated that sort of structure so well that it doesn't seem wrong anymore

My dd speaks French with an English accent and English with a slight East Anglian accent, like me, at the moment (I think - but everyone at 'home' thinks she has a French 'twang'), however, she does occasionally say a word that sounds a bit 'clunky'. She called her cardigan her 'sweet-ar' today when I was explaining that it is too hot to wear it. She also sometimes says 's' instead of 'th'. I think substituting 'th' is common for all three year olds speaking English but the French she hears encourages her to say 's' and not substitute with 'f' or 'd' like just English speaking children tend to do often unnoticed.

Cory - I find it interesting that your ds makes grammatical mistakes in Swedish. I have noticed in my teaching that children who learn English in France do tend to need more explicit grammar teaching than children growing up in the UK. The gut feeling that a sentence is right that purely English speakers have seems to be more reliable than the gut reaction of a child with more languages at his or her finger tips.

I have also noticed, with children I know who are learning English in France; that there is generally a noticeable difference between children who read in English for pleasure and those who do not. Their grammar and spelling are not effected but readers appear to have more flexibility with vocabulary. The readers seem to, perhaps unsurprisingly, have a considerably wider vocabulary. Also they seem to be less likely to stumble if an unknown word comes up in spoken English. I am guessing that the skills they have honed for attacking unknown vocabulary in texts are easily transferred to listening and speaking skills too. I am basing this on light observations of a few children and teenagers I know but it is a pattern I have felt quite strongly amongst these few children. Has anyone-else noticed the influence of reading for pleasure on vocabulary?

dd has a stronger Gothenburg accent than I do, presumably acquired on holiday

she is very confident speaking Swedish but will only write it to her own friends, not to her grandparents for fear of making mistakes

ds has a good accent but makes grammatical mistakes in his spoken Swedish

How interesting Pillowcase. DD is in a breton school. The teachers only speak breton. I sometimes worry that she won't be exposed to a lot of French as we speak english at home.

The accent thing is interesting.

My accent is Irish.
They kids have mostly my accent with a bit of a French twinge sometimes and sometimes a little English accent depending on who they've been playing with (and of course American twinge from watching too much HSM!)

DH has a French Parisian accent.
We live in the SW so the kids have the local dialect.

On top of that my 2 youngest are in a bilingual school French/Occitan so they now speak occitan/Gascon and sound like the old men in the bar!!!

Pitchounette - my DD2 is a bit of a perfectionist, doesn't like getting things wrong, and so refused to speak any French at school when we first moved back (she was 5) until she had sorted it all out in her mind. After six months of silence she suddenly came out with full sentences overnight! Now she speaks French more readily than English and I have to remind her daily to speak to me in English.

As for the social aspect - my DDs are old enough to know the social differences between the UK and France now so aren't bothered either way, but there used to be awkward kiss-or-not-to-kiss moments.

Funny about you not hearing your DC's English accent. I didn't realise DD1 spoke English with a French accent (before we lived in the UK) until I watched some video we'd taken of her when she was 2 several years later. It was comically French

Like Castille, I would love to have the opportunity to go back to France, even for 6 months, so that they learn to speak french with the right accent.

Apparently, they speak french with an english accent (according to friends in france, I can't har it myself, the same way that DH can't hear my french accent anymore). But sometimes, they also have 'l'accent du Midi' ie the accent from the region I am coming from.

Have you found that there is an age when your dc don't want to speak their weaker language with native speakers because theyu are not as ease as they are/say the thing the 'wrong' way/become self concious in general?
Have you also found that they are not always 'fitting' very easily because the social rules are different? I am thinking of occasions when french children wanting to play with my dcs started asking straight away 'What's your name?' which worried them a lot lot or the habit of kissing people to say hello (which they refuse to do too - cue for strange looks from friends who thinks they are impolite until I explain that it's a wierd thing to do for them)

- pillowcase I am really glad that your dd has found someone like her!

My dd is currently in the apartment downstairs watching a sort of Tom and Jerry style TV show in Russian with her little Moldavian friend!

I think she's just showing off now....

cory - There is not a huge amount of research in bilingualism compared to other areas of social, educational or linguistic areas of study - but I do find it interesting. I think because I am not bilingual myself reading gives me some sort of insight into how my dh, dd and my students (most are bilingual or striving to be so) use and perceive language.

