Bilingual kids

[Marina]

I know some of the foreros are married to Spaniards or are Spanish people living abroad, I'd like to ask them to share their information and expiriences in this subject with us as I find it really interesting and complex.

Do you speak to you children in your own mother tongue or in the language that is spoken where you live?
Is it true that if you speak two different languages to babies they take longer to speak???

[Marbella]

I am English, my wife is Spanish. My spoken Spanish is not brilliant so at home we speak English.

From the day our first son was born until he was 3 my wife only spoke to him in Spanish, me in English. He seemed to understand both languages (to the limitations of a 3 year old) but when he started nursery school in England the teacher called us in and said that we were delaying his progress in English and advised us to stop. He spoke English ok but when it came to colours and numbers he would say them in Spanish. He would say to the teacher, "it's not blue, it's AZUL!".

We stupidly listened to the teacher and taking her as an expert we dropped the Spanish thing.

We subsequently met another couple, same combination as us, English dad:Spanish mum, yet he spoke excellent Spanish so their language at home was totally Spanish. The only exposure the child had to English was from the TV or friends. When the child started the nursery school they received the same lecture from the same teacher.

Our son then had very little exposure to Spanish, apart from trips to see his yaya (bisabuela), abuela y tías, until he was 8 and we moved to Spain. Still our home language was English but within one month living in the urbanización and playing with the Spanish children he was understanding and conversing confidently.

Do you think he was capable of doing this because of those first 3 years?

I ask because our youngest who is now 5, almost totally rejects Spanish even though he also lived in Spain for 3 years. We speak to him in Spanish and he just says, "I´m not listening until you speak in English!". At least he can recognise the difference I suppose.

[ValenciaSon]

My fatrher is from Spain, but I was born in the US. When I was 8, we moved to Spain. I refused to speak spanish (I'm not sure why). Of course I did end up speaking spanish because I was enrolled in school and immersed in a spanish society. I don't remember having any leaning curve at all as if the language were seeded within me. We moved back to the US a year later. My spoken spanish has degraded but I can still read and understand a fair amount.

Now my parents have moved close to us from New York. I have 2 sons who are learning spanish from my parents, understand a fair amount spoken to them but are reluctant to speak, other than short phrases.

I believe in bilingualism. I am of the opinion as stated by Noam Chomsky that bilingualism enhances expressive agility as it works the broca and Wernicke brain centers of expression and reception into a higher level of functionality. Perhaps this is an equitable trade-off for the earlier delays in language development.

[lumpsuckerpig]

I work in a school in ICT, and we had an Asian heritage pupil come to the school after living in Spain for a few years. She sat her GCSE Spanish exam almost immediately after arriving and passed with an A* not bad eh. She is tri-lingual, English, Spanish and Urdu. I mention this as I believe being bi-lingual gives you a massive advantage when it comes to jobs, careers, travel etc. I think if children are exposed to languages, Spanish and English, at an early age and are involved and encouraged, they should have no problem picking it up at all, indeed I think if they are spoken to in both tongues from an early age, they would not know the difference between the two languages and should become fluent reasonably easily. I have made a concious decision now that when, or if, I become a grandfather, I will always try to speak to my grandchildren in both languages, although my Spanish is far from perfect, in the hope that I can give them a start on the path to bi-linguism.

[Ben]

We subsequently met another couple, same combination as us, English dad:Spanish mum, yet he spoke excellent Spanish so their language at home was totally Spanish. The only exposure the child had to English was from the TV or friends. When the child started the nursery school they received the same lecture from the same teacher.
Sounds to me like the teacher should be shot, or the teacher training system in the UK radically re-tuned to take into account the importance of bilingualism. Can you imagine a teacher in Scandanavia discouraging bilingualism like this? Then again I understand that in the UK it is no longer obligatory to take a language at GCSE (state exams at 16), so I'm not surprised. How are us Brits ever going to loose our reputation of being lazy with languages when we have an education system like that? [/rant]

I fully understand your decision to listen to the teacher by the way, they are supposed to know best after all!

[Marbella]

I fully understand your decision to listen to the teacher by the way, they are supposed to know best after all!

Yes, as first-time parents it was very easy to be swayed by a teacher who, on reflection I feel, wanted an easier child than some toddler with his own ideas about language. I don´t really know if her attitude is/was typical or not.

