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Infants, Toddlers, & Preschoolers
Talking to infant in 3 languages?
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Anonymous
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Our kids are (sort of) tri-lingual.
I'm Chinese, speak mostly Chinese to my kids (4 and 2.5), DH is Mexican and speaks only Spanish to them, and they hear English between the two of us and at preschool during the day. They are absolutely no problems understanding all three languages and have been known to help translate across languages for us. The only problem is that they speak mostly in English, not in the other languages. HTH! They are NOT confused 
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Anonymous
| To 23:29 poster - do you speak exclusively to your DC's in Chinese? Or do you mix Chinese and English? |
Anonymous
| Just to address the comments about delayed speach, my 2 year old is bilingual. We had been told that it might delay speach, but it didn't. He is actually verbally advanced and was saying 4-5 word sentences well before he turned 2. |
Anonymous
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you may want to find these links useful for your question:
http://www.multilingualchildren.org/index.html http://www.bilingualbabies.org http://www.opol4us.com/ http://www.biculturalfamily.org/research02062.html |
Anonymous
| Yes, PP, but statistically, bilingual children speak later, so the OP shouldn't be concerned if their child doesn't speak at the same time as monolingual peers. |
Anonymous
| I didn't mean the OP should be concerned. My only point was that, in deciding whether to continue teaching multiple languges (which is what I thought the question was), she shouldn't take it as a given that there will be delayed speach and should factor it accordingly. |
Anonymous
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I am the 23:29 PP - who speaks in Chinese to kids.
For my older DD, I spoke to her 95% in Chinese from the time she was about 1 month old until she was about 2.5 years old. At that point, I found that I had some difficulty explaining more complicated concepts to her -- as I'm ABC (American Born Chinese) and English is my "natural" language. So I started to switch over to English at times -- but of course, that got me "comfortable" speaking English -- I'd say that now, I speak 50/50 in Chinese English with them, and they are fine. When they were younger, they understood it as "Mommy says Nuo Nai, Daddy says, Leche, teacher at school says milk." At about age three, they started understanding the that one is Chinese, one is Spanish, and one is English. But it's perfectly clear in their heads! - Fran |
Meconbear
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| I second everyone else's support. My DS hears Vietnamese and English and is NOT confused. I've grew up billingual, now speak 4 languages and think that growing up billingual gave me a leg up with the other languages. We've hired a spanish speaking nanny and I encourage her to speak to him in Spanish as well. |
Anonymous
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Three languages is not a problem at all. Most kids in the world grow up with at least 2 languages! They'll keep the languages if they're useful in everyday life. Each language will not have the same function in life, so they might be able to explain math well in one language but not in another depending on the language used in school. Similarly later, they can write professional memos only in some languages. (I'm talking from experience)
It's particularly helpful to have the kids interact with other kids who speak those languages too. I grew up bilingual, with a lot of multi-lingual friends. I discovered this recently: http://www.biculturalfamily.org/index.html There's a lot of advice online. |
Anonymous
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Hello,
I want to echo the many posters who view 3 languages as totally doable! Though we're not doing it ourselves (we don't have a 3rd language), most of my family is trilingual and some of their children have exposure to 4 languages. Also want to share a book recommendation: The Bilingual Edge by King and Mackey. It only arrived from Amazon today, so my thumbs-up is based on a quick skim. It contains anecdotes about many bi and multilingual families that you'll find encouraging, and activity suggestions for introducing and supporting a 2nd or 3rd language. |