Each bilingual person uses their languages differently and are exposed to languages differently too. So working out methods and set ideas that are good for every bilingual child is not something I search for - but I do find that the more I read the more I can see some patterns and the more I find myself making learned and confident decisions in my private and professional life...

pillowcase - my eldest started secondary school last year in a bilingual section, and it was amazing to see the difference in her language use when being bilingual suddenly became normal - she had been a bit reluctant to speak English previously and now speaks it far more.

malfoy - when I was growing up we mix at least 5 or 6 languages and dialects. Even now when I have the opportunity to meet someone with the same background we lose no chance of doing it again! What a joy it was and still is.

Hi everybody.

I'm Swedish and my dh is English. We live in the UK and the dcs attend the local school, no Swedish speakers around, but we're lucky enough to be able to spend the summer and Xmas holidays in Sweden, where they have lots of cousins.

I speak English to a nearly native standard- I teach at the local university and have even worked as a proof reader; dh's Swedish is erratic, but he understands it well and can usually express more or less what he wants.

Have to admit we do mix and match- me in particular. Being the person who really knows things like nursery rhymes and children's literature in both languages, I felt it was my responsibility. Dh tends to stick to English when we are alone as a family, but sometimes gets carried away when the children speak to him in Swedish. We have no rules and have never felt the need of them.

Dd (12) reads a lot in both languages and spends a lot of time on a Swedish chat forum and keeps in touch with friends she has made on holiday.

Ds (9) is a little behind in reading in both languages, but I don't think that's anything to do with being bilingual; that's just him. I have noticed that he wants me to walk him to school so we can have a chat in the mornings- and he almost always initiates that in Swedish.

I read aloud to them in both languages, but mainly in Swedish. Have found books a great help in expanding vocabulary.

But like slng am a bit dubious about books on bilingualism. They tend to be either very anecdotal (I used this method and it worked, so you have to use this method) or linguistic research which can be interesting but is not usually very helpful for everyday life.

<<yawn>>

The ability to say "I am sacred of the big bear on my big brother's bed" in different languages is, I discover, not very endearing at 2 o'clock in the morning...

<<yawns and fall asleep on keyboard>>

^This on a few occasions has been a bit of a surprise for their guests, I suppose they wouldn't expect to be greeted in such a way by a little pale skinned, ginger English girl...^



I think it's important for them to have friends in similar situations (like your dd's Algerian-French friend teafortwo). My DCs are the only bilingual kids in our school (apart from a couple of English kids who don't have a French parent and struggle a bit). But DD1 is doing music on Weds and there's a girl with English Dad and French Mum there. They hit it off straight away and really get on well. The best news for DD was when friend told her she's moving schools next year, so will be in DD's class. DD said to me "I'm so excited because she's like me" (meaning mixed-language family) and I realise that it's important to her.

<waves in a jolly way at all the new mners to this thread.... the people I know and the ones new to me too...>

We have had a lovely day. DD had a little Algerian-French friend over to tip all her toys on the floor with and roll around giggling lots play.

Dd's friend speaks French and Arabic. It is funny because her and dd speak in French together but also enjoy copying each other's other language. Today DD said "I want my hat on." and her friend who was wearing a big bright pink hat of her own went "ey waaarrr ma heer-at on!" which made me giggle because she was wearing a very obvious hat and she giggled too because she finds the music of English delightful to make even when she doesn't know what she is saying!

Her first English word because of us was 'Baaaaybeeeey" because at the time we called her baby ............ because she was little and the exotic sound of the 'ay' dipthong and long 'e were simply magical to her young sensitive ears.

Dd, I am told, follows simple instructions in Arabic, counts to five or three depending on how she feels and says makhaba (welcome) to anyone who walks through the door when she is at her friend's place. This on a few occasions has been a bit of a surprise for their guests, I suppose they wouldn't expect to be greeted in such a way by a little pale skinned, ginger English girl... but, hey, why not?

Out of interest, why, malfoy?

I don't mind them switching halfway through an afternoon, or even a conversation. What I object to is "XXX, so-and-so m'a hit and il m'a hurt. Je veux que you tell him off." Or "XXX can I have some jus d'orange, please?"

Speaking as a bilingual person I never reached precisely the same level in both languages. Whilst at school and growing up, French was my dominant language. Since university English has become my main language and for certain specialised subjects (eg accounting and baby stuff) my only language.

As a child I used to find it irritating if people who could understand both languages would insist on "pure" English or French.

