Foreign languages | Imamother

Ruchel

Sun, Apr 29 2007, 4:30 pm

When do you start using foreign languages with your children to teach them the basics?

We talk to dd in French, but I can't wait to give her some basics in English. I feel that for a frum person it is so important. Dh wants to teach her his language, Italian. Dad is already speaking to her in Yiddish sometimes, and mom has started with bits of Hebrew.

She is 2 months old. When is the right time to get her used to these languages? I think it's probably too early, no?

By the way we don't need her to be bilingual at all, just basics.

Raisin

Sun, Apr 29 2007, 6:38 pm

if you speak in one language consistantly, (say english) dh speaks in another language consistantly (italian) and have your parents speak to her in french there is no reason why she shouldn't speak all 3 languages fluently. I have a student who speaks fluent hebrew (from father) fluent spanish (from mother) and fluent english (from school). I am not sure if you will be able to teach her 5 languages, but who knows, maybe it is possible!

I think you have to be consistant though - you can't speak french one day, english the next and yiddish on the 3rd. You only speak one language, dh speak another and so on.

montrealmommy

Mon, Mar 17 2008, 4:42 pm

we use french and english equally. when dc were younger (and learning to speak) they treated it like one language: more eau sil vous please. As they grew and learned language better they learned to separate it. We also double spoke a lot. If we read a book it would be "baby has a bottle", "le bebe a une bouteille", "bottle, bouteille". KA"H both kids (4and 2) are fully bilingual now. I do agree that consistance it important. We speak both at home, with each other and from day 1 with the kids.

Bonne Chance!

sarahnurit

Mon, Mar 17 2008, 4:57 pm

We speak to our kids in English, but I try to speak to them a litle bit in italian too-and many of our friends speak italian only.
My husband's family speaks russian, so that's anther language they hear pretty often, and they are gonna learn hebrew when they will start chinuch...
My older son started to speak a bit later, but he doesn't mix up the languages, and he usually speaks to people in their language...

bandcm

Mon, Mar 17 2008, 9:42 pm

Raisin is right - you nd to be consistent.
My kids (aged 4 and 2) are fully quadrilingual.
My husband speaks to them ONLY in Hebrew, I speak to them ONLY in Yiddish, the maids speak to them ONLY in Portuguese, and my siblings speak to them ONLY in English. Their videos are also in English only.

Seraph

Tue, Mar 18 2008, 8:19 am

I and my husband speak to uriel in english and plan on it for always.
Not perfectly, because I'll admit, I sometimes speak a little hebrish. And when I'm around israelis, I speak to him in hebrew bec I think its fair that they understand what I'm saying to him.
Uriel will pick up hebrew from frriends and things like that. All israeli kids learn it.
And iy'h I would love him to learn yiddish in cheider.

catonmylap

Tue, Mar 18 2008, 9:07 am

breslov wrote:

The hard part will be answering back in English when our kids start to speak to us in Hebrew or whether to force them to speak English with us altogether.

There are huge differences in kids of English speakers depending on how their parents spoke to them.

Seraph

Tue, Mar 18 2008, 11:03 am

catonmylap wrote:

breslov wrote:

Yea, I already see myself doing that, as I do it with my little sister. I start off in english, she answers in hebrew, and the conversation switches over to hebrew.
Most important to me is that uriel and all other future kids understand english because my mother in law and father don't speak hebrew, and I think they should be able to converse with their grandparents.
My husband grew up in israel in an english speaking home and speaks english like a native english speaker, most probably because his mother didnt understand when they spoke hebrew, so englkish was required.
Also, the other reason why understanding is much more important for me is because I'm not able to express myself as well in hebrew, so I dont want to ever have to struggle to figure out how to say stuff to my kids so they'll understand.

mumsy23

Tue, Mar 18 2008, 12:59 pm

As a speech therapist, I have to say that it is really NEVER to early to start exposing your child to other languages. Language learning starts in utero and just like you don't wait until you think the child can "understand" to speak in your first language, there is no need to wait to introduce more languages. They listen and absorb WAY before they look like they can understand. As long as your child is typically developing, learning several languages will not interfere with language learning at all. She may, as CM mentioned, speak later because some children who learn more than one language at one time take longer to 'process', but thats not a problem.

There are actually two ways children learn multiple languages. One is where they easily "switch" and they KNOW that there are two different languages and they use them separately, and the other is when they mix them up and only begin to separate later. Both are normal. And it just depends on the child which way they will learn.

Somebody mentioned "confusion" and this should not be a concern.
In fact, studies have shown that bilingual children do better in school and even have higher IQ's than their monoligual peers. Their brain has to "learn" more, more synapses (connections) are created and this creates a more, shall we say, 'developed' brain. So go for it!