Support for families:
Bilingual Parenting in a Foreign Language
Check out the listing of Frequently Asked Questions, resources, feedback from parents and much more.
humanities.byu.edu/bilingua/
Bilingual Families Connect
Emily, the founder of this website is raising her children in her second language (Spanish)! Check out the resources and join the forum. www.bilingualfamiliesconnect.com
BUC by Non-Native Speakers
Bernd Klein and his wife Karola, both native Germans, are raising their children in German and English using the OPOL method. www.bklein.de/buc/buc_non_native.php
Bilingualisme (Non-Native French)
The founders of this website are raising their children in French even though both were raised as monolingual English speakers. Wonderful tips, suggestions, advice and personal experiences. bilingue.shearer.org
Bilingual Wiki
This site is growing quickly and has quite a bit of information. Check out the link titled, “Teaching Yourself and Your Child a Second Language” for tips and support in raising a child in a non-native language. www.bilingualwiki.com
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{ 33 comments… read them below or add one }
I would never try to communicate to my child in a language that was not my own unless the language happened to be my spouse’s mother tongue. In a situation where neither parent speaks the language like a native, I personally think that maintaining the household in a foreign language is a bad idea. The children will not learn to speak the language properly, will not have the proper accent or grammer, and also will lose out on getting some of extra vocab otherwise used by parents in dominant language used outside the home.
Plus it’s just unnatural.
I’m sorry, but I just have to disagree with you.
Being a native speaker of the language doesn’t guarantee that one speaks it perfectly either. Often, people know the non-native languages they speak much better than their own native tongue because they have had to learn the grammar, not just the sounds. So, even if a non-native speaker hasn’t mastered all of the elements of a language, if they have mastered the elements which a young child will use (I want X. I feel X. I like X.) then they’ll be just as well off as any native speaker, in fact, arguably better.
Also, learning about the grammar of one’s own native tongue is easier when one can compare multiple systems of grammar against each other. I personally didn’t understand English grammar at all until I began studying Spanish, and now that I’ve learned German I can say that I’m much more proficient in English than I used to be, despite the fact that I haven’t studied English at all since high school!
Furthermore, no language is unnatural. It is our unique, flexible, and rich forms of communication that make us the human beings we are. Rejoice in that variety!
My personal experience with raising a child in non-native language is nothing but positive. Our family resides in Japan. Both me and my husband are non-native English speakers but that’s the only language we can communicate. I do not speak Japanese and he does not speak my native tongue. Our boys (age 6 and 3) consider English as their first language although once they go to school Japanese will eventually become dominant. I also teach English and observing Japanese kids who at age 8 cannot repeat “What is your name” or count to ten made me appreciate our choice even more. Accent? Yes. Grammatical mistakes? Yes. Do I consider those to be valid reasons to deny a child the gift o being bilingual? Absolutely no! Our kids enjoy movies in English, they read in English, they communicate with their English peers without any trouble. The whole new world is opened for them. I had my doubts in the process but if someone asks now, I’d say go for it. All the best,
Elena in Saitama
I disagree ever so strongly with Caroline, as I am the product of a non-native speaker. I was brought up speaking French by my mother in an English-speaking country. My mother speaks fluent French albeit with a very slight English accent. I ended up living in France for over a decade to do further studies and then work. My French is native, native speakers have no idea I’m not French unless the topic of conversation moves that way.
All languages that we can give our children are a boon, no matter how’s it done.
What an interesting discussion!
Just wanted to add that I am a “product of a non-native speaker”, too. My dad, a Korean, always spoke German with us (with an accent), yet all three of us ended up speaking “proper,” accent-AND dialect-free Hochdeutsch, what relief.
What a great discussion! I hope others will weigh-in on this discussion with their opinions. With more and more families choosing to introduce a language into their homes, this is becoming a very hot topic for discussion!