*hops on to the thread as an imposter*

I hope to raise a bilingual (French/English), possibly trilingual (added Dutch), family one day but for now I'm a governess for a bilingual (French/English) 7 year old in France.

He goes to a bilingual school, only speaks English with me (unless we're doing French homework) and French with his parents. His bilingual friends will speak French amongst themselves and either English or Franglais to English speaking adults. Despising Franglais as I do I insist they speak either pure French or pure English to me but will only respond in English unless they're hurt or very distressed.

Hello, we're English-French too - I'm British, DH is French, we live in France and we speak to each other in French.

We have always spoken to the DC in our mother tongues, but obviously they hear me speaking French a lot so sometimes I have to insist on the DDs speaking to me in English as they tend to gravitate towards French. But they read mostly in English, only ever watch English TV/DVDs and we visit my family as often and for as long as we can.

All 3 DC were born here but we moved to the UK for 3 years when the oldest two were little, which has been a huge bonus both for their bi-culturalism and for their accent (I know quite a few Franco-British children living here who speak English with French accents - never sure quite how that works but they do!). DS is nearly 3 and hasn't lived in the UK but has had my (almost) undivided attention since birth so speaks more English than French, at least for now

Another French-English bilingual family here .

I have no problem referring to "Papa" when speaking English to my daughter, but DP refers to me as "Maman" when speaking to DD, and she refers to me as "Maman" when speaking French, though definitely only ever calls me Mummy to my face.

To refer back to Pitchounette's question about the extent of bilingualism we are aiming to achieve: I want DD to attain a similar level of fluency in both French and English, but I do not believe that she will, at any one time, be at precisely the same level in both languages right through her development.

teafortwo Do you have rules for when you and your children speak English and French? If yes - Are they explicitly or implicitly learnt?

Actually there is no rule and this use to worry me a lot, as most books on bilingualism I read advocate the need for this kind of rule. But it just didn't come naturally, and after speaking with bilingual friends from varied backgrounds, I now believe that spontaneity is the best. DD does mix her languages but she seems to know who speaks what language.

Pillowcase Good to hear of other Franco-Irish households in France!

Kapusta We refer to family members in the language of their names i.e. I say "Daddy", "Granny" and I am "Maman". I actually told off my PIL for calling me "Mummy" to the children. I started calling them "Papi" and "Mami" and they stopped straight away. A friend of mine is also in a bilingual household and she referred to her partner as "Papa" so now the children call him "Papa", even though he's English.

slng I started reading a lot about the subject but I got bored as it was just making me feel guilty as I tend to switch between the 2 languages. I now think it's best to follow your own instinct.

As I would like the children to speak English to a native level, we watch British TV, we read mostly English books and we speak english 80% of the time at home. DH also works from home so they are exposed to a better level of English than mine and to a better accent!

I want my children to read my novels. I'm teaching DS1 (5.5) to read and write Chinese, and will teach DS2 (3.2) too. I'm pretty bloody-minded about it, I'm afraid ... and so far they seem to want to learn ... If they stop wanting to learn I'll think up something else, but hopefully there is enough interesting stuff out there to keep them hooked...

I flipped through one or two books on bilingualism in Waterstone once and concluded that so-called "evidence" is anecdotal (I'm probably wrong - it was really was flipping through the books ) and decided to go our own way. Besides I can't think there would be anything written down that would change our minds. (Does that sound arrogant?) I'm bilingual and don't see why DC can't be, since they have a superior teacher (Now that definitely sounds arrogant. )
Record this and play it back to me when DC decided not to have anything to do with anything Chinese!

I find it strange saying 'call Papa for dinner' - it's like putting a French word in an English sentence, so I say 'Daddy'.

Me, I'm Mammy (and he says maman) but the awful bit for me is that Mamie is Grandma in French so sounds the same. I do HATE it when strangers think I'm the granny

I read one book on bilingualism long before I had kids (or a foreign hubby) but haven't read anything since. Anyone want to comment on some of the books to save my lazy self having to read them?

teafortwo, don't worry about questions. We all have very different arrangements !!

Atm all the person on this thread have children who are relatively young. How bilingual would you like your dc to be when they grow up? I mean do you expect them to be fully bilingual, totally at ease with both languages, or be able to speak about daily life stuff but not expecting them to be able to read/write/go to Uni or even just be able to understand?

I started wanting mines to be fully bilingual (so being able to go to Uni in France if they ever wanted to do so). Now I am not so sure. Teaching them to read/write in french looks like a huge mountain to climb iyswim. Also how do you do it without it being a chore etc....

