Post by Christy C. on Oct 5, 2022 4:25:42 GMT 9
Hello! I’m Christy, and I’m the mother of a 16-month-old daughter in Louisiana. I am raising her to be bilingual in English and Spanish. I started learning Spanish seriously in high school and studied it in college and taught high school Spanish for several years until my daughter was born. I always knew I wanted to teach her Spanish, but I didn’t start seriously pursuing it until after she turned one. (I had never seen first language development up close and didn’t really know how to approach it.) I had sort of a lightbulb moment one day and when she was about thirteen months switched to speaking Spanish with her after a couple of weeks of pointing out lots of objects in English and Spanish. I was a bit afraid I was going to hurt her somehow making a fairly sudden switch, but she already is demonstrating good comprehension.
I’ve read one book on raising bilingual children, and I’m currently reading Bilingual Success Stories and just ordered Mr. Beck’s other book.
My biggest struggle right now is feeling very awkward speaking the language around my husband or extended family/friends. Right now I speak Spanish whenever I am not doing something with an English speaker. In other words, I speak in Spanish while my husband is at work or when he is at home but is off doing his own thing. I speak it in public if we aren’t speaking to anyone else (shopping, etc.). I don’t want to sacrifice our closeness as a family by speaking a language he doesn’t understand in front of him.
I do plan to homeschool, which should go a long way to supporting my bilingual aim. Currently I keep up a steady stream of chatter all day with my daughter. I still hold her a lot while I do things around the house. We also listen to lots of music and read books in Spanish. We occasionally have a Spanish-speaking friend with a baby over for play dates.
I’ve read one book on raising bilingual children, and I’m currently reading Bilingual Success Stories and just ordered Mr. Beck’s other book.
My biggest struggle right now is feeling very awkward speaking the language around my husband or extended family/friends. Right now I speak Spanish whenever I am not doing something with an English speaker. In other words, I speak in Spanish while my husband is at work or when he is at home but is off doing his own thing. I speak it in public if we aren’t speaking to anyone else (shopping, etc.). I don’t want to sacrifice our closeness as a family by speaking a language he doesn’t understand in front of him.
I do plan to homeschool, which should go a long way to supporting my bilingual aim. Currently I keep up a steady stream of chatter all day with my daughter. I still hold her a lot while I do things around the house. We also listen to lots of music and read books in Spanish. We occasionally have a Spanish-speaking friend with a baby over for play dates.