It is a blessing and an advantage for any child to learn a second language. In my case I was born in Chile so may native language is Spanish. I was raised by my grandparents. My grandfather was Austrian and my grandmother could speak French and English I was always exposed to languages and today I am a polyglot. It has given me wonderful opportunities as a professional and as a person I can easily relate to other cultures. It somehow makes you a more flexible and understanding person.
I find it is hard to make one decision that this is right or wrong in ALL cases. The level of fluency can also play a huge roll. I’m raising my children in a language that is not my mother tongue but I have been speaking this language for many years and am often mistaken for a native speaker. Obviously speakers with near native fluency can really impart a sold sense of the language.
My husband and I are both raising our child in a language that is not our own and things are working out beautifully. I am a Spanish teacher and have lived in Spain. I am very fluent and am constantly reading in Spanish to expand my vocabulary. My son speaks Spanish very well.
My husband grew up speaking German with his mother who is German. His German is not as strong as his English, but he hopes to continue the language with our children. So far our son, does well in both languages.
It would be a pity to deny our sons the ease of learning a language when they are young just because we are not native speakers. They will learn our native language of English just by living in the U.S.
I think the accent issue is not all that important. I am a Pittsburgher living in California. All the time I am asked where I am from. Last weeked I was asked where I was from in Europe. I had no idea that my accent was so strong. What would people think of my cousin from Alabama. Accents exist even within our own country. Who cares what the accent is as long as we are making ourselves understood.
We too have made a decision to give our children a 3rd language which is neither of ours, and in fact we both can barely speak it. Living in HK, our children have the unique opportunity of going to a Mandarin / English bilingual school.
At home, I speak English, my husband and I speak Dutch to each other and English to the children. At school they speak Chinese 70% of the time and 30% English.
I’m studying Chinese now to help support their learning.
It’s not always easy – particularly for my son, and we’ve de-emphasized Dutch on the basis that it’s an easy language to learn and they hear us speaking it, and can understand it reasonably well, and the demands of learning Chinese – including reading and writing are considerable.
They both can understand a lot of Dutch now, and my daughter can speak and read it reasonably (self taught) albeit with a very English accent. My son’s accent is better but he doesn’t speak as much.
I’ve often been close to giving up, but my husband luckily balances it out with belief that it can be done, we just need to be supportive.
I couldn’t agree more with James and the others who support language learning no matter how it’s done. There are so many American households (like mine!) where heritage languages have been lost generations ago. This doesn’t mean that children in homes with parents who only speak English should be left behind.
We live in a global community! Let’s work to open windows for our children where the doors might have been closed in our own childhood.
In full disclosure, I felt so strongly about giving kids a bigger world than just English that I went to work for Early Advantage, the publishers of Muzzy, the BBC Language Course for Children. I feel really blessed to be a part of such a supportive team championing languages for all kids.
Despite the fact that I only speak a little Spanish that I learned in high school language classes, my two children are exploring three languages, and they love it. On any given day they might watch Muzzy in Spanish, French or Mandarin, be read a story in Spanish by me (imperfect pronunciation and all!) or participate in their once per week French lesson at school.
It’s not perfect, but it sure is wonderful to explore languages together as a family. As a result, our house is filled with a healthy enthusiasm for language learning and joyful bits of conversation in many languages. I wish that for everyone.
Let’s encourage parents to give their children a bigger world – no matter how a family gets there.
I want to ask advice about the issue of accent, which was mentioned in the comments to this post. Even though my husband speaks English to my kids with his native English accent, my kids (5 y.o.) have a Greek accent in English, which is the language I speak to them, native to me, and the langauge of the place we live in. Does anyone know if it is because they hear me speak to my husband in English with a Greek accent (and are thus copying me), or because they are still developing their language/tongues and are being influenced by the environment they live in (and thus they will eventually revert back to a natural English accent)?
Does anyone have any similar experiences?