I have choosen to use the english word 'Daddy' for DH and we use the french word 'Maman' for me in both languages. And again french words to refer to my parents and english for my PIL.

I found it was easier for them when they were young (One name for one person). Now they use both words depending on the languages. It does however break my heart when ds1 is using 'mummy' when talking about me (in english). So I can fully understand kapusta's DH who wants to use 'papa'.

MIFLAW and slng - thanks for sharing what you do re. names.

MIFLAW - I'm sure you're absolutely right, our children are growing up learning that there are at least two words for everything, so why not for their parents too, and I know DS will soon figure it out. It's just that I've had the odd moment where I've wondered if I'm damaging him in some way by not providing him with constant, non-changing names for the two most important people in his life. It's mad, I know but he is my PFB so I'm allowed ...

P.S. No real reason for being a cabbage, there are just a lot of them about in my neck of the woods

I so love the way DC use the languages. I could spend hours just listening to them. And they do talk for hours, usually both at the same time...

Can I join in? DH and I are both English, but live in Belgium and dd goes to a french speaking school. She is 5 now, but when smaller she often dropped french words into English sentences and vice versa.

We read books and watch tv in both languages, though i am trying to encourage more french (despite DH's excessive attachment to Cbeebies ) as my main worry is that dd's vocab will not be up with that of her peers....

Sorry - reading it back that's even more confusing than it was to write!

Basically, though it could be confusing, I am of the opinion that as a bilingual she will soon learn that there are at least two words for everything so there is no reason why she can't cope with the same being true for her parents.

(Even monolinguals know this in some ways - they hear other adults call their parents by first name, maybe strangers call them Mr and Mrs X or sir and madam but, to them, they are "mum" and "dad" - in other words, mummy and daddy have two or three "names" each)

We do: for grandparents, my language for my parents and dh's language for dh's parents. DC call me "mama" but refer to me as "mummy", call dh "papa" and refers to him as "papa" when talking to me and "daddy" when talking to other people. When we hear "mummy" and "daddy" being brandied about it's usually when they are playing "mummies and daddies". Sounds complicated now I've written it down ...

Kapusta

I have to say that this is all still new for us - daughter only 17 mths - but I refer to all family members in French and my partner refers to them all in English.

This means that (because my daughter's slightly stronger language is English) she calls me "daddy" but I refer to myself as "papa" (and I'm hoping she won't start confusing "daddy" and "dada" which means "horse"!) and I refer to my own mother as "mamie" ("nan") and my partner as "maman" while my daughter calls my partner "mummy."

In other words, it could all end in tears, but for the time being this seems to be most consistent with the OPOL method which is how everything else is set up in our lives.

PS why are you a cabbage?

TFT - thank you so much! I will really enjoy looking at these links.

I have a question for all you bilingual families. Which language do you use to refer to yourself and your DH/DP when you are talking to your DC? If your native language is English and you speak English to your children whilst your DH/DP speaks a different language to them, when you talk about him to the DC do you refer to him as Daddy or as Papa/Vati/etc.?

When I talk to DS about his dad, I always call him Daddy, and DS has now started calling him 'Da'. But when DH (a native Russian speaker) speaks to DS in Russian, he calls himself Papa. Should I also be calling DH 'Papa' when I talk about him to DS? I just hate the sound of 'Mummy and Papa' - it's so wrong somehow! 'Mummy and Daddy' sounds so much more natural - but I don't want to confuse my poor DS.

What do the rest of you do about names for family members?

pillowcase - my dd says the French "aaaiiiiyyyyaa" when she is hurt! I don't know why but for some reason I would love her to say "ouch"!

[daft bat emotion]

kapusta...

This is my current read. It is fairly academic but really interesting I keep photocopying bits to give to people I know...

www.amazon.co.uk/Bilingual-Family-Handbook-Parents-Linguistics/dp/0521004640/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&s=b ooks&qid=1246350092&sr=8-10

These two books are wonderful for getting a feel for how everyone approaches bilingualism and general thoughts and feeings on it...

www.amazon.co.uk/Bilingualism-Development-Language-Literacy-Cognition/dp/0521635071/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UT F8&s=books&qid=1246350092&sr=8-3

www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0415333326/ref=s9_simz_gw_s0_p14_i1?pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_s=cente r-1&pf_rd_r=0PBSDGSGT0SDR7NFW5QX&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=467198433&pf_rd_i=468294

Here are some nice little features on bilingualism... although it is only when I was making the links I realised how old they are...

www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2004/mar/03/familyandrelationships.features10

www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2005/jun/22/familyandrelationships.features113

waves

I find the way they grunt in the mornings when it's time to get out of bed is neither French nor English but rather universal.

