Bilingual For Fun™ » Methodologies for Bilingualism

Bilingualism at 23 months, III

Bilingual For Fun — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 13:50:22 +0000

One interesting component of A.’s recent speech development is that he now sings! Music has always been a strong presence in his life, I always played lot’s of music for him and sang to him. He never used a pacifier, or a comfort object or anything like that, all he needs to calm down and be reassured is a couple of songs. Until recently he would hum the tune of some songs he liked, and he danced a lot (he’s so funny when he dances!). But now he sings and often enough he starts singing on his own! He doesn’t sing the whole song of course, just the key words of the songs he loves best, like Happy Birthday (right now it’s Happy Birthday every day), Twinkle Twinkle little star, Old MacDonald, Yuppy Ya Ya, Hey diddle diddle and few more.

This is great, for two reasons:

We have great fun, we both love it!
It’s an easy and effective way to stimulate him to talk. We sing a song and then I stop and let him finish the line, I might repeat the trick a few times until he catches it and starts using the right word to complete it. And then we have a good laugh.

These are great moments of sharing and complicity for us, but also an excellent opportunity for him to learn new words without even realizing. Incidentally, I never ask him to “repeat” words when we talk, I stimulate him by repeating words to him at any possible opportunity, but I don’t urge him to actually say them. The one and only thing I taught him by “nagging” is to answer the question “How old are you?”

Now that I think about it, I believe that asking him to SAY a certain word would be really annoying, but singing is a completely different story. My view is that the child doesn’t feel any pleasure in repeating a word, what’s the point? However singing and completing a line is not only very satisfying, it’s almost compulsive! Do you remember Roger Rabbit when he can’t resist to the tune “Shave and a haircut…” and has to jump out to finish it with “two bits!”, well, something like that! (I can’t find the video, pity…)

A very picky person, like me, could still observe that singing might be very different from using the language actively. One thing is to say Apple because I want an apple, another one is to sing diddle diddle or ia ia hoooo because that’s how the song goes, without having any clue about the meaning of these “sounds”. I thought about but couldn’t find any literature on this, so I can’t say anything for sure, however i do have a view. I think that in fact some words are just sounds that the child sings just because he learnt the song. Other words though are daily words, that he normally hears and understands, for this words singing might be the first way to try them out, to actually say them, but from there to using them in speech it shouldn’t take much. I’ll see how it goes and I’ll let you know…

See here for Bilingualsim at 23 months, I and Bilingualism at 23 months, II

BILINGUALISM STEP BY STEP

Today’s homework is, easy enough to guess, to sing. In the minority language of course…. If you don’t normally sing this is a great opportunity to start. Buy a CD (here some suggestions in English, French and German ), listen to it few times, choose few songs both you and your children like, look the words up on Google and there you go. Sing them, anytime: in the car, when bathing the kids, before going to bed, etc.

If you already do that, start using the songs to stimulate your children to talk. Just sing and stop before the last word of the line.

By the way: children have their own taste. They won’t hear about some songs, no matter how nice, and they’ll love others. Listen to them, watch them, and go for the songs they like best, don’t force music on them.

The expert’s advice: English as a third language

Bilingual For Fun — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 14:13:33 +0000

After writing on English as a third language for bilingual children, we received comments and questions from parents who feel that once they are raising their child bilingual it would be a pity to miss English out, and wonder whether they can at least help their children familiarize with the language. We asked the opinion of PhD. Sabine Pirchio*, who does research in Developmental and Education Psychology at La Sapienza University (Rome) as well as being herself italian-french bilingual and mom of a bilingual baby.

Phd Sabine Pirchio says:

Is it advisable to introduce English as a third language in the life of a child? Introducing a language in the life of a child is always a very delicate matter. Whether the child will learn the language or not depends on several factors, including:

How often the child is exposed to the language
Who are the people the child can interact with in that language
How the language is delivered
Motivation
Consistency in the approach used

In fact we know very well that learning a language requires considerable efforts and use of mental resources, although it might seem a very natural and spontaneous process, particularly in the early years. Both adults and children go through this process only if they deem it useful or necessary. What children really care about is relating and communicating with people they like and love, and of course engaging with them in interesting and pleasant activities. If they need English in order to accomplish this they will learn it, if not, they won’t. So really it’s up to parents to make a decision and behave accordingly with consistency.