I agree with all you say about starting language learning at school. So important to start early in life, however, I listened to you being interviewed on the radio clip and just thought it was incredible how you coped with doing that. Inspirational really.

[Ben]

I agree with all you say about starting language learning at school. So important to start early in life, however, I listened to you being interviewed on the radio clip and just thought it was incredible how you coped with doing that. Inspirational really.

I had a heart rate of around 150 and was sweating quite a bit! One of the most nerve-wracking things I have done, I can tell you!

[Marina]

I agree with Ben that the teacher was twat that probably was looking for less possible hassle.

I read a very interesting article about this subject in "El Pais Semanal" (the sunday magazine of el pais (http://www.elpais.es)) a couple of years ago and it said that it's common that when a child is learning two lenguages at the same time they take longer to speak but the effort is absolutely worth it. It also mentioned that it's very important to be strict and each of the parents should always speak in its mother tongue when speaking directly to the child.

But even if they don't speak the lenguage, I think it's worth it that they listen to it as children so it will be definately easier for them when they decide/need to learn it. My spanish sister in law (my brother's girlfriend) family went to live in England for 2 years when she was 8 (or 6 I can not remember). For the first 6 months she didn't open her mouth at school, as if she was processing the leguage, then after the first 6 months she started to speak quite fluently!

[Isabel]

I had a school mate, half French and half Italian living in Spain, she was perfectly trilingual. I’ve known a little girl with a German mother, when she was 3 she mixed German and Spanish, but she was able to separate both if you asked her for. I’ve known a Greek mother who talks only Greek to her twins; in France they talk only French, but in Greece they are little Greeks. My ex-house mate only talked in English at home living in Spain, she speaks both languages fluently and she learned French very easily.

In every case, it took longer to learn to speak, but they were perfectly bilingual afterwards.

I’m Spanish, living in France and newly wed to a French man. I don’t have kids yet, but I’ll try to transfer my language and my culture to the children I’ll have.

[richardksa]

The teaching of foreign languages in the UK leaves a lot to be desired. (So does most of the teaching of all the other subjects, but that's for another topic!) Schools start far too late, usually when the child arrives at secondary school at the age of 11. I despaired with my two sons who basically thought that speaking a foreign language was "for sissies". This was reinforced by the language teachers who said girls were far better as they didn't have the macho hang-ups that boys have at that age. Very young children do not have the "gender gene" switched on and so don't care. Boys play netball, girls climb trees.

My job takes me to many different countries. I find that the children of colleagues who live in those pick up the local language very quickly. An example is the sons (12 and 15) of my American boss who speak Arabic, Japanese and Spanish totally fluently. They did not learn them at school, but in the street, with local friends. My boss tells me, with a shrug, that neither of his sons are particularly academically gifted!

An organisation in the UK (don't know what, but I saw it on my local TV news) arranges exchanges of young children (under 10) with French schools and families. After just six months they return totally fluent. Yet the ministry of education has yet to realise that children have this potential. Keep talking to your kids. I wish I had had such an experience in my long lost childhood, then I would find it easier with the French and Spanish that I am determined to master.

[Marbella]

I agree with Ben that the teacher was twat


You are great Marina, your use of the vernacular here tickled me. I couldn't have put it better!

After watching the game last night, Riojana and I were trying to translate into Spanish the word "gutted".

[Brian]

I am American (with a Spanish university degree) and my wife is Spanish. Our best attempts have been to speak Spanish at home as much as possible, although it's very easy to revert to English, because it's more convenient. We do have a rule, and that is that no English may be spoken at the dinner table. So, they're quite adept at "La sal, por favor." :rolleyes:

My oldest is 11, the youngest is 5, and both of them understand way much more than they are willing to express, which I suppose is natural. When we visit Spain, they are able to keep up with the conversation, although they have little to contribute.

In addition, my wife has been teaching structured Spanish classes to them for a few years.

I agree that even in the States, foreign language education is sorely lacking. I was talking to my High School Spanish teacher the other day, who was lamenting the fact that it's too late to start teaching foreign languages to 14-17 year-olds. However, he's pushing a statewide initiative to educate children in elementary school, as well as teaching post-graduate rudimentary Spanish for teachers who have Spanish-speaking students.

[Marina]

Could it be translated as "hecho polvo" o "estar jodido"??? (Sorry for the language:rolleyes: )

[gary]

I fully understand your decision to listen to the teacher by the way, they are supposed to know best after all!