Hello Pillowcase!

hi all,
love reading about other bilingual households, good to know we're not freaks!

I (Irish) speak English to dc and dh (French) speaks French. Kids are 8, 6 and 4. We lived in Ireland until dd1 was 4. She and dd2 spoke English only but dh spoke to them in Fr always and they understood.

When we moved to France the progress in french was amazing. DD1 went from being too shy/confused/overwhelmed to speak at all, to speaking fluently within about 6 or 8 weeks. I was amazed. So the language was really there after years of listening.

At this point they are all properly bilingual, making a few mistakes now and then but nothing serious. I do think though that the wheel is slowly turning and soon I will have to reinforce their English. We're so bad at reading together etc, but have plans over the summer.....

Malfoy - please stay around! I am sure you have lots to add and say.

Pitchounette - Sorry to have asked so many questions. It sounds to me like your desire for your children to speak French is very strong and I feel this is the most important thing...

For me the not understanding is the other way round. I tend to 'get' most of what is being said between dd and dh and generally, now, don't mind if I don't - it is part of my learning curve! I used to bug dh to translate for me but he finds it a drag and so unless very necessary I listen hard and squint to try and hope to find some meaning!!! I feel it is harder for the person who understands both languages fluently.

malfoy, I can relate to much of what you said because I do it too (all the 'baby/parenting' vocabulary is english for me so I am struggling to say what I want in french ).

And bringing up children is not an easy task. Sometimes I do wonder why the heck I am doing it! So there is no shame in not doing it!

Humm, I am probably not that good at translating for DH.
I do it for IL regularly though but again found it easier to speak english to all because if I ask a question to the dcs in the middle of a conversation between them (dcs and MIL)then they will answer in french (to me) when really the person who was interrested was my MIL so it would have been better to speak english iyswim.

I will try to answer.

Do your children have a reason other than you want them to speak French and it is good for them to speak it?
Yes my parents for a start would not be able to understand them!! And in some ways, I would also like them to feel french in some ways (My dream would be 50/50 but I know it will be more like 80% english and 20% french)

Do they have good friends, cousins, Aunts, Uncles and/or Grandparents who only speak French to chat with on the phone?
I am lucky that my parents have moved near us (in the UK) so they can speak to them too. Otherwise, no aunts/uncles (only child) and my cousins have children younger than mines and ... they also live abroad!!. Unfortunatly, there isn't a lot of opportunity for them to use their french

Do you bring them over to France lots or make sure holidays are in French speaking countries? I feel this could make a big difference.
I am going back to France once a year for about 2 weeks. Can't afford more (no family home to go back to) and can only do that because I am going with my parents and they pay for most of it...

Do you read to them in French at night?
Oh yes, we read a lot....

I am thinking of getting my dd sorted with an English pen-pal as soon as she starts to do something close to writing too... do your children write to friends in French (with your help)?
Don't know about that one. The dcs are going to an english school (no bilingual school where I live) so it will be up to me to teach them to read and write in french. I have started with ds1 but there is still a very long way to go.

Do they watch French dvds? When dd starts school I am seriously considering a subtly and kindly imposed ban on any French TV for her.
We don't have a TV! but we have a computer and lots of DVDs. I have decided that DH would buy the english ones and he is not as much on the ball as me so... most of them are in french

Do they go to any French speaking club?
Nothing like this where I am...

DH has learnt quite a bit of french from listening to us but his rate of learning isn't as good as the dc's.
He is also not good at languages which doesn't help.
It is an issue because I end up doing 80% of the conversation with the dcs during our meal. And then he is asking the same thing thsn me because he missed a very good chunk of it. But also there is some misunderstanding between us when I ask the dcs to do one thing and he understand wrongly what I said....

Pitchounette - I have the same "arrangement" as you except I speak Mandarin to the children. DH understands (mostly, I think) what we say - he did night classes for quite a few years, but I repeat myself in English to him. I still speak Mandarin to the kids when there are other English speakers around, but I translate. Conversations just seem to take twice as long ... but I'm so used to speaking to the kids in Mandarin now. And it's fantastic having a "secret" language....

