In preparation for our addition to the family, my husband and I have switched to speaking Spanish to each other nearly all the time. We even text in Spanish. This is a pretty big break from our pattern of communicating in English with each other and Spanish only with the other native speakers in our life.

I have always known that it’s difficult for me to use Spanish when I’m upset, angry, or otherwise emotionally out of sorts. However, I didn’t anticipate how hard it would be to have intimate daily conversation with my husband in my non-native language. No matter how well I can get across the details of the matter at hand, it’s the feeling that is sometimes missing.

When we have an argument, I hear myself repeating the same vocabulary over and over, but in a different tone of voice. I don’t feel that I have the breadth of word choice to really explain myself. When I’m trying to be funny or sarcastic, the result is not as funny to me as it would be in English. Worst of all, when I’m trying to comfort my hubby after a long day, I’m never 100% sure that I said the right thing.

What’s amazing to me is that no matter how long I’ve been speaking Spanish (over a decade now), I continue to find limits that I did not expect. I assume that everyone who learns a language after early childhood runs into a similar dilemma, but I still wonder what it feels like to be bilingual or multilingual from birth and feel a native level of comfort with more than one mode of communication.

In a way, this is what excites me about raising bilingual kids… but it also makes me feel disconnected from them, because I’ll never be able to use Spanish with the children in the same way I can use English with them.

Does your emotional connection to each of the languages you speak affect your ability to use it in varying circumstances?

{Image by Claire Burge}

Last week, I posted a question to our Facebook page asking parents who use the mL@H method to raise their children bilingual to share some of the difficulties they’ve encountered with it. I wanted to write a post around those answers based on some of my own difficulties with the method. But then, one of the parents asked what mL@H stands for and I figured I needed to step back a bit.

Inadvertently, I assumed everyone who’s raising bilingual children knows what acronyms like mL@H, OPOL (one parent/one language) and T&P (time and place) stand for. Maybe it’s because we throw them around here all the time or because I’m so used to them ever since we started this journey nearly four years ago. But the truth is that it’s always good to go back to the basics.

If you’re new here, you might find this information useful. If you’re not, then maybe you can share your experiences using the particular method you use to raise your kids bilingual.

Minority Language at Home (mL@H)

It’s no secret that when I embarked in the journey of raising bilingual kids, I had no idea that the “method” I planned to use had a name. Making sure my children spoke both Spanish and English was not something I decided to do once I became a mom. No. For my husband and I, there was no other option but to raise our kids bilingual because we need to ensure they grow up speaking Spanish. Since Spanish is our first language, it seemed completely logical to us that we’d be speaking Spanish at home and we’d let them learn English in school.

In essence, that’s the definition of the mL@H method. Parents speak the minority language — the one that the community at large doesn’t speak — at home while their kids learn the majority language (in our case English) elsewhere, usually in school. The interesting thing about this method is that although it says that we use the minority language at home, the reality is that we actually use it everywhere whenever we are with our kids. In other words, it’s really has nothing to do with the place where you use the minority language.

Another amusing observation, at least in my case, is that because my kids spent the first three years of their lives strictly at home — as opposed to at a daycare setting — Spanish was actually their majority language until they were introduced to English in preschool.

Read: 3 Methods to Raise Bilingual Children

Either way, the mL@H method has worked extremely well for my family… so far. At 6 years old, Vanessa is bilingual and is doing great in her non-bilingual school. She has no problems going from one language to the other, but it seems to me like she has a preference for Spanish. At 3 years old, Santiago is just starting his bilingual journey and I see him following his sister’s progress.

It’s important to point out that neither you nor your partner have to be native speakers of the minority language you’ll be using to raise your children bilingual. In other words, as long as you are both fluent in the minority language – which in this country is anything other than English – this method will work for you.

Now that I’ve explained what the mL@H method is, soon I’ll be sharing some of the disadvantages or difficulties I’ve encountered with it. Can you share some of yours?

The bell rings and Santiago runs to get the door shrieking with excitement. He’s been waiting all afternoon for friends of ours to come over for dinner so he can play with their 7-year-old son.

“Hi, Liam!” he says and hugs him as soon as I open the door.

“Hi, Santiago!” Liam responds and off they run to play with Vanessa who’s in the playroom in the basement.

A bit later, they all come up to the kitchen where I’m having a conversation with Liam’s mother. All of sudden, I find myself stopping mid-sentence when I hear Santiago speaking English.

“I can’t see,” Santiago says while Liam and Vanessa look at pictures on someone’s iPhone.