Thank you EVERYONE for your fabulous comments! It is so amazing to read about the different experiences we are all having in raising our bilingual children! As a mom who is raising her children in a non-native language, I agree with everything which was said here, including Caroline’s very first comment. The existing research actually discourages us from raising our children in a non-native language but for a VERY DIFFERENT reason! Research against non-native language parenting was focused on families where parents were feeling the need to speak the community language at home (social pressure) rather than just speaking their own languages. An example: a family from Mexico comes to the U.S. and is pressured by society and even the government to always speak English at home with their children even though they are learning the language themselves. What families are doing nowadays is a totally different situation: we are trying to augment our children’s language landscape. We are making the effort to share something in addition, not override our personal desires to speak our language due to external pressures.
I will write a post about this down the road after I dig out the research.
Just sent you an e-mail before I saw your posting in the discussion. I think that’s right. The situation non-native speaking parents are raising their kids VOLUNTARILY in another language then their mother tongue does not seem to have been researched. Saunders is the only one mentioned always. Furthermore: The situation where people speak a different language at home than their own because they spent time abroad and like to stay connected to that time and want to share that with their kids is – as you state correctly – a new phenomenon in a globalized world where you travel to places in hours for which you needed weeks, sometimes months not even sixty years ago.
Chloe – GREAT question! Yes, accent is such an interesting topic. I’m not sure the exact answer to your question but I do know that your situation is not unique. Many of my friends have experienced the same thing. I’m not sure if it is because your children are used to speaking Greek a lot and thus when they speak English their mouths just aren’t used to forming the letters (that happens to me about spending a month in Germany visiting family!) or whether they are, as you said, copying what they hear around themselves (you but also others who speak English with a Greek accent). I’m going to pass your question on to Multilingual Living Magazine’s expert, Madalena Cruz-Ferreira and will add the answer as a separate post to this site. Thank you, thank you for sharing (and asking!).
So, how do you do it?
I am Irish, living in the US, and can speak German and Italian. We have 2 kids, 6 and 2 and so far, we have done very little with other languages. We talk daily about how words translate into other languages, but we definitely don’t converse in the other languages. I guess I don’t feel comfortable enough with the other languages.
Summer break starts in 2 days and I want to start focusing on German with the kids. Where do I start?
Sarah, so sorry I didn’t see you comment until now! Yes, yes, yes! Use summer break to jump into some language exposure! Think about what is most enjoyable to you in terms of language and start there. Maybe revolve it around a theme: make it an Italian day where you make Italian food, read a book (can be in English!) about Italy, visit a local museum that has pictures by an Italian painter or two. You don’t need to speak Italian the whole time. Start with a few sentences in the morning that your child can learn and bridge out from there. Maybe you teach your child a few words for things like: hello, goodbye, food, eat, walk, drive, talk, listen. Then use the word in place of the English word. Once that starts to feel comfortable, then the next day add some more. You can do this in both German and Italian but it might be easier to start with one language until you feel comfortable. No need to to overdo it. Let me know how it goes!!
I would rather my little boy had the opportunity to be a proficient “user” of French than have no knowledge of the language at all just because I’m not a native speaker. My little boy may speak French with a slight Scottish accent, but, well, so what? How many French (or Spanish or Italian… etc) native speakers speak English without a trace of their own beautiful accent? As for grammatical accuracy, even native speakers make mistakes…
Fiona
Sounds like a great plan, Fiona! We aren’t talking about our children living in isolation where they only receive communication from us. Whatever we can offer in other languages is just one big gift which will go on giving in so many ways that we can’t even know today! Thank you for your comment!
I think it really depends on a huge variety of factors including your knowledge of the language you are intending to teach.
The first language a child learns is the one it builds its grammar foundations on for the other languages it will learn, it is the reference language. If your knowledge of the language you are teaching them as their mother tongue, including its structures and subtleties, is not very solid you may cause problems.
I have heard people around where we live speaking English that they were taught as their mother tongue by non-native parents, in some cases their sentence structure and vocabulary is very strange, in others one would be none the wiser that they are non-natives.
As with most things in life there is no one answer!