Our sentences are completely mixed up! our main language as sisters is French; we speak English with our parents.

When discussing children I will use more English expressions, eg "weaning" because I don't know the French equivalent. My sister does the same in french.

So I will say to her "J'ai wean mon fils avec du butternut squah" because my child related vocab is all English whilst dear sis would not be able to translate her "reeducation du perinee"!

Sorry, will exit the thread. I am ashamed that I do not speak to my children in French.

Pitchounette - I would push to keep up the French as much as possible. I find I am learning so much French through listening to DD and DH talk - surely this is a good opportunity for your dh to learn French too?

Do your children have a reason other than you want them to speak French and it is good for them to speak it?

Do they have good friends, cousins, Aunts, Uncles and/or Grandparents who only speak French to chat with on the phone?

Do you bring them over to France lots or make sure holidays are in French speaking countries? I feel this could make a big difference.

Do you read to them in French at night?

I am thinking of getting my dd sorted with an English pen-pal as soon as she starts to do something close to writing too... do your children write to friends in French (with your help)?

Do they watch French dvds? When dd starts school I am seriously considering a subtly and kindly imposed ban on any French TV for her.

Do they go to any French speaking club?

I think it is a matter of us having to keep the language not being lived in as 'alive' and 'meaningful' beyond ourselves as possible!

Sympathies re your dh. I have another friend who is English and living in France. Her children speak English as a foreign language because her dh didn't want them to speak English at home! I was like this when I first discovered this !

malfoy, that's interresting. In some ways, I am not bothered by them switching languages from one sentence to the next when they are speaking to each other. After all, they are both able to understand both languages.
I found it more irritating when they have english words (or actually worse now, engoish grammar) in the middle of their french (ie when they are talking to me. It then should be absolutely perfect of course ).

I just wanted to say hi although I don't belong on this thread. I just wanted to say that my sisters and I were brought up bilingually and we used to mix our languages all the time. We still do when we talk to each other but we all managed good Bac results in France and got degrees from good British universities.

My dear sister is bringing up her DD bilingually in Paris but I am too lazy to do it for my DCs.

Can I join you too?

I am french and living in the UK for nearly 10 years. DH is english but doesn't speak a word of french (actually it's worse, he hated french at school, refused to learn anything on the ground he would never need it .... ). We have 2 dcs who are 4yo and 5.5yo.
Our organisation, you guess it is english between me and DH, and DH and the dcs and I am the one to do the bilingual bit...

I have gone through loads of stress at the start because ds1 was mixing languages, the grammar was wrong, gender etc... but have learnt to relax a bit.
My biggest issue now is that I am finding that DH is excluded from our conversations with the dcs as he can't understand us. On the other side, now that ds1 is full time at school, meal times are one of the biggest opportunity for me to speak french with them so I don't really want to speak english to them. I haven't found the right answer yet. I am just finding that slowly but surely I am speaking to the dcs in english (when we are with other english speaking people). And I am not sure what I think about it...

Anyone with some experience about it?

weegiemum - which language did your children learn to read in first... why and do you think it was the best choice?

And... Breiz -

Do you have rules for when you and your children speak English and French? If yes - Are they explicitly or implicitly learnt?

kapusta - I will gather some links for you - I am at the start of my addiction .... so I haven't got lots and lots of titles but I do have a few yummy ones!

MIFLAW - It sounds like you are making a great job of bringing up a bilingual child. Congratulations! A friend of mine is in a similar situation to you. She is bringing up her son to speak English, Arabic and French. She speaks English well because her Nigerian Granny would speak to her in English when she was a little girl but it isn't her first language. Her husband speaks to her son in Arabic and French and speaks very little English while she speaks little Arabic I often wonder how much English he is learning and how much Arabic she is learning too....

A bit of all three ...

Although not quite in your husband's league I'd spent a lot of time in France, worked there for a couple of years, used to teach university French, and did statrt to feel, if not French myself, that i belonged over there and that they were better at some aspects of life than we are (notably compulsory education).

I was also aware of how much work I'd put in over the years to get to my high standard of French. Wouldn't it be great, I thought, if my child could have this for free, without ever really noticing she'd learnt it.

Then I read up a bit on the question and found out about all the benefits of bilingualism to general intelligence and development.

I also started to think about whether one day we might be able to move to France and get her into their wonderful, secular school system; or, if we stayed in Britain, she'd have the chance to learn a different language at school.

