Anyone trying to teach two languages simultaneously?
Oct 24, 2014 21:12:16 GMT 9
Post by Judit on Oct 24, 2014 21:12:16 GMT 9
I’m sorry I’m so late posting this, but after all the family visits, we had some personal problems so here I am trying to catch up.
As I mentioned in my introduction, I’m trying to pass on to my little boy two languages at the same time (both are minority languages) and so far with great results. He’s two and a half this month and speaks Hungarian the way his peers do back in Hungary, using fairly long sentences now. He understands English and Italian but only answers with 2 or 3 word-phrases instead of long sentences. (except when I ask him “Guess how much I love you?” He knows the answer by heart: "Right up to (the) moon and back!”
) He also knows quite a few of his favourite English books by heart.
Mainly because of my job I already had tons of English books, games, DVDs, CDs, flashcards, etc (I try to go back to the UK once a year and of course there’s Amazon…) and so my plan was to read and sing to him in English and later on let him watch only English speaking TV, DVDs...and speak to him in Hungarian in between. I know it doesn’t sound much, but I do sing for about 3 hours a day at the nursery where I work so my repertoire is rather big and I read to him at feeding time (was breastfeeding at least 4 times a day up to 2 years).
He now wants to watch his favourite programmes only in English; the other day he was about to watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse on TV while I was preparing his lunch, when after about a minute he came up to me looking quite sad and told me in Hungarian that he didn’t like that Mickey that was on. I went into the room and realized that the language had changed back into Italian.
Anyway, the reason why he speaks mostly Hungarian even though we are living in Italy is simple. He is with me nearly all the time as I only work 9 hours a week (3 mornings) outside home. He started nursery when he was 18 months but did only 2 mornings/week. This year it’s 3 mornings and I’m free in the afternoons as well, so more time for language exposure. I’d like to keep this up for the next two years and maybe increase it to 4 nursery mornings when he’s 5 just to get him slowly used to school routine.
When my husband gets back I let them play for a while so they speak Italian but then I’m around and so hears me speak Hungarian again, maybe even with English TV in the background. We also keep in touch via Skype with lots of ml speaking relatives, including a very young cousin with whom they often sing songs together. I’m also very strict about talking to him only in our ml in public.
Now his attitude towards English is rather strange… As I mentioned earlier, ever since he was born I read and sang to him mainly in English. I tried to read him some Hungarian books before but he didn’t seem too interested, while he could sit and listen for even 30 minutes at a time 3 or 4 times a day with the English stories.
About 6 months ago he started bringing me Hungarian books to read and now our reading time is about 60%-40%. But…after having read the English books, he asks me to translate them into Hungarian or sometimes he does it alone. If I continue to speak to him in English and tell the story with other words, or reply to his questions in English, he gets angry and says mum, mum in a funny tone until I answer him in Hungarian.
Other times, if out of the blue I start talking to him in English while playing, he is relaxed about answering me back in English.
One of his favourite games is that he pretends the phone rings and it’s his English speaking Godmother, who we see about every fortnight. I need to pretend to speak to her in English, ask what they’re doing and so for example say “Ah hi Aunty Barbara. How is the baby? What are you doing? You’re out shopping? What are you going to buy today…?” etc and when I put the phone down, he re-tells me the whole conversation in Hungarian! A future interpreter?? He absolutely adores this game and so I’m trying to come up with lots of new ideas to add to my imaginary chat with Aunty Barbara (visiting the zoo, cooking dinner for the family, going to the dentist etc).
So this is our story so far, looking forward to the future hoping he’ll (we will) keep up the good work, especially now that he seems to pick up a lot of new words and phrases every day. ((Gosh, sorry, just realized how often I used the word “English”))
As I mentioned in my introduction, I’m trying to pass on to my little boy two languages at the same time (both are minority languages) and so far with great results. He’s two and a half this month and speaks Hungarian the way his peers do back in Hungary, using fairly long sentences now. He understands English and Italian but only answers with 2 or 3 word-phrases instead of long sentences. (except when I ask him “Guess how much I love you?” He knows the answer by heart: "Right up to (the) moon and back!”
) He also knows quite a few of his favourite English books by heart.Mainly because of my job I already had tons of English books, games, DVDs, CDs, flashcards, etc (I try to go back to the UK once a year and of course there’s Amazon…) and so my plan was to read and sing to him in English and later on let him watch only English speaking TV, DVDs...and speak to him in Hungarian in between. I know it doesn’t sound much, but I do sing for about 3 hours a day at the nursery where I work so my repertoire is rather big and I read to him at feeding time (was breastfeeding at least 4 times a day up to 2 years).
He now wants to watch his favourite programmes only in English; the other day he was about to watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse on TV while I was preparing his lunch, when after about a minute he came up to me looking quite sad and told me in Hungarian that he didn’t like that Mickey that was on. I went into the room and realized that the language had changed back into Italian.
Anyway, the reason why he speaks mostly Hungarian even though we are living in Italy is simple. He is with me nearly all the time as I only work 9 hours a week (3 mornings) outside home. He started nursery when he was 18 months but did only 2 mornings/week. This year it’s 3 mornings and I’m free in the afternoons as well, so more time for language exposure. I’d like to keep this up for the next two years and maybe increase it to 4 nursery mornings when he’s 5 just to get him slowly used to school routine.
When my husband gets back I let them play for a while so they speak Italian but then I’m around and so hears me speak Hungarian again, maybe even with English TV in the background. We also keep in touch via Skype with lots of ml speaking relatives, including a very young cousin with whom they often sing songs together. I’m also very strict about talking to him only in our ml in public.
Now his attitude towards English is rather strange… As I mentioned earlier, ever since he was born I read and sang to him mainly in English. I tried to read him some Hungarian books before but he didn’t seem too interested, while he could sit and listen for even 30 minutes at a time 3 or 4 times a day with the English stories.
About 6 months ago he started bringing me Hungarian books to read and now our reading time is about 60%-40%. But…after having read the English books, he asks me to translate them into Hungarian or sometimes he does it alone. If I continue to speak to him in English and tell the story with other words, or reply to his questions in English, he gets angry and says mum, mum in a funny tone until I answer him in Hungarian.
Other times, if out of the blue I start talking to him in English while playing, he is relaxed about answering me back in English.
One of his favourite games is that he pretends the phone rings and it’s his English speaking Godmother, who we see about every fortnight. I need to pretend to speak to her in English, ask what they’re doing and so for example say “Ah hi Aunty Barbara. How is the baby? What are you doing? You’re out shopping? What are you going to buy today…?” etc and when I put the phone down, he re-tells me the whole conversation in Hungarian! A future interpreter?? He absolutely adores this game and so I’m trying to come up with lots of new ideas to add to my imaginary chat with Aunty Barbara (visiting the zoo, cooking dinner for the family, going to the dentist etc).
So this is our story so far, looking forward to the future hoping he’ll (we will) keep up the good work, especially now that he seems to pick up a lot of new words and phrases every day. ((Gosh, sorry, just realized how often I used the word “English”))
Very positive podcast review of my book Bilingual Success Stories Around the World at Kletsheads 
