Raising Bilingual Kids

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Comment by Trisha Moore on August 5, 2011 at 2:27am

We have an almost 3 year old that we adopted from China last year.  I have been studying Mandarin for many years although I am more than a bit frustrated that my Mandarin isn't better than it is.  Despite that, she does know and speak quite a few Chinese words.  And I have quite a few children's shows in Chinese that we watch together, but I really don't yet know how much of it she understands.  And she is still learning English - she's only been exposed to English for less than a year now.  I don't think her English expressive language skills are quite yet up to the level that a child hearing English from birth would be, and neither is her Chinese.  Although I think her English is a bit better than her Chinese at this point, but there are some things that she seems to always prefer the Chinese word for and some things that she prefers English for. 

I would love for her to learn Spanish also, which I also know a little bit of but haven't had time to work on, since whatever free time I have now for languages gets used for improving my Chinese.   And I would like her English and Chinese to be a bit better before I start introducing Spanish to her.

Ana - I only had a chance to glance through your site, I will have to look more closely at it when I have the time.  I have managed to find quite a few places to buy Chinese learning material, books, games, etc.  But I haven't found as much yet for Spanish. 

A book that I've found to be very informative - and have no affiliation with is 'Raising a Bilingual Child' by Barbara Zurer Pearson.  Is seems the bottom line is that for a child to grow up with a language and become fluent in it is that they need to be exposed to the language at least 20% of the time, and that means to be talked to and interacted with in the language.  I don't think I am quite up to 20% yet with Chinese, but I am working on it. 

 

Well, I've gone on for long enough, I'm probably boring people but I love talking about languages!

Comment by Aysha Iqbal on October 30, 2010 at 7:44pm

Hello I just joined this group. I am bilingual in English and Tamil (a south Indian language) I also used to be relatively fluent in Malay (from Malaysia) and could understand a lot more Chinese than I can now..Perks of being a Singaporean I guess..
Anyway I recently wrote about this.
Kids Learning languages
Would love to hear your take on it. Feel free to take part in the discussion and leave a comment.

Comment by Show Me MaMa on May 22, 2010 at 6:14pm

Hello everyone, new the group. I am bilingual in English and Dutch. I know a little German and Spanish but not so fluent. My daughter speaks Both English and Dutch and I am teaching her spanish too. It is funny when i have a conversation I end up speaking so many languages that I get myself confused at times :) LOL.

Hope to chat with you all soon!
http://showmemama.blogspot.com

Comment by Marion Goodwin on May 22, 2010 at 6:11pm

Hi there,

I have two kids (a daughter who's almost 3 and a son who's almost 5). I'm German and my husband is American. I'm would love to raise my children bilingual, but since I'm their only daily German contact, it's been really hard. Any suggestions or ideas on how to make it easier?

Thanks!
Marion

Comment by Mother's Utopia Lactation Srvcs on May 22, 2010 at 5:59pm

Hi ladies!

For the Spanish speaking breastfeeding moms, I started a breastfeeding support group on twitter, every wednesday at 8pm PST. Here are the details Club de Lactancia en Twitter

See you there!

Saray
Mother's Utopia

Comment by Grace Silva on May 3, 2010 at 5:43pm

woo I'm definitely going to teach my baby spanish. I think its silly when people don't know the language of their nationality.

Comment by Amanda on April 5, 2010 at 11:25pm

Hey ladies. I am doing a series of posts on cold lunches for kids with an ethnic focus. I would love to have some guest bloggers on the topic! If you are interested message me or tweet me @marocmama . As well as being ethnic focused, the food should be whole foods - no processed foods! Would love it if any of you were interested in guest posting!

Comment by Amanda on March 30, 2010 at 11:28pm

Hi - We have two boys aged 3 and 6. I'm American and my husband is Moroccan. We are trying to raise them bi/tri lingually in Arabic/English/French - the first two being our priorities for now. Def. a challenge but worth it IMO

Comment by Kirsten Elizabeth Adhikari on March 30, 2010 at 6:05pm

Hey ladies! My name is Kirsten. I am caucasian...My husband is from Nepal, and we have an almost 14-month old son. In an effort to raise our son bilingually, my husband is trying to speak to him in mostly Nepali, while I speak to him in English. I know it's going to be difficult though, and I would love to learn some things in this group! :)

http://diapersanddandelions.blogspot.com

Comment by foodie mummy on February 9, 2010 at 6:06am

Hi, I am french living in Ireland and trying to raise bilingual children. Marie is nearly 7 and Noelie is 8 months old. Here is my blog http://foodiemummy.blogspot.com

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