Thank you for your comment, Eibhlin! You make some very good points. I’m not sure I would completely agree that if the first language a child learns is not very solid that “you may cause problems.” The word “problems” is a very packed word. Our children are almost always surrounded by many people, not just us, and are hearing a massive amount of language. Our children’s language learning is part of a life-long process and will continue to grow and develop over time. In addition, I don’t think that most parents would choose to raise their children in a second language 100% of the time if their language was not adequate. Luckily we can make the decision of how much exposure and adjust along the way. 10% exposure to a language is still better than nothing!
Many would argue that it is better to at least know some English with strange sentence structure and vocabulary versus none at all. Which comes down to just as you said: there is no one answer. I totally agree!
Dear all,
I need HELP!!!!
I have a 14-month old baby that is exposed to four languages and I am worried thought that it might end up being too much for him. Three of the languages come in very naturally. My wife is Italian so she speaks to Matías in Italian all the time so that he will eventually comunicate with his Italian family without any problems. She sings and reads stories in Italian too and we’ve got cartoons in that language, Cds, etc.
We live in a Basque comunity and both my mum and Matías’s nanny, as well as pretty much all the children around here, speak Basque so my son is pretty exposed to that one too, therefore I don’t think he’ll have any problems with it.
My father (Cuban) and my brother (Spanish) can’t speak Basque, so they use Spanish to comunicate with Matías and with me. And Spanish is also the language I use to talk to my wife. Apart from that, we’ve got plenty of films, radio, music and so on in Spanish.
So far so good. The problem comes in when I was highly criticised by a friend of mine, who lives in England and has bi-lingual kids, when I told her that I spoke English to my son. I always thought it’d be brilliant if he did not have to struggle they way his parents did to learn it so I started to speak to him in English since the very beginning. I was educated(university-wise) in Ireland, Scotland and England. I am very aware of my language limitations but I also think that over my years in Britain I mastered a very acceptable usage of the English language. Anyway, I was very happy with my life until this heavy criticism shook my confidence.
I’d be very greatful if you could tell me what you think about both teaching Matías Enslish and English being his fourth language.
Gracias.
Rivas, check out my reply to your comment at the bottom of this post: http://www.multilingualliving.com/2010/04/23/multilingual-life-non-native-speaker/
Rivas, I think you should do it.
Do not let the critisism upset you. You are doing the right thing, which is why you felt happy with it from the beginning.
Matias may show some signs of “confusion” when he does speak, and his speech might be delayed (moreso than his peers) but all young children have these same problems in the beginning. Do NOT give up. This is normal, and he will thank you later in life.
Thank you Eileen for all your support. I recently took my family to Ireland, where I started my university studies some years ago, and I was delighted to see how well my son interacted with my friends in English… it was truly satisfying to see that things are working out fine. We still continue with our four-language routine and hope to do so in the future… I am struggling, though, to find literature that deals with the education and the bringing-up of children in 4 languages. Give us whatever title you might have in mind.
Thank you, thank you for this post! I am a non-native speaker of German. I have a PhD in German lit and teach German language at the college level and at a Saturday school. I consider myself to be fluent, though not without some issues (darn those noun genders!). I’m committed to speaking German with my son, who is now 15 months old. However, I can’t imagine not speaking English with him as well. My solution is to speak German with him part of each day – every afternoon, we switch to German for about 4 hours. I have German books and DVDs and have downloaded Kinderlieder from iTunes. I am very fortunate to have a best friend who is German, and her son is about the same age as my own. She’s using OPOL, so I learn a lot from her. My “baby/child” vocabulary was almost non-existent (it’s not something they teach in school!), so I have a lot to learn.
I’m wondering if anyone else is speaking part-time and having success with it?
Also, if there are any resources for learning the words and phrases I need to use with my child that I never learned in school or when studying abroad?
Thank you!!!
Kate´s last [type] ..How can I feel comfortable raising my child in a language other than my own
I love your decision to use both languages with your son! So wonderful to give him both languages, and as you said, why should you have to choose? YOU are bilingual, so why not speak both with him! We get so caught up in “rules” that are written up in books or that others tell us that we forget that multilingual parenting is all about creativity – linguistic gymnastics. And that is what makes it so much more enjoyable! I am certain you are going to find your rhythm in what you are doing!