While this is obviously no big deal at all considering Santiago is 3 years old, it is a huge deal for me because I’ve never heard my boy say anything in English beyond “hi” and “bye”. Ok, maybe the obligatory “What’s your name?” and “How old are you?”, but that’s only because we practiced them at home before he entered preschool.

I continue observing my son as they move from the iPhone to playing with a cheap yo-yo I just got at the grocery store.

“It’s my turn,” my son protests for a chance to spin the yo-yo.

Although he’s not having full-fledged conversations in English like he has in Spanish, I’m in awe of what’s happening right in front of my very own eyes. Both my husband and I make comments throughout the night about all the new phrases he’s learned in English in preschool.

Having gone through the same process with his younger sister Vanessa, it’s not like I ever thought it wasn’t going to happen, but I’m still amazed. Mostly because he only goes to preschool three times a week, which means he only spends about 15 hours a week immersed in English. And yet, he’s well on his way to becoming bilingual.

Read: Raising Bilingual Kids with the mL@H Method Really Works!

I know this not only from interactions like the ones I just described, but also because he understands pretty much everything that is said to him in English. He might not be able to answer in complete sentences just yet, but he doesn’t miss a beat when someone talks to him in English.

I’m sharing this with you today because I’m incredibly proud of my Santiago, but also because I think it serves as proof that learning to speak English is impossible to avoid when you live in this country. In other words, all those parents who worry that using the mL@H method to raise their children bilingual will put them at a disadvantage in English need to remember that English is everywhere… it’s inescapable. The only language we truly have to worry about is Spanish, the minority one.

I love having a child who’s a perfect example of how well the Minority Language at Home method (or mL@H) really works. If you’ve been following SpanglishBaby for a while, you know that, at this point, my daughter Vanessa, who’s almost 6-years-old, is fully bilingual and biliterate. Although the days of me worrying that Vanessa wouldn’t get enough exposure to English because we’ve only spoken to her in Spanish since the day she was born are long gone, the funny thing is that I’ve barely ever heard her speak English… until this weekend.

I mean, I’ve obviously heard her read and say a few words and phrases in English here and there because, even though some people find it hard to believe, we really ONLY speak Spanish at home. Therefore, I’ve never really been around her as she goes about her life in English. But this weekend, we had a long-time friend come visit us from Miami with her 4 1/2-year-old son whom Vanessa met when he was a baby. Although they didn’t really know each other, they became inseparable little friends almost instantly.

While Vanessa’s little friend understood everything that was said to him in Spanish, he only spoke English and so Vanessa knew to switch languages instantly. Since they were staying with us, I got to see and hear Vanessa interact in English more than I ever had. It’s not like I had any doubts about her abilities, but I have to say I was pretty amazed by how truly fully bilingual my daughter is. I know that might sound kind of weird, but I’d never had an opportunity to hear communicate in English for such extended periods of time. I felt like I was eavesdropping, but for a good cause!

In any event, I only wanted to share this with you because I know that using the mL@H method can be kind of disconcerting — especially at the beginning. I know I’m not the only mom who worried about the amount of exposure to the majority language our children get at the very beginning, particularly if they’re mostly staying at home. In other words, for Vanessa’s first two years of life she really mostly heard Spanish pretty much all day long since I was home with her so her exposure to English was minimal. And yet, both her languages are now flawless and, while I’m obviously biased, she seems to speak both like a native.

Do you have any of your own stories that prove the mL@H method really works? Please share with us.

Image by :Raúl A.

Before Vanessa started preschool a couple of months after she turned two, I often wondered how she was going to survive for four hours surrounded solely by English. I worried that others would think she had no manners because even though she already understood the concept of “gracias” and “por favor,” she knew nothing about “thanks” and “please.” I explained the situation to her teachers and they reassured me everything would be fine. You see, up until then, her life had only revolved around Spanish.

To be honest, before she was born, we didn’t really give much thought to what method we’d use to raise our daughter bilingual. I mean, both my husband and I knew we were going to speak to her only in Spanish because she’d learn English in school. The same method had worked in the past with my husband’s son who is now a bilingual teenager. Truth be told, I didn’t even know there was a name for the method we were using…

Minority Language at Home (mL@H)

When I started doing research for SpanglishBaby, I found out it’s called the Minority Language at Home or mL@H. This method is self-explanatory, but it’s important to point out that neither you nor your partner have to be native speakers of the minority language you’ll be using exclusively at home. In other words, as long as you are both fluent in the minority language – which in this country is anything other than English – this method will work for you.

