สวัสดีครับ from Thailand!
Mar 5, 2017 13:57:56 GMT 9
Post by Rupert on Mar 5, 2017 13:57:56 GMT 9
Hi! I first read Adam's book before knowing about this website, and both have been such a joy to read. That was last week, and since then I feel like my family's lives have been transformed for the better. Thank you Adam. The short reason is the changes we made instantly have changed us viewing bilingualism as a frustrating game of constant catch up into something genuinely enjoyable (in our current situation at least!).
My wife is Thai and we met in London UK and have always lived together there. When we met I had never been to Thailand and didn't speak a word of Thai, so in the early days everything was in English, but I was keen to learn and had enough of the language to support my wife when our first child came. When we had our first child, who just turned 8 now, my wife and I had decided to each speak our own languages to him. In those days I think we used our mother tongue to talk to each other i.e. I spoke English to her and she replied in Thai. Either way, it was clear that we had desperately underestimated the challenge! My wife was wonderful in only speaking Thai to him and demanding a reply in Thai, no matter the circumstance, but over the last 3 years since starting school, English (majority language) has leapt ahead at the expense of Thai. My goal has always been clear: I want him and his sister to have a level high enough to study in the Thai higher education system, only in terms of the reading and writing skills that go along with it. My response to those who don't see the importance of Thai has always been that if he is bilingual and continues through an education system without too many hiccups then I won't worry about his future; conversely the competitiveness of places like London and prices too mean I'd be concerned without other options.
My wife has always shared this goal in theory but has found it hard in practice, particularly in creating the exposure. She isn't naturally talkative whereas I don't shut up! So the English exposure has always vastly dominated Thai. 3 years ago my Thai had improved so we started just using Thai to communicate to each other, but I would still speak English to my son. This helped in terms of showing him there was a real reason to learn it, but the English still vastly dominated. Because of this and because our aims were clearly not going to be met, we decided to move to Thailand for a year where he could go to a local school, and we're halfway through that journey (I'm a maths teacher, and therefore have been able to work here). We're staying with the in-laws and my son's cousin and aunt; we're in a separate little house but the daily language exposure has been excellent, especially from his cousin.
The first change we made during reading Adam's book was for me to change to speaking Thai only to my son (and 1 year old daughter) i.e. one language one environment. We had never considered this as an option, which only exposes our lack of background reading and unpreparedness. My son, all credit to him, has seen this instant switch as completely natural luckily. We now both have enough of the language to communicate what we want and so far he hasn't shown any frustrations. Because gaining proficiency in Thai is also a top priority for me and consumes much of my free time, linking this to my children, and easing the enormous pressure on my wife, has been a life changer. I now no longer worry about my one-year-old daughter's future language acquisition. (The second change was daily homework where we both keep a journal in the minority language - it is just wonderful to read about his day at school because he writes about the small things that get lost when asking about his day). (Actually there was a third, daily reading aloud to them in the minority language).
However, my son is 8 now and we spend a lot of time together now, but in a few years I need to prepare for change with more demands from the majority language school and general teenage hood. Despite our ability to communicate on a daily basis, when I honestly grade myself (eg using the CEFR en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages) then I would put myself and my son at in between lower and upper intermediate, fine for communicating and non-complex reading, writing, and listening, but miles away from where I want us both to be. We have a lot of work to do, but it is my top priority and I'm only glad I came across Adam's book and this website now while we can build on the exposure we have now.
It will be a huge challenge to continue speaking to him in Thai in public when we are back in London. I do feel like a fraud. Adam's book and hearing about everyone else's experiences will help tremendously. I'm only hoping that these changes, which have transformed both our exposure levels, will help. We both read every day in the minority language, and reading has always been a central part of the family, and I'm optimistic that reading will be a key part of both our journeys. We've begun the stocking up on books to ship back to the UK too!
I look forward to reading about everyone else's family language journeys!
Rupert
P.S. Sorry for the long post, but it's very cathartic!!
My wife is Thai and we met in London UK and have always lived together there. When we met I had never been to Thailand and didn't speak a word of Thai, so in the early days everything was in English, but I was keen to learn and had enough of the language to support my wife when our first child came. When we had our first child, who just turned 8 now, my wife and I had decided to each speak our own languages to him. In those days I think we used our mother tongue to talk to each other i.e. I spoke English to her and she replied in Thai. Either way, it was clear that we had desperately underestimated the challenge! My wife was wonderful in only speaking Thai to him and demanding a reply in Thai, no matter the circumstance, but over the last 3 years since starting school, English (majority language) has leapt ahead at the expense of Thai. My goal has always been clear: I want him and his sister to have a level high enough to study in the Thai higher education system, only in terms of the reading and writing skills that go along with it. My response to those who don't see the importance of Thai has always been that if he is bilingual and continues through an education system without too many hiccups then I won't worry about his future; conversely the competitiveness of places like London and prices too mean I'd be concerned without other options.
My wife has always shared this goal in theory but has found it hard in practice, particularly in creating the exposure. She isn't naturally talkative whereas I don't shut up! So the English exposure has always vastly dominated Thai. 3 years ago my Thai had improved so we started just using Thai to communicate to each other, but I would still speak English to my son. This helped in terms of showing him there was a real reason to learn it, but the English still vastly dominated. Because of this and because our aims were clearly not going to be met, we decided to move to Thailand for a year where he could go to a local school, and we're halfway through that journey (I'm a maths teacher, and therefore have been able to work here). We're staying with the in-laws and my son's cousin and aunt; we're in a separate little house but the daily language exposure has been excellent, especially from his cousin.
The first change we made during reading Adam's book was for me to change to speaking Thai only to my son (and 1 year old daughter) i.e. one language one environment. We had never considered this as an option, which only exposes our lack of background reading and unpreparedness. My son, all credit to him, has seen this instant switch as completely natural luckily. We now both have enough of the language to communicate what we want and so far he hasn't shown any frustrations. Because gaining proficiency in Thai is also a top priority for me and consumes much of my free time, linking this to my children, and easing the enormous pressure on my wife, has been a life changer. I now no longer worry about my one-year-old daughter's future language acquisition. (The second change was daily homework where we both keep a journal in the minority language - it is just wonderful to read about his day at school because he writes about the small things that get lost when asking about his day). (Actually there was a third, daily reading aloud to them in the minority language).
However, my son is 8 now and we spend a lot of time together now, but in a few years I need to prepare for change with more demands from the majority language school and general teenage hood. Despite our ability to communicate on a daily basis, when I honestly grade myself (eg using the CEFR en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages) then I would put myself and my son at in between lower and upper intermediate, fine for communicating and non-complex reading, writing, and listening, but miles away from where I want us both to be. We have a lot of work to do, but it is my top priority and I'm only glad I came across Adam's book and this website now while we can build on the exposure we have now.
It will be a huge challenge to continue speaking to him in Thai in public when we are back in London. I do feel like a fraud. Adam's book and hearing about everyone else's experiences will help tremendously. I'm only hoping that these changes, which have transformed both our exposure levels, will help. We both read every day in the minority language, and reading has always been a central part of the family, and I'm optimistic that reading will be a key part of both our journeys. We've begun the stocking up on books to ship back to the UK too!
I look forward to reading about everyone else's family language journeys!
Rupert
P.S. Sorry for the long post, but it's very cathartic!!
)
