Forums

Hi Rachel–

I am a non-native speaker of Spanish and am raising trilingual children.  I speak to the children in only Spanish, and my husband who grew up speaking German with his mother speaks to them in German.  It was a bit challenging for me at first, but now I am very comfortable with using only Spanish.  My husband and I took the kids to Peru this summer, and we all took Spanish classes.  I am now trying to speak to my husband in Spanish too.  I am a regular contributor to this blog and often write about raising kids in a non-native language.  Check out my posts, maybe they will help.  Here is what has worked for me.

–Be consistent and only speak Spanish to the kids.  (I am sure other methods would work too, but this has been my way of doing it.)

–Find a Spanish speaking playgroup.  (I used meetup.com, and have a great group of friends also on the bilingual journey.)

–Read to your children in Spanish.  It increases your vocabulary and theirs.

–Attend an Enrichment class in Spanish.  My kids just love their class.

–Continue to work on your own Spanish abilities.  (I will be writing a post on this next month.)

–Travel to Spanish speaking countries.

Raising children in my second language has been a challenge, but it has been so rewarding.  I am always amazed at how easily they can move between three languages.  I encourage you to go for it.  It is one of the best gifts that you can give your children.

Susan

Hi–

I did start speaking to them in Spanish from birth, and we live in California which is a very diverse state with lots of opportunities to speak Spanish.  I am originally from Pittsburgh on in the east, and Spanish speakers are rare.  I was amazed at how well received hearing me speak in Spanish was.  I was often asked by strangers what language I was speaking and how wonderful they thought it was.  

My boys are 2 and 4 and speak Spanish amongst themselves.  Although the four year old will scold his brother in German.  Either Papi is more strict or German sounds more demanding.

You should look for my posts on the website, not the forum.  Do a search for Susan Stephan.  I submit an article every six weeks.  I am registered in the forum and am not sure why it is coming up as guest.

Good luck on the bilingual journey.  By the way I lived in Barcelona too.  I worked there as a nanny when I was younger.  I loved it there.  My husband and I went back for our honeymoon.