I have a bilingual (Spanish/English) friend who lives in the Northeast and has been using this method with her children aged 8 and 9 from the beginning. They are bilingual alright, but it has been a difficult road since they live in an area with virtually no Hispanic community. This means that the only Spanish her kids get is at home from her, her husband and the nanny. The result: even though her kids are bilingual, the truth is they speak English most of their waking hours. Her strategy has been to be as strict as possible about talking to them exclusively in Spanish. In fact, many times her kids will address her in English and she’ll respond by asking them to repeat it in Spanish.

One Parent – One Language (OPOL)

The most popular system in both Europe and Canada is the one in which one parent speaks one language and the other one speaks another. There are several combinations of this method. For example, each parent speaks their own native language which is a minority language and the majority language is learned outside the home. In this case, the child would grow up with three languages. Another option is that the father speaks the majority language and the mother the minority one. Based on absolutely no scientific evidence but on my own observations of my daughter’s bilingual playgroup, it seems as if the latter example is the most common one.

Another friend of mine who has been using OPOL – although not exclusively – since her son was born two years ago, explains some of the problems she’s encountered with this method. “Ideally, I’d never speak to him in English, but for some reason, when my husband is home, I feel a little weird, as if I am excluding him from our conversation.” So, she ends up speaking in English. Actually this is a very common worry and a subject of which we’ll write about in posts to come.

Time and Place (T&P)

This type of method is what’s most often used at schools with bilingual programs. For example, the minority language is used in the morning and the majority language in the afternoon. Or, like in the bilingual school I attended, some subjects – such as math or science – are in the minority language one school year and in the majority language the next. This strategy refers less to family life than the other two.

From what I gather, none of these methods seem to be fail-proof and although consistency is important, flexibility is even more so. Even if you start with one method, who’s to say that a few months down the road you realize another method might work better for your family or for your current situation?

What method do you use to raise your kids bilingual? What problems have you encountered with the method you’ve chosen?

Bilingual Baby Project–a study presented by researchers of the University of Washington and the University of Texas at San Antonio–concluded that the earlier we start exposing babies to a second language, the more flexible their bilingual brains will be and the more they can identify and separate the sounds of the different languages they are exposed to.

The key, researchers say, is that during their first year of life, babies should be exposed through rich interactions to the two languages at home so their brains can absorb all the sounds and retain them by the time this first window starts to close once they turn one year old.  In fact, “the researchers also show that the relative amount of each language — English and Spanish — babies were exposed to affected their vocabulary as toddlers.”

This study is significant because it is the first one to measure brain activity in the first year of age and relate it directly to language learning in babies exposed to both English and Spanish at home.

Knowing this, we give you three strategies parents raising bilingual babies can use as soon as their child is born {or even in the womb!}:

1.  Habla, habla, habla! Researchers also found that exposure to the language does matter. Meaning, the more a baby hears the sounds of a particular language, the larger his vocabulary in it will be.  Talk to your baby all the time in Spanish, or your second language, even if you think she has no idea what you are saying; she’s absorbing every little sound and it will be the building blocks to her own speech acquisition.  Reading and singing in Spanish will also enrich their bilingual environment and get them used to hearing books and songs in Spanish.

You can also organize playdates with other Spanish-speaking amigas with babies so that your kids listen to the chatter in Spanish while you’re all entertained.

2. Have a plan, be consistent and stick to it.  The personal strategies parents adopt to raise their child bilingually are fundamental to creating a rich and consistent environment to learn multiple languages. As a couple, decide early on which of the proven methods to raise a bilingual child you will use in your home: Minority Language at Home{ml@h}, One Parent, One Language {OPOL}, or Time and Place.  Once you decide, have a game plan and stick to it to create familiarity and consistency in the baby’s environment. For example, if the dad will be the Spanish speaker, he will always be the Spanish speaker, sin excusas.

3.  Commit to your decision. The study also showed that the parents’ desires to raise bilingual children is of utmost importance.  Committing to the bilingual journey requires a real passion and desire to follow through. Be sure of what your reasons are and let that passion filter through your daily actions to ensure a fun and immersive bilingual home environment for your baby.

The research is clearly on our side, we really have no excuse to not promote bilingualism in our kids as soon as they are born. Just think about it, they have  no idea of the gift you are giving them and of the incredible ways it will manifest as benefits in their lives, and, the best part is they can’t even complain or argue against it yet.

