Stick to OPOL or reinforce partners language?

[thabang]

My baby is 1 and so far we have been trying to do OPOL. I speak the community language and am ay home with her 3 days per week, the other two days she goes to daycare. I speak English and we live in an English speaking country. My partner speaks Italian but we speak English as a family.

I know she will pick up English as she is always around it, and know Italian will not be as easy. I do not speak very good Italian, I am aiming to improve but am not at the level that we could speak Italian as a family. I am trying to encourage my partner to be 100% Italian with her, I can generally understand what hes saying with a bit of context. He is so used to English that sometimes he slips in and out, but its a work in progress.

My question would be, would it be worth me reinforcing Italian with what I do know (animals, colours, simple comands etc) or stick to English? Anyone been in a similar situation? If I am honest I would not be speaking to her all day in Italian, so it would mean maybe reading an Italian book a few times throughout the day, or using simple phrases (e.g. don't eat that/where's Teddy etc).

 

[aldredian]

@thabang Reinforce where you can. That can take all different forms like listening to Italian nursery rhymes.

Keep encouraging your partner to only speak Italian even when the whole family is together. He can speak to you in English but he should always switch back to Italian with baby.

Get him to read this: https://bilingualmonkeys.com/how-many-hours-per-week-is-your-child-exposed-to-the-minority-language/

Lots of great tips for the non primary caregiver (your partner) to pass on and increase exposure in the minority language.

 

[kaririopelle]

@thabang Minority Language at Home is really effective. Like, to the point that my kids speak their minority language better than the community one (for now, I’m sure it’ll change as they grow and make more friends).

If you’re not worried about your language, there’s not much risk in reinforcing the Italian!

 

[rayh]

@thabang I think it depends on your language goals. It sounds like your child might benefit from having you use more Italian at home. Simple commands, reading books in Italian, watching shows in Italian, and singing along with Italian songs and nursery rhymes will help.

I say that as someone in a similar situation. My child was not getting enough input in my spouse’s language, as I am the one who is able to spend more time with our child, so now our child mostly watches TV shows in my spouse’s language. If it’s a complicated storyline, we watch it in English first, then in the other language later. We talk about how the characters sound different depending on the language and which voice we prefer.

I often am the one reading to my child, so I read books in both languages. For birthdays and holidays, I make an effort to buy at least one book in each language for our child.

We sing children songs in both languages. Listen to music in both languages.

When my child learned how to count, we learned in both languages.

My child takes lessons in my spouse’s language, I am the one overseeing the lessons and homework. I ask the tutor for advice and clarification sometimes.

I got children workbooks (ones for native speakers) in my spouse’s language, and I am the one that goes through the books with my child so that helps us “study” together. If I do not know something, we look it up together, or ask my spouse. So far, this has worked well for us. My child is also aware that I have my own workbooks and study the language. I am currently working through them so I hope to be able to continue helping my child with their workbooks and continue reading stories in both languages.

So far, I think it has been good that my child and I are bonding in both languages, that my child can feel we are learning together, and we can enjoy our journey in becoming a bilingual household.

 

[thanksyoueel]

@thabang I'm an American living in Taiwan with my Taiwanese husband and even though his grammar is far from perfect in English, we do primarily English (the minority language) at home, not least of all because despite taking lessons my Chinese is terrible. My husband often will speak Chinese to her when it's just the two of them, but English is definitely the family language.

She's 15 months old and her expressive language skills are not impressive, but all of the words she says are English, although they're pretty much all missing the final consonant still (dog is dah, ball is bah, open, which she is a bit hit or miss about using vs just shrieking at the thing she wants open, is ope-eh). I probably wouldn't recognize Chinese words with her pronunciation, but my husband also doesn't recognize any of her babbling as Chinese words.

I don't know how well our approach is working, but I do know that most of my public school students who have one native English speaking parent do not speak fluent English, and I want my child to speak more fluent English than they do. My best bet on doing that is to make the minority language the default language at home as much as possible, and count of the community to teach her the community language.

 

[thabang]

@thanksyoueel Dog is DOH! in our house (And cat is also DOH but occasionally cah)

 

[relle25]

@thabang My personal rec is to really encourage your partner to switch to 100 percent Italian with your kid- it's very, very effective (my husband is the only one from whom my kids consistently hear his native language, and they are totally fluent) and for you to stick to OPOL, but you can use Italian reinforcements from other sources like local playgroups if there are any, Italian kids' songs and audio books, etc.

If you yourself aren't fluent or feel super comfortable in Italian I think it just makes the most sense to stick to your native language of English as there's also an emotional component in speaking to your child. There's nothing wrong with singing an Italian song with your kid or anything but from my own personal experiences as well as working in bilingual schools and observing many multilingual families, it's sufficient to just have one parent speaking the language with fun reinforcements- the key is, though, that that parent is consistent.

 

[thabang]

@relle25 Hes getting a lot better at that, and we can hopefully move towards him speaking Italian more as I am around. I understand plenty and it will help my understanding as well.

Totally agree with the emotional component of speaking with your child. I speak German pretty well but didn't concider speaking it to her as I want to be fully able to express myself with her, even while she doesn't understand everything. Also didn't want the extra labour in my mind of speaking a second language, a baby/toddler is exhausting enough .

No playgroups nearby but my partner does have plenty of Italian friends here, and when she starts watching TV I would try and use Italian TV, but the options are much larger in English.

 

[relle25]

@thabang Makes total sense! Even exposure to your partner's Italian friends can help, and if you get the chance to take some trips to Italy or Italian family members come and visit you guys, that helps immensely- whenever my kids spend time in my husband's home country their language skills get a major boost.

 

[thabang]

@relle25 Yes, his mum is coming for Christmas and we will hopefully eventually take her to Italy, but we live in Australia so its quite the trek!

 

[relle25]

@thabang I feel ya! We also live nowhere near an English speaking country either so the travel part in that respect can be tricky for sure. Fingers crossed you guys get to make it out there

 

[miriam40012]

@thabang We're in thr US, so English majority and my native. Husband is Japanese though. He wants to slip in and out, but has gotten really good at not. Just some self discipline.

Luckily, our family language has always been more Japanese (not a native, but good enough to do most things!) than English. If I were you, I'd just try to speak Italian the best I could. If you SO always does, your language will always develop.

 

[callitgrace]

@thabang Anecdotal, but I'd stick to English if your Italian isn't good. I grew up in Italy with an Italian dad and a Mexican mom, my dad's Spanish was perfect but he still only ever spoke Italian to me and my siblings as my parents strongly believed in only speaking their native language to their children (I personally believe that a foreign language is fine as long as you speak it really really well). My siblings and I speak perfect Spanish thanks to the fact that my mom never spoke Italian to us. However my cousins (also Mexican mom and Italian dad) actually had trouble with Italian as children (even though they grew up here too) because my aunt's pronunciation wasn't perfect so they had issues with their doubles and with distinguishing Bs and Vs. Your husband should be the one reading books in Italian and never straying from his native language (tv in Italian after screens are introduced is also good in my experience). I think if you do want to reinforce Italian, it should be through speaking Italian with your husband, it would actually benefit you too!