Comments on: Ask an Expert: Help! My 3-Year-Old Doesn’t Want Me to Speak Spanish!

By: Loyda

Loyda — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 23:15:44 +0000

Hi Lilli,

I live in San Antonio and my oldest son (3 yrs old) is currently attending to that the PS. We like it a lot so far!!! Also, wanted to mention that we belong to a Spanish Playgroup here in SA that you may be interested in. Go to http://www.meetup.com and type Mis Amiguitos San Antonio. Best Luck!

By: Lilli

Lilli — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 03:19:54 +0000

Hi Veronica,
Barbara was the expert that responded to my question. I am the bilingual mother that posted the question. I live in San Antonio, TX and the specific school I am referring to is The Pinapple School. They have a preschool program that starts at 3 yrs old.
I wrote a blog on them here: http://voices.mysanantonio.com/mytottravels/2010/09/learning-playing-and-growing-i.html and you can also find them on Facebook. If you drop by tell them I sent you. Good luck!

By: Rylie

Rylie — Sun, 05 Dec 2010 03:32:15 +0000

I don’t think you should force her to learn. I don’t really know what you can do but definetly don’t force her. That will make her like it even less

By: Veronica

Veronica — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 19:31:24 +0000

Thank you so much to SpanglishBaby for posting this question, and of course an expert’s response. Barbara could have not described my situation any better… right down to the monolingual husband and the daughter’s age. I now have my answers. Now, Barbara, I have been looking for Spanish immersion programs. I never heard before of preschools that offer such opportunities. Where are you located? I am in the LA/Orange County area???

By: Lilli

Lilli — Thu, 02 Dec 2010 23:27:41 +0000

I was so excited to see this post today. I sincerely appreciate Barbara’s feedback as well as the encouragement of this community. Spanish is part of who I am and I want it to be part of who she is so I did start to freak out to hear my not-even-three year old daughter resisting the use of Spanish BUT all this said I have continued to tell her how much Spanish means to us and will now make an effort to praise her use of it… I just had not thought of that and I am sure it will make a difference to her. I submitted the question almost a month ago and since then I have also changed how I react when she responds in English to Spanish conversation… instead of just continuing to speak in Spanish and allowing her to continue to respond in English I now repeat her response in Spanish 99.9% of the time she actually says it in Spanish and I have now noticed that she is responding more in Spanish when she is spoken to in Spanish. I have very high hopes for the school which I have visited and will remind myself of what Beth O said…this is a 25 year project… stick with it! Muchas gracias.

By: Beth Butler

Beth Butler — Wed, 01 Dec 2010 22:10:21 +0000

Hola Lilli – Fear Not! You are in the right place with the right expert advising you and a community of others who will lend their experiences with just this type of challenge. Personally my neighbors have gone through this with their nietas refusing to speak their native Ecuadorian Spanish, and – after time – they now proudly flow between Spanish and English both with ease and with pride.

How did they do it? It took having our Anglo daughter share some of her Spanish learning with them after which they processed in their little minds, “Hmmmm…look at this brown hair, blue-eyed neighbor who is learning our native Spanish. Spanish is cool! I will speak both!” It did not happen over night, and it took many interactions of these children casually witnessing one another speaking each other’s language.

Maintain your calm, your pride of Spanish, and know that in due time, given all of the great efforts you and your husband are making she will possibly end up one day as a translator at the United Nations or something even grander (all to make you chuckle at this current frustration).

By: BethO

BethO — Wed, 01 Dec 2010 16:03:44 +0000

I can tell you for sure this sort of thing is an issue around our house as well. Living in the USA, English just seems to invade at every crack and crevice. I know the kids will be perfectly fluent in English and it’s the minority language we have to work to preserve. But I can also tell you with patience it does get better. It’s important not to get frustrated, stay positive and just keep encouraging the minority language in many different ways all the time & don’t give up. Spanglishbaby.com has lots of great ideas for activities that keep kids interested. In our family I have been trying lots of different activities and have been saying “español por favor” like a broken record for about three years. For a while people (yes including adults) rolled their eyes and really complained but I guess eventually they got tired of resisting, or maybe they have actually started to believe me how great it is going to be if the kids can keep their Spanish strong. It’s gotten to the point that whenever the kids notice I’m nearby they say “acuerdate tenemos que hablar en español” to each other and they help each other remember the right words to say. Sometimes when I start feeling like my progress is so slow I just try to remind myself that children are a 25-year project!