I strongly disagree with Caroline. By assuming that she will only be doing a disservice to her kids, she is also sadly unaware of the many benefits of learning multiple languages.
Caroline and those with her same mindset should really read more articles and books written by linguists.
Many people in the U.S. only speak English, but being monolingual is rare in comparison with the rest of the world.
It does not decrease a child’s intelligence, it does not confuse a child, and it does not promote poor grammar skills. The infant brain can distinguish between many different languages, even when the language is yet to be understood. This is something that the adult brain has lost the ability to do.
The infant and child brain is hard wired for language, and not just one! Please do more research on this, Caroline, so you can make a more informed opinion.
Thank you for your comment, Eileen. Of course, if parents are unable to speak a language well, then it would be a bad idea if both of them only used that language with their children. That could be what Caroline is worried about. However, that having been said, I don’t think that most of us would WANT to speak to our children in a language that we felt so uncomfortable speaking – I’m sure that we would quickly realize that our relationship with our children was lacking!
I really like the list of reasons why raising our children in more than one language is such a wonderful thing to do, even if it isn’t our native language! It is so wonderful to have so much support here from people like you! Thank you for taking the time to comment!
My husband and I are native American English speakers and are fluent in German (both taken for native speakers although non-natives). We decided before having children that we would raise them bilingually. Our lives, relationships, even work and research is all German-English, so it made sense to involve our children in this world as well. We took our three children (ages 7, 5, and 2) to Germany and Austria recently and they were all taken for natives as well (even the early language of our 2 year old). As non-native speakers of German, we were definitely going against the grain in raising our children bilingually (especially given that both grandparents are monolingual) and it has taken a lot of effort to provide a language rich environment for our children to successfully acquire German in, but it has been a success and is a major part of our family culture. A unique situation as well is that our oldest son has a language disorder, of course not a result of raising him bilingually, but when he was diagnosed, we decided to continue raising him bilingually (were also advised by the clinicians we worked with to continue) because at the time his German was stronger than his English. Fortunately his language disorder is a normalizing disorder (will catch up to peer level in the next year or so), so at that time any disadvantages he has experienced will be more than compensated for by the fact that he is bilingual (and also literate in both languages).
Is there research on this? I looked in the book section and saw books of general applicability (how to raise child binlingually, etc.). But can anyone recommend reading materials dedicated specifically to analysis of the effects, benefits, downsides to actually raising a child in (as opposed to just teaching the child) a language that is not native to either parent? In may case, my wife and I are interested in raising the child in French and English. Her French is fluent, but not native, and I am a native English speaker with decent French knowledge. Presumably she would speak only French with the child and I only English (i.e., OPOL), but we would speak English with each other. Would be grateful for any help you can provide. Thanks. – Carl
Sorry, you can probably ignore the above question. Just noticed François Grosjean’s book on the site, which has this information. If anyone has any further reading recommendations, I would of course be interested. Thanks.
My daughter is 4 years old and speaks fluent French, English and German as we live in Switzerland. My husband speaks only English with her and I speak only French with her despite being British. I studied French at university and went on to teach it to A-level standard in a UK high school. I believe that if I can teach other children to get to such a good standard of French that I should share the gift of languages with my daughter.
She copes no problem, switching easily from one language to another and translates for my husband who only speaks English. She does make grammatical errors in all 3 languages and doesn’t have an authentic accent in French, but she really enjoys being able to speak different languages. She started speaking later than some of her
monolingua peers but caught up with them a couple of months later.
I strongly believe that giving her this multilingual start in life is a wonderful asset and achievement. I regularly have to explain and justify to other people who think that it is strange that I am not speaking with her in my mother tongue, but at the end of the day, if she is fluent in 3 languages and happy with conversing with me in French, then that’s all that matters.
My only advice is to try to avoid switching from one language to another, be consistent with always speaking the same language and be proud of your little ones for being multilingual!
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