And, of course, I eventually cottoned on that it would be good for my own French.

I lost my nerve when she was born and spoke English to her for the first week of her life, then realised I didn't give a toss what other people thought and reverted to plan A.

I don't know a lot about family bilingualism but loads about education ......

So glad I alighted on this thread .

My situation is as follows: I am originally from the UK but have lived in Russia for the past 15 years and am married to a Ukrainian (from the Russian-speaking part of Ukraine, hence his native language is Russian). We have one DS, 1.10.

DH and I speak Russian to one another. I speak English to DS, DH speaks mainly Russian to him. (When we are out and about, DH will insist on speaking to DS in his heavily-accented, grammatically incorrect English which drives me absolutely round the bend, but that is a matter for another thread!) I work part-time so we also have a Russian nanny who speaks only Russian to DS.

DS appears to understand most of the things said to him in both languages, but (with the exception of "bye") he hasn't uttered a single word in either language yet. I know all children develop at their own pace, and bilingual children start speaking later than those raised in a monolingual environment, but I am curious to know when your children first started speaking. We met up with friends this w/e with a little boy just a month older than DS who was already speaking very fluently and even declining his verbs in Russian . Made me feel a bit .

TFT - you say you're addicted to reading articles/books on bilingualism. Is there any particular book that you would really recommend? I'd really like to read more around the subject but don't know where to start.

Hello Breizhete and weegie - we are just off to feed the ducks - I will be back later to ask you some questions... (friendly ones I promise!!!)

LOL at speaking to the cats in French.

I am really in ore of your determinaion. What made you decide to do this? Is it your own love of languages, a particular love of French or because you are in the know about how great being bilingual is???

Hello,

I am French married to an Irish man and after 10 years in London we moved back to France. We're bringing DD 2.5 and DS 11 month bilingual. We speak English at home, DH speaks exclusively in English with the kids and I alternate.
I have read quite a bit on the subject and I know it's not ideal, but I spoke with friends who grew up bilingual and whose parents switched between languages and it never did them any harm.

DD was an early talker and she is quite advanced but she does mix both languages.

Because of this- the Ghaidhlig education - they are a little behind peers of a similar intelligence when it comes to reading in English. They had 2.5 years of total immersion before English was introduced.

But dd1 is reading the 3rd Harry Potter and ds has read every "Beast Quest" every written as well as Horrid Henry etc ...

They are also very good at Maths and Music - apparantly this goes with Bilingualism.

My children are bilingual but myself and my husband are not.

We opted (when we lived in a Gaelic speaking area of Scotland) for Gaelic -medium nursery and then school. Although we now live in Glasgow there is fabulous Gaelic-medium education available here and all 3 kids attend Sgoil Ghaidhlig Ghlaschu and are doing brilliantly.

Dd1 (in Primary 4 - age 9) is totally fluent, native speaker standard. Ds (in primary 2 - age 7) is pretty close to being fluent. Dd2 (in primary 1, age 5) is doing really well.

I have picked up quite a lot of it, and can read fluently even though I can't speak it (or often understand what I am reading!!)

We are delighted we have gone for bilingualism - the kids are thriving on it and while Gaelic is hardly a very useful language, the benefits of any form of bilingualism are so big to kids that we don't really mind what the language is.

They have also figured out now that it is a "secret" language they share, and they use it beween themselves at home!

Support from relatives - ha!

That's a bit unfair, actually - my mother, i think, thinks that I am slightly mad but sees it as harmless and is, I think, impressed with the early results - maybe a bit like your parents?

No one else in my family gives a toss - we're not close ...

My partner is happy with the arrangement though she found it odd at first - and I think she would have been a good deal less happy if she had ever felt excluded (she doesn't speak a lot of French but she understands loads) or if our daughter's English had ever seemed jeopardised.

Most of our friends seem to find it a harmless eccentricity but I am sometimes bashful about revealing the situation for the first time. In large part, I am especially worried that people will think I have her enrolled in French classes, ie teaching her French as a foreign language (which I would see as hothousing) rather than attempting to raise her bilingually.

I have also made sure of support from French friends; I work hard at giving her exposure to "real French" (all the books we read together are in French, I get her French DVDs, we attend French-language playgroup on Saturday mornings, her lullabies and bedtime songs are in French, etc ...) And the plan (though this is still only the second year) is that I will get her to a French-speaking country for at least a week at least once a year.