I do need to add that even though this Bilingual Baby Project finds that the first year of age is the best time to start learning a second language, this in no way means it’s our only window of opportunity.  It is the first one and will set a solid base for a flexible brain, but children until the age of seven are clearly well suited, neurolagically speaking, to easily become fluently bi and multilingual.

Share:  How  early did you start exposing your child to a second language?

Yes, that´s right. We´ve hit the dreaded speech development wall.  My girl, Camila, turned 3 years old in August.  She´s been making sounds and talking up a storm as soon as she discovered she could. She has never been the calladita type.  She´s loud, full of energy and always has something to say.  Problem is, only a handful of people actually understand what she is saying.

She is up to speed with the amount of words in her bilingual repertoire and with the ability to construct sentences.  She also is really savvy at using the correct tenses and picks up new words very, very quickly.  Where she has a problem is in the clarity and pronunciation of her words.

Now, take a wild guess how many times I´ve been asked if it is due to her being bilingual?  I´ve stopped counting, it´s just not worth it.  And, it´s not coming from strangers or people who don´t know better.  The question has been raised within the confines of our ML@H household.  Yes, both my husband and I have questioned the fact that both of us only speak Spanish to her. I question it, but immediately dismiss it because I know better. If it wasn´t for the last two years of keeping up SpanglishBaby, reading our experts amazing advice, reading your stories and comments on our Forum and Facebook, plus researching for our Must Read articles I probably would have had falsely credited her bilingualism to her delay.

The fact is that this type of speech delay has been common in my family and my husbands.  Also, she has no problem distinguishing between Spanish and English words and using them when appropriate. Plus, her word count is where it needs to be.  If she was bilingual or not she would still have a speech clarity delay. Punto.

We go in for her first formal evaluation in three weeks.  I will let you know how it goes and what I continue to learn from this experience.  Stay tuned for a post in the coming weeks with expert advice on how to handle the perceived notion of bilingualism as the cause of speech delay.

Now, please tell me, has your bilingual child gone through speech therapy? How was the experience and what should I prepare myself, and Camila, for?  Thank you!!

One of the biggest fears for those of us raising our bilingual children using the mL@H (minority language at home) method is that they won’t get enough exposure to the majority language, in this case English, and will be behind once they enter preschool or Kindergarten. It certainly was one of my very real worries and, from the Ask an Expert questions, comments, and emails we’ve gotten from you, it seems like it’s something that’s been on your mind too.

Unlike those of you who use the OPOL (one parent, one language) method through which children are exposed to both the majority and the minority language practically simultaneously, mL@H children – or at least mine – don’t really hear too much English at all, except when they go out in the community or they watch an occasional movies or TV show in the majority language, which truly happens very rarely in our household.

While the benefits of using the mL@H method are gigantic – my children’s vocabulary in Spanish is expansive, they never feel like it’s a chore to speak Spanish because they never really had another option, we don’t really do anything out of the ordinary to make sure they’re exposed to Spanish because this is simply the language we have always used at home – there are also some drawbacks to it.

I’ve written about how worried I was about my daughter’s lack of English when she entered a parent’s day out program at our local church when she was 2 years old. And then I’ve also written about how unfounded those fears were. Today, though, I want to share with you a quick video of my daughter and her big brother speaking English, as tangible proof that if you use the mL@H method, there’s nothing to worry about.

My 20-year-old bilingual stepson spent the holidays with us and he found it really amusing that Vanessa could speak English, so he kept on begging her to say something in their second language and, since she thinks the world of him, she joyfully obliged. While you watch the video, please keep in mind that no one in our family – including my mom, my siblings, and in-laws – nor our nanny, speaks English to either Vanessa or her baby brother Santiago. What you’ll hear is what she’s learned at  preschool where she goes three times a week, for a total of 15 hours, for the last two years.

Enjoy and let me know what you think!

Photo credit: Phil Scoville

It’s starting to happen. English is slowly creeping into our house. My almost four-year-old is consistently using more and more English. She never fully speaks solely in English to me, but whereas before she’d say an English word or two in a sentence, lately she’s been known to say full sentences. I know there’s nothing wrong with this and I was expecting this would start happening, but it seems like it’s happening a bit faster than I anticipated.

I can’t believe I was once worried that my daughter would be at a disadvantage if I only spoke Spanish to her. In the last year, I’ve stood by fascinated by the amount of English she’s learned on her own, in preschool and just playing with her friends because, as you probably remember, we use the mL@H method, so we don’t speak English at home – in theory, at least.

