Bilingual parents: What language do you speak to your child?
Answer:
Your friends are totally right. She may be a bit slow to start out in pre-school, but she'll be totally caught up and totally bilingual by the time kindergarten rolls around. Once she starts learning English, continue to speak to her only in your native tongue so she doesn't forget. Read to her in your native tongue also, so she learns proper grammar and spelling.
my ex's cousins live in Russia, and they tried speaking only Russian to their kids so when they started school they'd understand the other kids perfectly n wuld fit straight in. abt 2 weeks after moving out there they gave up 4 a reason i don't kno, anyway, their kids kno Russian and English very well and im pretty sure they did manage 2 pick it up from TV n play school. quite amusing when the 3 yr old gets confused n speaks in russian part of a sentence n english for the other!
If you have a husband or someone who's always around her, hav them always speak english to her. It is true that until school age, children who speak a different language at home are a little distant and less social, because they don't exactly understand it all. There are 2 girls at my church who's mother speaks Finnish while their father speaks english to them. They never say a word, even though the parents insist that they can speak fluent english.
My granddaughter has an Italian mom, which has taught her BOTH English & Italian. She is only 3yrs old, but can communicate with both sides of her family. We really gets a kick out of her Italian Accent.
My brother in law is from Mexico, so he and my sister speak Spanish in their home. Their 4 year old (that reminds me, today is his birthday!) speaks both English and Spanish. He's picked it up through family (we all speak English), TV, daycare, and preschool. Just make sure she has exposure to both and learns full vocabulary for both to ensure her the most success.
IF You're in America..Speak English !
Well I have a friend whose mom and spoke to her in Spanish (and still does) and she was able to pick up English through school and the world quite quickly, and she is so grateful to have the extra connection to her heritage and to be able to communicate with her relatives she wouldn't be able to in English. I think you should speak to her in your mother tounge and have her pick up English later. Young kids are the best when it comes to picking up new languages and as long as she is been introduced to English she should be fine.
I am fluent in a few languages and my parents just spoke whatever they felt...your daughter will learn english via television and preschool and she will not be behind...
well my daughter is bilangual now. i learned spanish really well and my first language is english. her father is a hispanic man and his family is involved with my daughter so she learned how to speak both english and spanish. i use both languages with her. shes still 3 so shes still learning and sometimes mixes both languages (spanglish) i think if ur going to only speak one lanuage to ur daughter, then do it, but if she will go to a school that she will need another language. start practicing with her. she will pick up some english from tv, but unless u help her she wont learn it well.
English. But our kids learn Arabic in school as the family speaks Arabic.
A kid can speak at a very early age as many languages as you want. Here is just a mere example: Father Estonian, mother-Russian. At the kindergarten the child speaks English-Italian.
She is just 3 1/2 years old. Actually, it is recommended to teach the child many languages. It helps develop brain, build up vocabulary, confidence love for different cultures...etc
Don't worry! Besides it is very important for the kid to keep in touch with his/her roots.
Speak both languages with your child. Its better if they hear English from you as well as the TV. Don't just rely on the TV or wait till she is in school! Then it will be harder!
She will be left out...at first. Until she learns English fully, sorry to say, but she will. My first language is English but my husband and his family are hispanic. His parents only know Spanish, my parents only know English. We speak to our 3 kids in both languages. My 6 year old is fully bi-lingual and my 2 year old has limited vocabulary, but he understands and speaks English and Spanish. We teach them English first because we are in the United States. But we also feel with the rising minority being hispanic, that it is important for them to know Spanish too. So we teach them both languages.
My brother in law & his wife taught their daughter only their native language until she started kindergarten and she picked up English really really fast. It's now a year later and you'd never guess she didn't always speak English. Remember, although you are speaking to your child in a language other than English doesn't completely prevent the child from being exposed to it through media and people outside your family.
well i speak spanish and my dougter is 3 and i speak to her in both languages she understand both is better that your child learns both languages so he wont knows were hes parents came from and so he wont be a menace to sociaty and it would benefit him or her when they grow up.
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