I’ll give a straight answer to this question (which I’m hearing quite often now): Don’t.
English is clearly the one language we all need to speak now, so all to often parents of bilingual children are worried that their child should learn English early on too, but obviously don’t know how to go about it. I really want to challenge this assumption, and I’d say that if a family is bilingual but English is not part of their portfolio, it’s probably better to just leave it aside for the moment, at least when the children are very young. And these are some good reaons for that:
- trilingualism is more difficult than bilingualism, it requires lots’ of consistency and exposure to all three languages, which is difficult to achieve if one of he languages is neither spoken at home nor in the community
- the child will learn English eventually anyway, no need to worry about it. In fact people who can speak two languages are more adept at learning a new foreign language than their monolingual counterparts
- the native language is necessary for a serene upbringing and for staying connected with one’s orginins and family, it shouldn’t be sacrificed for the sake of a language of pragmatic use, like English is
- parents shoudl ask themselves too much and get stressed about it, by having unrealitsic expectations and quite you might set yourself up for failure, become frustrated and end up abandoning bilingualism all together
- better to do one thing properly, rather than doing two things so-so
- don’t ask too much of the child, a child is just a child, his/her priorities are to be loved and cared for, to play, have fun and discover the world, going to language classes shouldn’t be part of the picture (assuming that the family environment in this circumstances is not best placed for learning the language)
Related posts:
Children who can speak two languages are better at learning a third languageLisa's recipe for trilingualism7 Strategies to use when a bilingual child doesn’t want to speak a languageWhat are the cons of Bilingualism?When to start with Bilingualism
2 Comments
hello,
Well I just met a friend yesterday who speaks spanish to her child as she is from Mexico but as she knows English she lived in new York and studied at University there. She has decided to teach english too and she has a set time in the evening from 8 until he goes to bed when she peaks english. The child goes to school in the morning therefore gets plenty of Italian and the father only speaks Italian. the child understands and speaks all three languages and he is 5 years old.
Emma,
thanks for sharing this example, which is very interesting. I’m not saying that adding English as a third language can’t work, but I think your friend is quite exceptional in sticking to the method she chose. Anything can be done if one is sufficiently motivated, but when parents are confused about what to do and struggle to find the right approach for two languages, I really don’t think they need to worry about English as a third language.
That said, if they really want to and are clear about how to, why not?
By the way, I’d really love to hear your friend’s experience, why don’t you invite her to join the discussion?
Thanks,
L.