But now, I have a confession to make, something that I hadn’t really paid attention to before because, apparently, I’ve been doing it unconsciously. While it is 100 percent true that we only speak Spanish to our children (with the occasional exception by my husband who still thinks it’s kind of cute to exchange a few sentences in English with our daughter), I just recently realized that lately, my husband and I have been using a lot more English when we talk to each other. ¡Que horror!

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like we’ve never done that. I mean, even though we profess to use the mL@H method, we do some code-switching, (never when speaking to the kids, though). Yet, what I’ve been noticing lately is that we’ll just have full-fledged conversations in English. I might have not been worried about this when Vanessa was a toddler, but now that she’s speaking non-stop and is oh so aware of all conversations around her, I’ve noticed that sometimes she’ll say something in English in direct response (or as a commentary) to something her father’s saying to me (or vice versa) if it’s somehow related to her.

Ever since this started happening, I’ve been paying closer attention to the language my husband and I use and I’ve been amazed by how quickly we’ve been unconsciously changing to English as our preferred method of communication. I’m not really sure where this is coming from, except for the fact that I recently went back to work full-time and I’m surrounded by English all day long, whereas before I was home with my children and our world revolved around Spanish.

While I’m proud that we only speak to our children in Spanish, (it wouldn’t be natural for us to do it any other way), I am aware of how what’s happening in the grownup’s language usage in our household can affect not only their exposure to their minority language, but also their perceived need to speak it.

Now that we’re aware of what’s going on, my husband and I have promised each other we’ll work hard to change it. We’re supposed to remind each other to use Spanish when the kids are with us by uttering the word “español” if we notice we’re turning to English. (Let me tell you, it’s easier said than done. It takes a lot more effort than you’d think.) Plus, since Vanessa LOVES any opportunity to win, we’ve also turned it into a little game. Whenever she hears us speak English, she’s supposed to yell out: “¡inglés! ¡Perdiste!” She thinks this is super funny, until she’s the one that loses, of course!

Are any of you out there going through something similar? How are you dealing with it? Or, do you have any suggestions for what we should do?

A few days ago I went to the parent-teacher conference at my daughter’s preschool. I can’t believe she’s nearing the end of her first full year in preschool. Besides the fact that I was told a few things I already knew and expected—Vanessa knows what she wants and she’ll try everything until she succeeds—other things were a bit of a surprise for me.

I should start by saying that we use the mL@H method, so the only English she’s exposed to is while she’s in school three times a week. At first, I was a bit concerned she wouldn’t be able to communicate—and I know this is something lots of parents using the same method worry about all the time—but I should have given her more credit. Not only has she been able to make herself understood with her teachers, but also with her peers, as I was told she’s one of the classroom leaders. That was surprising!

I mean, I know it makes sense with the kind of personality she has, but since I haven’t really heard her have full conversations in English, I didn’t really expect her language skills to be strong enough to lead! I’m sharing this not only because I’m obviously proud, but also because I know a lot of parents using the mL@H worry about the lack of exposure their children get to English, or any other majority language, with this method. Although any parent knows that every single child is different, the reality is that in our case, being immersed in preschool a few days a week has been enough for my daughter to learn enough English to not only survive, but to thrive.

In the name of full disclosure; however, I was also told by Vanessa’s teacher that she doesn’t know/recognize all the letters of the alphabet in English (as she does in Spanish). Because her lead teacher knows some Spanish, she’s able to tell that my daughter does a lot of mixing.  I’d be lying if I didn’t worry about this even if it was only for a second. The thought did cross my mind that maybe I needed to help her by teaching her the alphabet in English, but her teacher reassured me there was no need. And, then I went back to knowing that everything would be alright and that we should stick to speaking to her in Spanish only.

First of all, she’s too young for any of this anyway. I know she still has plenty of time to learn it all. More importantly though, she is learning two languages so it is to be expected that some things will take her a bit longer to learn than her peers. I’m not worried…really. In fact, the only thing I am worried about is what will happen when she goes through the stage in which she’ll refuse to speak Spanish, which I know is almost inevitable.

On a lighter note, Vanessa’s teacher told me it has been a real treat not only for her, but for the rest of the children to have Vanessa in the classroom. She said because of Vanessa, the rest of the kiddies have been exposed to Spanish as she likes to count in her first language as well as recite the months of the year. I was also told that Vanessa is proud of who she is and that she loves the fact that she can speak two languages. Nothing could make me happier!

Do you worry about your children’s exposure to the majority language? Why? Why not? Are you doing something about it?