As a psychologist I perfectly agree with what stated in the previous post: English can wait, there’s no hurry! However this is not a hard rule, there are exceptions or way to work around it, here a couple of ideas:

The child could learn English at day nursery and/or kindergarten. Nowadays this is a widely available option in most countries, often even in state owned schools. At home parents can support and reinforce what the child learns at school, without actively teaching English the parents can help the child’s learning experience by acknowledging and praising him.
English is now part of our lives, wherever we live, to the point that we often forget that words like T-shirt and computer are foreign words for most of us. This is very similar to what happens with writing, which is everywhere around us even before children know how to write. One option then is to take a similar approach, children are encouraged to “read” and “write” well before they are actually able to do so, similarly they can be encouraged to play with English words.

A key point though is to have realistic expectations about efforts and results: if parents expect children to actually speak English they should be ready to invest a considerable amount of time, identify suitable methodologies and implement them consistently over time, they should also be aware that they are asking a considerable effort of their children and factor in that they might be frustrated if things don’t turn out as they wish.

On the other side a light, a playful approach would do no harm. Things like “gimme five”, counting “one, two, three”, singing “jingle bells” or watching English cartoons has no negative impact on the child’s psychological health, on the contrary it can even be positive if the whole experience is pleasant and loving. However in this case one can’t realistically expect the child to learn the language, not even to familiarize with it, unless these experiences were frequent and both consistent and diversified.

A last point. Parents might consider the early introduction on English because they would like the child to have a positive attitude towards the language before they are taught it at school. However if the school environment will be good and supportive there’s no reason why the child should offer resistance to learning the language, the association English=Good and fun will easily happen in due time. However if the school environment or the way English is taught at school will be negative or demotivating, this will unfortunately but surely overwrite any previous, positive, experience.

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*PhD. Sabine Pirchio does research in Developmental and Education Psychology at La Sapienza University (Rome- Italy). Her work focuses on language acquisition and use, particularly on second language acquisition is infancy; relationship between gestures and language in the development of normal, bilingual and special needs children; relationship between abstract abilities, bilingualism and cognitive development as well as integration of immigrant children in primary school. Sabine is French-Italian bilingual and is raising her child, 21 month old, bilingual.

My baby is bilingual, how can I help him learn English too?

L. — Mon, 25 May 2009 10:40:37 +0000

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)

Children who can speak two languages are better at learning a third language

L. — Mon, 25 May 2009 10:18:58 +0000

This interesting article based on research from Nothwestern University shows how bilingual children are better at learning a new foreign language than monolingual children. The implications are ery relevant for all multilingual and international families, who don’t need to worry about their kids learning English too early on (when English is not part ofb the family’s languages that is): sooner or later they will, so don’t worry about it!
Exposure to 2 languages carries far reaching benefits

The Importance of a Social Context (think Playgroup) for Bilingual Children

L. — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 09:21:09 +0000

Do parents or society shape children? A lot has been said on this, but I think most people would agree that it is a bit (or a lot) of both. Children take input from many sources and recognize the authority of different people (parents, teachers, older children, uncle, etc…), this way they build their own value system and choose their role models.

It is commonly accepted that monolingual children learn how to talk from many people: mum of course (that’s where MOTHERtongue comes from to start with…), but also teachers and children they see at school, TV (or rather videos), etc. Funny enough though, what is widely accepted for monolingual children is not really taken into consideration for bilingual children. But bilingual children learn to talk exactly in the same way, i.e. from multiple people and interactions, only they have a lot less opportunities to interact… If this is not factored in, it is very likely that the children will understand the minority language, but won’t speak it, as so many bilingual parents report. When this happens the children are missing out on a great opportunity (relatively speaking though, because let’s never underestimate passive bilingualism, which is already a big achievement!) and all too often the parents feels betrayed and frustrated, if not guilty of “not getting it right”. But the relevance of a social context for the development of a language can’t be overestimated, it is an essential component to motivate children and parents just have to come to terms with he limits of their own role, fundamental in shaping a child, but not sufficient.

Barbara Zurer in Raising a Bilingual Child (to be reviewed on this blog) rightly points out that parents must provide children with “opportunity” and “motivation” for the minority language. However a common mistake is to assume that if the parents is motivated, so will be the child. Unfortunately it is not so… The parents’ motivation is rooted into his/her experiences and projections. Much in the same way, a child’s motivation is rooted into his/her experiences, the language must have a purpose and a meaning according to his/her view of the world. Only in this way will motivation come from within, as opposed to doing something “to make mummy happy” (or daddy of course).That’s why it is important for the child to feel the urge of using the language in some contexts, with people and activities that are uniquely associated to the language.

