Growing Up Bilingual

Filed in archive Parenting on October 1, 2007

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My kids are bilingual. I grew up bilingual. My husband didn't.

Growing up bilingual was normal for me, since everyone I knew were bilingual. I assume my sons think The same way. But for my husband and his family who grew up in a one language environment, the idea of rearing our kids in 2 or 3 languages was welcomed with pessimism. It wasn't easy trying to understand his anxiety, but in the end I did manage to convince him.

In the end, we did manage to teach our sons both languages and he also gained a lot from his experience with the kids, since his English improved (a lot!).

Friends normally ask me for advice as to how they'll teach their kids a 2nd language. For us, what we did was, we consistently spoke one language at home (or within the immediate family) while my kids (my son JP) spoke the other language with his Oma and Opa. That arrangement worked for us. But that doesn't have to be the case. There are other ways to teach your kids 2 languages such as:

1. The One Parent, One Language, where each parent speak their native language to the children. I know someone who was complaining about this set-up because the kid refused to use the other less used language. But then, as the kid grew older, she did start speaking the less used language, and everyone was happy :))

2. The Minority Language At Home, which was what we practiced. I can attest to this method, since my son can speak both languages perfectly.

3. Less Common Patterns Any pattern that works for your family is a good pattern, of course. This is just a brief selection of all the possible patterns: the first person to speak chooses the language; one language is spoken every day, the other on extended vacations to another country; one language is spoken every day, the other on special occasions; the children attend school immersion programs.


I'm not familiar with the last one. But I guess, what's important is that the family is comfortable with it, and that both parents are consistent.