I find it hard sometimes - I have to make a real effort to keep my own French alive (daily reading as a minimum) or else I get very stale; I get paranoid about making mistakes of gender or preposition, precisely because this is such an effective way of learning; I do a lot of checking in dictionaries in areas (like, of course, childhood) where I've never previously needed the vocab; and, because she's only just starting to speak proper words, I have spent a lot of time getting zero feedback and essentially speaking to myself. It's deifinitely not for everyone!

I'm hoping it will get easier - in terms of momentum, at least - as she speaks more and also if we have another baby so that we will be three Francophones in the house instead of two (though I currently speak to the cats in French so she hears me speaking to others!)

This thread feels like a monologue so far.... ....

Here is some more information MIFLAW...

DD spent her whole first year with me talking to her in English in Paris. Once a week we went to a baby playtime in French which was very good for both of us.

When dd was one she started spending an afternoon a week with a French family as I wanted her to 'feel' French when she was still a baby. She was soothed when she tripped, sung to while falling asleep and offered food in French when she was hungry. Since she was two, two afternoons a week she has attended a little French nursery. Which has developed her French even further. She is still more fluid in English but her French is quickly catching up!

In France children start school at three. This September she will be starting a bilingual school in which she will be taught everything on he French curriculum but also have lessons in English treating it as her Mother-tongue rather than a foreign language. When she is older she will also learn humanity subjects in English.

I wish she were also learning art and sport using English too though. As I feel if she is expressing visually and moving while speaking in her Mother-tongue it will benefit her more than doing this in French a language she will have pleny of experience of expressing herself in and using to organise movement simply through playing with French children.... anyway...

Before school I was worried about pushing French because her whole world was with me and therefore English was srongest. Now I am gearing myself up to push and push and push with English!

Hi MIFLAW!

I am English and speak to dd in English and my dh is English with English parents but has lived in France all his life so actually his srongest language is French (although English is the language closest to his heart )!

Our triangle is

*me and dh speak English

*me and dd speak English

*dd and dh speak both never Franglaise but the language they speak in is fluid depending on where they are and who they are with (I know - this is seen as very bad by theoriests - but seems to be working for them)

We live in Paris so all speak (me with big L plates on) French outside the home unless we are meeting English Mother-tongue friends when of course we switch to English.

I am impressed by your determinaion to speak French wih your dd it must take real guts and determination. Do you have lots of support from your relatives and friends?

We communicate in this way out of necessity and make a fuss of it and try to get it as right as we can because we realise it is so good for dd.

How are you finding it all?

TFT

Do you mean that your partner is a native of another language or that you and your partner are both native English speakers and you are raising your daughter bilingually with one of you "pretending" (for want of a better word) to be a native of the other language?

I haven't explained that very well, I know - but hopefully you see what I'm getting at.

I am doing the latter (I "pretend" to be French and never address my daughter (17 months) in English). I have started a thread on here about it (non-native bilingualism).

In any case, I recommend the Multilingual Family Newsletter, as much for not feeling alone or weird as anything else - and would love to discuss ideas/experiences/reading with you.

BTW which is the other language and where are you based?

Ooooooooops - dd just knocked over her drink i.e like 90% of mn posts I created this while being distracted - the first 'grammar' needs to be ignored for the first paragraph to make any sense -

.... sorry!!!

I come from a very mono-linguistic background. All my family and extended family speak the same language and being able to speak another language was seen as something rather nice but not really necessary for life. A bit grammar "Ooooh aaaarrr - d'jya know 'e gows to Grammar school yeeeaah! 'e even tawks French, my God!" I suppose.

My family are lovely and deep thinking clever people who don't talk like that - but it is just to show you in a sentence what I mean!

So... it is intensely fascinating and a great challenge to find myself bringing up a bilingual daughter.

I am a bit very addicted to reading any articles or books on bilingualism and am keen to know people in real life who are also bringing up bilingual children. Actually most of my friends children speak two languages - Some Moldavian friends of mine gasped at the idea that I only speak English fluently... "Just English? But how do you live?!?" They asked - as if I had announced I never drink water.

I thought - it might be fun to have a kind of Mumsnet bilingual chat thread where we can talk about the day to day highs, the lows, the funny bits and the sad bits of having a bilingual family and swap advice, ideas, theories, reading material (I am after a good summer read) and anything-else it would be useful to pool.

So.... <gets a bit nervous>.... what do you think?