Not always true... I am a teacher and I agree with Ben. Working in schools for over 30 years I have had probably one new initiative every eighteen months. The confident and the competent just plough on teaching and getting the results. The shakier members of the profession chase the initiatives in the hope of it all coming right for them, but the only real answer in most cases is a personality transplant. The problem we have now is that when some students finishe uni they dont know what to do so they do the extra year for the teaching quali. Then they teach for two years to get their student loan wiped and bugger off leaving a mess behind them for the real teachers to mop up. Dont get me wrong I know some excellent young teachers - they have it - if I could bottle it I'd make a fortune. The others concentrate on their reams of planning, but planning is no substitute for talent.
Theres a good percentage of deadwood in English schools, but sadly no way to replace them in an Alan Sugar sort of way, so we put to teach them in Years 3,4,5,7 and 9 where they do least damage to the exam results - dont get me started on that one but if you want more on teachers and exams I have blogged it here...

Zoo Time (http://gtcc.blogspot.com/2006/01/zoo-time.html)

Pig Weighing (http://gtcc.blogspot.com/2006/03/pig-weighing.html)

[cubix]

The teaching of foreign languages in the UK leaves a lot to be desired. (So does most of the teaching of all the other subjects, but that's for another topic!) Schools start far too late, usually when the child arrives at secondary school at the age of 11. I despaired with my two sons who basically thought that speaking a foreign language was "for sissies". This was reinforced by the language teachers who said girls were far better as they didn't have the macho hang-ups that boys have at that age. Very young children do not have the "gender gene" switched on and so don't care. Boys play netball, girls climb trees.


Language Education in the United States, or atleast where I live leaves much to be desired for. It doesn't start till 8th grade(13 or 14) for the advanced students, and the start of High School for the regular student(15) When I started spanish it started in 7th, but due to budget cuts and "focus on reading" they moved it up a grade.

The biggest problem with Spanish Education here, is a lack of good teachers. At my my school, there is a mix of Native Speakers and Teachers who learned Spanish in College. Each has their advantages, the native speakers get their students speaking but are not comfortable with grammar so much, or can't explain it.

While the professors who learned it at college, bore their students with grammar, but speaking in their class is non-existent.

I have many stories about my spanish education.

One of my favorites was my first year of spanish. We had this new spanish teacher. She held certifications in Spanish and French, she seemed ok, she basically curved everthing becuase she felt bad for us. Well about 2 months in she quit, no-one really knows why. We went about a month without a teacher, we finally got a nice Spanish lady, we were reviewing what we had learned, and we got to the verb to read "leer" right, well we had been taught to pronounce it lear(like a learjet) After that we started all over.

They reserve the good teachers for the upper echlon classes, like the AP classes. Right now my teacher is a native speaker of both portugese and Spanish. Has taught college before, worked for the U.N, and such as that. Instead of focusing on a text book or listening tapes or such. We were forced to speak, and forced to learned the grammar. My grade in their is lower than years past, but I have learned more than the past 4 year combined..


Wow, that was long

[Brian]

An organisation in the UK (don't know what, but I saw it on my local TV news) arranges exchanges of young children (under 10) with French schools and families. After just six months they return totally fluent. Yet the ministry of education has yet to realise that children have this potential. Keep talking to your kids. I wish I had had such an experience in my long lost childhood, then I would find it easier with the French and Spanish that I am determined to master.

Great idea, but I don't know if I'd let my 10-year-old stay with a total stranger.

Still, total immersion forces a kid to swim. And children are incredibly resilient.

[richardksa]

It had nothing to do with language teachng, but for several years we took in french students visiting the UK as part of a school trip. We were cheaper than hotels! We and our house were vetted and approved by the organisers. I am sure that something similar would happen in this case. Besides, what I understood from the news clip was that two families were introduced and got to know each other before the exchange occured. And I'm sure the company kept a close watch on the children.

[gary]

The biggest problem with Spanish Education here, is a lack of good teachers.

Its the same in the UK - many many of the kids in our school go to Spain regularly on a package holiday. Virtually none go to France or Germany yet these two languuages prevail because of the lack of availability of teachers that can teach spanish. Often Spanish is offered as a second foreign language for students that are deemed capable of coping with two.

This was the case with me - I had two years french prior to taking Spanish but the french surrendered ;) and the Spanish prevailed.

One local secondary school I know would die to substitute Spanish for german but cant staff it.