Obviously there are many way to create and nurture a social context for the minority language, the extended family is a great resource in this direction (creating not only a social but also an emotional environment and bonds), friends can be of great help too, more difficult instead – at least in Italy- is to identify a child centered social context, what we mean by that is Playgroups, or other forms of children get-together.

7 Strategies to use when a bilingual child doesn’t want to speak a language

L. — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 10:06:45 +0000

It’s quite common for bilingual children to refuse to use one of the languages they are exposed to and parents get often very frustrated. However this is very normal, and there’s no reason to worry about it nor to be bothered.

To start with let’s clarify the difference between active bilingualism (i.e. talking two languages- and possibly reading and writing them too), and passive bilingualism (i.e. understanding a second language without speaking it). Passive bilingualism should not be underestimated, being able to understand a second language is already a great achievement, particularly because the second language can easily become active in few days when the right conditions arise, typically a holiday back home.

That said it still helps to try to understand why the child is behaving that way and how to help him/her. There could be many diverse reasons for refusing to speak a language:

The child could be making a pragmatic decision to speak the language s/he masters best and it’d be difficult to argue against such a sound line of reasoning…
The child could be making an emotional decision, deciding to speak or not a certain language could become a way to express feeling for a person, for instance s/he could choose to speak the language spoken by someone they feel very close to
Children don’t want to stand out, they want to be like the others. This could lead them to refuse a language that differentiates them
For the same reason, i.e. that they don’t want to stand out, children don’t feel comfortable with being shown off as bilingual. Asking them repeatedly to show their linguist skills off could have the opposite effect
It could be that a language has less social prestige that the other or that it is used to identify a social group, like immigrants for instance. Children are very sensitive to these nuances from early on
May be the second language became part of the life of the child only recently, for instance the family moved abroad. In this case what we see is not quite a refusal of the language but rather a “silent period”. During the silent period children are all busy learning and taking new input in, something quite similar to what a newborn baby does, spending the first year listening before s/he talks. This is a very normal and active learning phase, although it doesn’t show, children are really busy processing stuff!
May be people who don’t speak the second language are around, children are very sensitive to such things and don’t want to cut others out, and this is a very noble thing to do
Children might feel under pressure, if they feel they HAVE to speak the second language they might refuse this pressure all together

So what can parents do?

Keep talking in the minority language! Your child might refuse to speak the language for a variety of reasons, but this solution applies indistinctively. By insisting in talking the minority language you’ll allow your child to keep learning, even if at first it could just be in a passive way. As we mentioned, a passive bilingualism can easily turn into an active one, it just takes for the right conditions to trigger it. However when this happens the child will quickly start talking and even with complex expressions, because s/he already masters all the tools s/he needs to do so
If you can understand what is blocking your child you might already be half way through. If what inhibites him/her is the feeling that s/he doesn’t quite master the language, all it takes is to give him/her more opportunities to be exposed to the language. If it’s a relationship issue, you might want to address them in however way you believe appropriate. It the problem is identification with what is perceived as a more prestigious society, you might want to propose them good role models belonging to the relative culture. If opportunities to use the language are lacking, you might want to offer opportunities to socialize in that language (like attending a Playgroup) or may be bring him/her back home to visit grandparents
In any case avoid by all means to force the child or to put him/her under pressure. Bilingualism should develop naturally and each person will achieve it in their own way and at their pace, embarrassing the child or making him/her feel inadequate won’t help
Have fun. Associate the minority language to play or other activities the child loves. Play is an essential component of and means to learning for all children, particularly young ones
Lot’s of patience, empathy and resilience will go a long way. And in any case be confident that what you are doing is right, your child might not speak as and when you’d hope, but for sure s/he understands you and is bilingual. When the time will come s/he’ll be grateful for what you have done
Look for other bilingual families with whom you can share your experience, you’ll soon realise this is happens quite often and hopefully you’ll feel less frustrated and demotivated
Try to understad how you motivate your children, do they feel pressure to performe? Even too much praise can be perceived as pressure, see here for more on the impact of praise.

Lisa's recipe for trilingualism

L. — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 13:05:01 +0000

Lisa has three children, and she has succefully raised them trilingual. Her recipe is simple: each parents speaks his/her own language, the third language is learnt at school. However she does have a secret ingredient: the whole family follows the (OPOL) rule, always and without exceptions. That’s not easy to do, but it seems to pay off…

I am an American mother of three children, whose father is Italian, and we are living in French-speaking Switzerland.

