“My husband and I are expecting our first child in May 2010. My husband’s native language is Spanish, while mine is English. We mix the two languages all the time at home–often in the same sentence. Although I speak Spanish and am fairly fluent, I think I would prefer communicating with my child mostly in English. I am a little worried though that our child would not hear enough Spanish if only my husband speaks in Spanish. Also, if we mix the languages at home, I wonder if that will confuse our child.
I’ve browsed the site and seen references to a few different types of models. Where are the best resources for beginning to educate ourselves as to these models and other relevant information?
Thanks for your help!
Jana”
Dear Jana,
Congratulations on thinking ahead! This is definitely the time to be educating yourselves. Your best resources for it are right here: books like mine, Raising a Bilingual Child, to let you see a range of experiences, and a website like Spanglishbaby with timely advice and a way to hook yourself up with other parents with similar needs and interests.
With your language background, you have your choice of the major household strategies: You could do “one-parent-one-language.” You could continue to mix languages and both speak in both languages with your child. Or you could both speak only Spanish at home. How will you decide what’s best for *your* family?
First let’s set aside your worry that your language mixing will confuse your child. Mixing is probably the most widespread “system” in the world, and there is no evidence that it is confusing for children. Your child will likely not mix more than you do, or if so, only for a short time. So, a household with mixed languages is still in the running. On the other hand, you feel you’d rather speak mostly English with the child. So, you need to look for who else could help with the Spanish end of things if you don’t.
I think you need to look further than just you and your husband. In my book (pages 159-160), I present a questionnaire to help you evaluate *all* your language resources. What other speakers will there be in your child’s life? grandparents? friends and visitors? household help? Are any of them monolingual (in Spanish)? Are there any bilingual schools in your area? Do you anticipate being able to travel or make long visits in another country? and so on. Fill out the self-evaluation questionnaire and then see where you stand.
It will help your child choose to speak Spanish, if at least some of the time it’s the only choice. So, find some monolinguals. Even if you decide to join your husband in speaking Spanish with the child (my personal preference), you’ll still want to create a broader community for yourselves and your Spanish. Monolingual speakers will help you, too.
You could use the time now, even before the baby is born, to search out as many sources of Spanish as you can. Sounds like fun to me.
Feel free to contact me if you want to throw around some more alternatives ….
Best wishes,
Barbara
Barbara Zurer Pearson, Ph. D. – A bilingualism expert with over twenty years of research experience in the fields of bilingualism, linguistics, and communication disorders, Pearson is the author of the informative and extremely useful book Do you have a question for our experts? Remember no question is too big or too simple. So, to send us your question, please click here or leave a comment below. Thank you!
Jana,
I was feeling the same way before my son was born and had nearly the exact same language situation as you do. No matter how fluent I felt, I thought I could never manage to speak Spanish all day every day. To my surprise, it just happened. I learned new vocab by listening to my husband, reading plenty of bilingual books to my son, and increasing the amount of Spanish music and television in our house. Not only was this a valuable challenge that took my second-language skills above and beyond where I thought they would end up, but it has made me feel like I’m fully involved in the process of raising him bilingual.
I encourage you to use as much Spanish as you can when your baby arrives, and don’t worry about whether or not you’re saying things “correctly.” Choosing a method is like many other parenting choices: we think we’ll stick with it, but reality often evolves into something entirely different (and altogether better). Make your own method, and have confidence that no matter how you introduce Spanish, it will be a positive influence on your child.
.-= Chelsea Morales´s last blog ..Bilingual Strides =-.
Barbara and Chelsea,
Thank you both for the advice! Barbara, I purchased your book and it has been very educational and extremely helpful. I think we are now leaning toward both of us speaking Spanish as much as possible. But it’s good to know that mixing languages won’t confuse our baby.
Thanks again!
Best wishes,
Jana
I remember reading Barbara’s book in bits and pieces as I researched some things for my interactive Spanish/English Mommy & Me classes and then reading “The Bilingual Edge” also for even more current research and suggestions. I found the most comforting thing to be the underlying tone of “Good for you for wanting to raise bilingual children AND you will not cause confusion in your children’s brains by speaking more than one language.”
Go for it Jana – make it fun and natural in the process – organically your child’s language development will shine!
.-= Beth Butler´s last blog ..Terrific Tips on Teaching Tuesday from Boca Beth =-.
I’ve found it very helpful to have these resources as a sort of ammo in those moments we all have as parents when we wonder, “Am I doing this right?” Keep Barbara’s book and Spanglishbaby at your fingertips!
For us the decision to use 2 languages at home was largely because the entire family on each side only knows 1 of our languages (my husband and I are the only ones who can converse in both). Additionally most of them live far away. We are also fortunate to live in a place where there’s LOTS of the minority language outside home (almost unavoidable, really).
I would not worry about any confusion for the child. Little human brains are really made for this and it’s just that our own specific culture has not always taken advantage of it. Our experience was that our son INITIALLY only understood/spoke certain words in a certain language and other words in the other. To me it is exactly like a monolingual child understanding “nose” but not really getting “mouth” until a bit later.
At age 21 months it’s still too soon for me to say he’s equal in both languages but that is very definitely the direction he’s going. And I would like to add that the level of his development is 100% completely normal, even looking at EITHER language compared to other children with only that language. No, he is not ready to tell me all about his day. But ALL kids walk, talk, ride bikes and everything else on their own timetables within a RANGE of “normal”.
So whatever you choose just keep getting that support and information to feel confident, and THAT is the best thing for your baby!
It´s always amazing to read your comments. Thank you so much for being such an active member of this familia. We really appreciate every single comment on the posts and on the forum.
We look forward to connecting more with you…and ALL of you!
My hubby and I are a bilingual couple and even though we neither of us speaks Spanish, we want our baby to learn three languages so we have bought a Spanish for Kids program. However, your points are also applicable to anyone who is in a bilingual relationship… ergo I give you big ups for the great post.