[Polly]

Foreign language instruction leaves a lot to be desired in the US too -
It usually isn't offered on any broad scope until the high school level.

My neice was four years old when my sister moved with her new husband to Geneva. Neither my sister nor my neice had any French previously -- but my neice becamefluent within 6 months. Her stepfather also spoke to her exclusively in French at home. My sister - was in her middle twenties at the time, it took around 18 months for her to become fluent.

My ex was brought up in a home where Spanish was spoken among the adults - but not to the children. His father was second generation Mexican-American, and his mother had immigrated from Mexico. They used it as a "private" language in order to talk to eachother but not include the boys. It was the mother who insisted that all the boys speak english only. It was very important to her that they not be looked "down" on for being bilingual!

Of course we now know this was the wrong way of looking at it - but that's just how it was 40 years ago. Out of 5 boys - eventually three of them learned to speak Spanish fluently. But not until they were adults - the other two are passable speakers, but not fluent. None of the grandchildren from that family (there are now 12, I believe) speaks more than a few words of Spanish. What a wasted opportunity! :(

[cubix]

In the states, spanish education is pushed though, because being fluent in spanish is seen as important nowadays because the hispanic(Mexican mainly) population is growing at such a huge rate as compared to other groups in the states.

Usually schools will offer French and Spanish, German used to be offered at my school but there was a lack of interest. I would love to learn Chineese, I see that as the next major language to learn(with the growth potential for China)

[greytop]

Foreign language instruction leaves a lot to be desired in the US too -
It usually isn't offered on any broad scope until the high school level.

:(

Wonder if this will make it worse. It came as a surprise to me as I thought it already was but then I´m English so ever so slightly biased!

http://www.lasprovincias.es/valencia/edicion/prensa/noticias/Internacional/200605/20/ALI-INT-093.html

Estados Unidos declara el inglés “lengua nacional”

[cubix]

Wonder if this will make it worse. It came as a surprise to me as I thought it already was but then I´m English so ever so slightly biased!

http://www.lasprovincias.es/valencia/edicion/prensa/noticias/Internacional/200605/20/ALI-INT-093.html

Estados Unidos declara el inglés “lengua nacional”

That acutally hasn't passed, it has been approved by the Senate, they have also approved a bill that states that "English is the unifying language of the United States"

These will be included in the larger immigration bill, and you follow United States Politics you what a mess that is. Though, President Bush does speak fluent Español...

[Polly]

Though, President Bush does speak fluent Español...

Yes, but his Spanish pronunciation isn't any better than his English! SNORT!:D

[Alan]

Bush doesn't speak Spanish :)

[gary]

Bush doesn't speak Spanish :)

My favourite quote is that

"...the trouble with the French is they have no word for entrepreneur."


presumeably the spanish have no word fir siesta...

[Polly]

Bush doesn't speak Spanish :)

George W. has a rudimentary grasp of Spanish...it's been described as "halting, conversational" -- so really no better than MY spanish! :D He uses a lot of Tejano idioms (Tex-Mex slang) when he speaks and has a pronounced East-Texas accent. He's a "get-er by-er" in Spanish.

But his younger brother Jeb (Governor of Florida), speaks fluently. He learned it while a student at Phillips Academy in Andover, Mass. He was 17 and in an exchange program in Mexico, teaching English when he met his wife, Columba. He eventually graduated from the University of Texas with a degree in Latin American studies.

[richardksa]

Just got this from the Expatica Website.

16 May 2006
MADRID — It is not just the British who are hopeless with foreign languages – more than half of Spaniards only speak their mother tongue
But a new law is about to change this, introducing English into classrooms at an earlier age.
The Organic Law of Education, passed by parliament earlier this year, will mean children aged between 3 and six will start learning a foreign language.
Later, a second foreign language may be introduced.
In regions around Spain, schools are also starting to introduce more foreign languages.
In Andalusia, 140 state schools offer bilingual education with French and German too.
In Madrid there are 80 bilingual schools.
But training and resources have been a problem in many cases.
The move comes after the Eurobarometer survey found Spain was near the bottom of table of countries in terms of ability to speak foreign languages.
It was ahead only of Hungary, Portugal, Italy, Britain and Ireland in terms of speaking another tongue.
Indeed, a survey revealed 56 percent of Spaniards speak only their own language.
[Copyright EFE with Expatica]