Welcome To the Wonderful World Of Bilingual Kids

November 26, 2006 - 10:22 AM by

With kid number three starting to talk, I’m a veteran of the humorous language confusion in a bilingual household. It offers hours of entertainment and amusement, as Liza is just now discovering with her first:

We never know what language will come out of his mouth. Earlier on, his primary language was English. As he grows older, however, more and more Hebrew creeps into his daily chitchat. He understands perfectly when addressed in English, but will often respond in a baffling combination of the two languages, at times using English sentence structure and Hebrew words. Eventually, his language issues will sort themselves out, and it is fascinating to watch our son develop his language skills. For the time being, however, it can sometimes be rather challenging as we translate his speeches into whatever language happens to be required by his audience. This was often the case while my parents were visiting, and as a result, we now find ourselves actively working on the issue of bilingualism, trying to make him realize that he speaks and understands two distinct languages, and starting to teach him the to distinguish between the two. We have introduced the concept of “English”, and when he says something in Hebrew, we will often ask him what the word would be in “English”. So far, it seems to be working. On the flip side, when we ask him in English to say something to someone else (“please”, “thank you”, and so on), if the other person is Israeli, he will carry out the request by translating and responding in Hebrew. Sometimes, when he says something in English and receives no response, he switches to Hebrew, so clearly, he seems to realize that there are two sets of words.

When our son was born, I started an internet forum for bilingual families in Israel. I was concerned about the language issues, and wanted to hear how other parents had approached the hurdles we were facing. I queried people in the forum, I queried friends who were in similar situations. I came across the words of supposed experts, who claimed that it was essential that each parent speak to the child only in his or her respective language, and I assumed that this would be the route we’d be taking as well. My husband’s English is quite good, and I liked the idea that we would both speak to our child in English, but felt that I would be asking a lot by requesting that my husband speak to our son in a language that was not naturally his own. I was pleasantly surprised, therefore, when he suggested that we both use English, believing that it would help to ensure that our son felt equally comfortable in both languages, that he would be totally bilingual. Occasionally, we are both guilty of lapsing into Hebrew when speaking to our son, but for the most part, we address him in English. We read to him primarily in English, teach him children’s songs in English, and encourage him to choose videos and television shows in English. He loves “Dora the Explorer”, watching videos of the American version that switches between English and Spanish as well as the more relevant Israeli version, which switches between Hebrew and English and shows him that it is natural to speak in both languages. Of course, it’s still early days yet, but so far, our “hard work” seems to be paying off. He may be an Israeli little boy, but his immersion into the English language can only work to his benefit, allowing him to connect with friends and family across the ocean and enabling him to be a citizen of the world.

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