I am raising my 3 kids in 3 languages and it works fine. My oldest (12) recently did a CILS test in Italian and received a 37/40! We are very proud! He goes to school in French and gets English from me and the TV!

None of the languages are as fluent as a monolingual child. You do notice a lack of vocabulary and a slight accent but they are fluent in all 3 languages.

We are proud of our children and happy with the choice that we made. We stay consistent with our children (I speak English, my husband speaks Italian, and they are schooled in French). We NEVER speak to them in another language. When other children are about we translate everything even though our children understand. We were told by our pediatrician to be ULTRA consistant. There have been times when my husband gets frustrated with them as their vocabulary is small in Italian but he trudges on and it has paid off!

I do admit that it is hard at the beginning but you must stop yourself from switching languages.
Also, if my kids asked me something in another language, I would just say…in English please, and they would repeat it in English. If they had trouble finding the right words then I would help them.

At one point my 2 oldest started speaking together in French (as they go to school in French) and I told them that when we were just us or between themselves, they must speak English together. I felt bad insisting on it but they didn’t bat an eyelash and have never looked back! They are thanking me now as they see other kids where the language is slipping
Geneva is an exceptional place. Everyone seems to have more than one language at home anyway! Switzerland has 3 main languages anyway (4 if you count Romansch) and on top of that Geneva is an international city. I only know a handful of couples where both parents are the same nationality!

I can thoroughly recommend Tracey’s book: Raising multi-lingual children.

Lisa

I'm raising my child bilingual, or am I?

L. — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 12:55:17 +0000

All bilingual families from time to time should try to find the time to stop and think, to check how they are doing and whether the method they are following is the right one. All families raising bilingual children have a technique, irrespective of whether it is an explicit one supported by rules, or an implicit one left to the family’s natural dynamics. Either way though it is often the case that we are not doing what we think we are doing… It is often the case that what appear to be occasional exceptions or inconsistencies create patterns we are not even aware of.

An example. Let’s take a fictional family where Amy, 1 and half year old, speaks Italian with mom and English with dad, i.e. the OPOL method. In theory… May be though analyzing the number of hours Amy speaks and listens to each language per day, we’d realize that in the morning dad is around for just about 30 minutes, then he has to rush to work, rightly. In the evening dad comes back and speaks English with Amy for about one hour, if none rings him for some important issues that is, then Amy goes to bed. During the weekend dad spends a lot more time with Amy, let’s say that on Saturday they speak English for about 3 hours, and the same on Sunday, unless Amy’s cousin doesn’t come to play and they have to speak Italian. End of the story, OPOL doesn’t mean 50% one language, 50% the other…
Amy hears English for about 8 to 10 hours a week, against more than 40 hours of Italian…

Another example. Mom speaks Franch with Pierre, and dad speaks italian. Mom works and pierre goes to the kindergarten, in italian, of course… Grandparents pick Pierre up at 4.0, then mom arrives at 5.30 and from then on she speaks French with him. Sometimes though they stop for dinner at granparents’, and they have to speak Italian there. During the weekend though it’s a full immersion, also because dad speaks French too. Pierre happens to listen a lot more French than Amy listens to English, yet Italian is always predominant.

Ok, so what? What could Amy’s and Pierre’s parents possibly do? Amy’ and Pierre’s parents, like all parents raising bilingual children, are already doing a lot. But may be they hadn’t realised themselves that their child was getting so much Italian each day. Once realised that, may be they could simply pay more attention, try to exploit every possible occasion to use the minority language, be firm on speaking that language even in presence of people who don’t understand it, find one hour per day to spend with Amy or Pierre when no interruption is allowed, try to see more often little friends who are also bilingual, go to a Playgroup…

Any family can find many small tricks, the important thing is to understand what one is really doing in practice, which is always a bit different from theory… So this is our tip. Mom and dad, when you’ll have the luxury of a nice chat without having to rush to the supermarket, clean the house or go to work, try to think of a typical day of your child, weekdays and weekend, and make an estimate of how many hours s/he gets in each language. And don’t forget naps! Two hours of native speaker baby sitter spent sleeping don’t count for much, unfortunately…

What are the cons of Bilingualism?

L. — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 14:20:50 +0000

The debate about the pro and cons of Bilingualism is often an ill informed one. It is quite common to think that Bilingualism can cause problems to children, but these are just prejudices. Let’s look at some of the most common myths about Bilingualism.

To be bilingual one should master both languages as a native speaker. There isn’t an official definition of bilingualism, but there is overall agreement that the above is not a good definition, as it is too restrictive and quite unrealistic. Even people who have been raised in two languages and are native speakers on both, normally master a detailed vocabulary for specific areas in either one of the languages, for instance words pertaining to things like DIY, or medicine, or cooking… Could one say that a person is not bilingual because s/he can’t translate rivet or jugular? In any case these debates are better left to the experts, let’s be content with saying that is bilingual who speaks more than one language or even who speaks only one but understands well another (which is called passive bilingualism, quite common among bilingual children)
Bilingual children are late talkers. This has not been proved by research, which instead seems to point otherwise, however it is true that some families did report a delay. Reality is that each child starts to talk, crawl, walk, etc whenever s/he is ready to do so and is easy to blame a natural delay on bilingualism. In any case a bilingual child will catch up easily and will be able to express himself clearly in both languages.
Bilingual children mix the two languages. This is a normal and temporary phase of the learning cycle. Once the child learns more words and acquires confidence s/he will be able to speak each language properly
Bilingual children are exposed to each language less than monolingual children. This could be true but has no impact whatsoever. Bilingual children will eventually master each language like their monolingual peers.
It is difficult and it requires a lot of effort. It can’t be denied that raising a child bilingual requires lot’s of dedication, patience and persistence in implementing the chosen methodology. However the upsides are well worth the effort!
One can raise a child bilingual only in his/her native tongue. That’s not true! Sure native speaker parents are in an ideal situation, but it is perfectly possible to raise a child bilingual also in one’s second language or even in a language one masters just a bit. The trick is to find the right method for one’s family.
Children can learn a second language watching TV or DVD. That’s not really true. Young children learn to talk by interacting with other people, TV and similar tools have little or no impact. Older children, say at school age, can have fun and learn also with TV and DVD, however they should always be used as support tools only, children of all ages learn primarily through interaction with people.
One can’t teach a child more than two languages. There is no proof that this is true, while many children who grew up speaking more than two languages seem to hint otherwise. It really all depends on the effort and dedication a family is willing to and can put into it.
It’s too late for my child. It’s never too late! It is certainly true that the earlier the better and ideally one would want to start as a baby is born. However reality is that one can start at any time and help a child becoming bilingual, it just takes motivation and persistence as well as some consistency in the approach adopted. Children’s learning pace is just amazing.

When to start with Bilingualism

L. — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 14:16:29 +0000

In short it’s never too early to start introducing a second language to a child, and it’s never too late to start… on this point there is unanimity among experts. That means that if you have a baby, or you are about to have one, the best thing to do would be to start straight away. The younger a child is the easier it is for him/her to learn another language, it’s all very natural and spontaneous. In fact young children don’t learn a language, they acquire it, as they also acquire the ability to walk, eat on their own, get dressed and draw. Young children don’t go to classes, they do things just for the pleasure of a reward, whether the reward is getting what they want, receiving approval or just the fun of doing things independently. Also starting early has many advantages: it makes it possible to learn the second language accent free, like a native speaker, and it makes it much easier to learn further languages later in life.

However that is not to say that one must start on say one or forget about it, by no means! Any moment is a good moment to start, and there might be many reasons for starting later, may be the family moved somewhere, new people become part of the family circle, or may it’s just that the parents decided that way, as easy as that. In any case one can add a second, or a third, language to a child’s life at any time, only the later it is the more dedication it will require.

It might also be interesting to note that, contrary to common belief, adults learn languages faster than children, because they have more developed analytical skills and memory. However most people have experienced at least once in their life the frustration of learning a new language (anybody who ever struggled with german will know what I am talking about…) In fact adults can learn faster, but need a lot of motivation and are easily frustrated if they don’t proceed as fast as they’d like to. Children instead don’t even know what frustration or mistakes are, they make mistakes and learn the whole time, trying again and again until they achieve what they wanted to do and then set themselves a new goal. This is no small difference!

Anyway raising a bilingual child requires a lot of effort, dedication and perseverance, but the outcome is well worth it…

A small tip, if you decide bilingualism is right for your family, before you jump into it spend some time to think about which methodology would be best for you. There is a method for every family, but no method can suit every family. Here you can find some ideas on how to get started.