What age is too old?

[seekertruth72]

My kids are 4 and 6, wife speaks only English, at home we speak English. I am bilingual Italian and English. Tried teaching the kids but they always got so frustrated even at a young age. I’m worn seeing if it’s too late. Also we live in the US and they get English everywhere all the time, which is what made it difficult to teach them.

 

[zjmcdon98]

@seekertruth72 My son is almost 3, my husband doesn't speak French so we speak English to each other, and we live in an English speaking country. I feel you! I try my best to always bring French into situations, so say we are driving and he goes "oh look, a truck", I'll say "oui, et en français on dit un camion". I'll always try to be very situational about the words I use so he gets it. I also end up doing consecutive translations a lot, so tell him something in French followed by English. Because otherwise he does not understand (blank stares as you say). It's not perfect, but I feel like he does get the gist of things , as long as it's something I repeat to him often (wash your hands, put on your shoes), and in that case I don't do consecutive. Suggest maybe you start there, identify things you say to them a lot and do those in Italian to get them used to it.

I have a lot of French kids books and we read those too, and we listen to French music, that helps, maybe also try those if you haven't. Don't despair, any language is good, and when he is older, I plan to get him into French language lessons so he has a structure around it. Perhaps look into that?

 

[seekertruth72]

@zjmcdon98 I like what you said of finding repetitive/daily actions to insert the language. Makes more sense to them probably than the random sentence I spew out here and there and then they forget.

 

[zjmcdon98]

@seekertruth72 Yes for sure! I also know that some people pick one activity where they only speak their language, instinctively I often end up speaking only French during breakfast as it's when I'm most alert and when we are just the 2 of us (husband works then and doesn't eat breakfast), but you could try to do it only at bath time or play time or whatever makes sense in your routine. That's also an option.

 

[learnandbloom]

@seekertruth72 I think it’s like how do you make it interesting to them. I can use modern chinese but my dad tried to introduce classical chinese to me when i was like 8 (think medieval way of english writing but chinese so different enough to be almost different language) so he sourced interesting and not serious stories… about ghosts or fairies written in those text and just read to me. So naturally a kid will want to know what happened next? Then I just went on to read it. Unknowingly learnt to read a text almost no one use day to day.

So on that same idea nowadays i did a similar thing. I sourced lots of books and tried not to duplicate with books my kid got at the nursery (in art style or authors) to keep my home collection interesting. Due to budget issue might not all be printed in chinese but i can only tell them the story in mandarin. Then that way they learnt the words.

Day to day i kinda let my kid choose. If they respond to me in english i am ok. As long as you got your message across. But if they can tell part of the story or sing in mandarin i am happy with that and consider it a win.

 

[w4g]

@seekertruth72 Have you tried just speaking Italian exclusively to them rather than 'teaching' them?

 

[seekertruth72]

@w4g Sometimes. It’s hard tho because I need to get a message across and I get blank stares. Do you tell them in Italian and translate in English so they get the message, or just say it in Italian and point till they get it?

 

[robtarc]

@seekertruth72 Speaking to them exclusively in Italian would force them to get it eventually but it requires patience from you and them in the beginning. A 4 year old for example would pick up Italian very fast if they had to suddenly go to Italian kindergarten.

I feel for your kids though because it’s very confusing for them that one parent does a 180 on them with language out of nowhere. Is Italian your mothertongue? Any reason you haven’t used the language with them until now? Why do you suddenly want to introduce it?

 

[seekertruth72]

@robtarc Italian is my mother language, I haven’t used it so far because they’ve always gotten so angry about it even early on (my kids both like to get right to the point), and now my 6 year old is more “teachable” and open minded, so seems like it’s a good time to start without so much push back. Hopefully this also promotes my 4yo to learn.

Overall I wanted them to learn a second language to 1) speak to their grandparents (who don’t speak English) and 2) I always felt it really helped me academically, more mental flexibility and open mindedness to other cultures.

 

[robtarc]

@seekertruth72 I think “teaching them” will be difficult, if you are speaking to then in English 90% of the time and the remaining 10% becomes an (often frustrating) teachable moment.

Most of us here believe in One Parent, One Language - meaning you do not actively teach but rather, to your kid, you do not speak any English at all. There is no reason for them to start to communicate to you in Italian when they are used to speaking to you in English and they know it works well.

I would probably try to ease into it. Use simple words with sign language, when you hand them something say the word for it in Italian. Use Italian for every single repetitive task “put on your shoes”, “put your plate in the sink” etc with a show-and-tell, no English. Use English as little as possible to translate yourself, slowly ease into using Italian exclusively.

Switch out their TV and book materials for Italian ones. Make sure they are always hearing Italian one way or the other. Face time those grandparents often.

It can definitely be done but speaking English to them by default with an hour study session of Italian every week will get you nowhere I’m afraid. They are not too old to pick it up quickly. I have nieces and nephews that moved at this age and they were fluent after a couple of months with a LOT of exposure.

 

[barsomo]

@seekertruth72 The best strategy is to speak it them exclusively. Of course, doing the switch later on will be met with more resistance but it can still be done. The onus is on yourself though, you need to commit to only speaking Italian to them and not get discouraged even when it seems like it’s not working. Maybe you’ll have to transition slowly. There are many reasons why people don’t exclusively speak their native language to their kids, such as:

-Their partner doesn’t speak/understand that language
-They feel discouraged when they perceive that they’re getting resistance
-They are in an environment where multilingualism might not be well understood or encouraged
-They don’t have enough resources or encouragement to help them keep doing what they are doing

All of those reasons are completely understandable! But I would say none of them should be a reason not to speak your mother tongue to your kids.

Me and my husband are raising our daughters doing OPOL + 2 community languages and so far our daughters know and are learning all the 4 languages well. We have a podcast where we talk about our experience raising multilingual kids and our number 1 reason for starting the podcast was to encourage other parents on their journey. Check us out: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-language-experiment/id1695186161

Good luck

 

[seekertruth72]

@barsomo I’ll check podcast out thanks

 

[mcv222]

@seekertruth72 I would find a teacher and send them to have lessons. I always spoke my language to my kids since they are born same did their dad and community language is a 3rd language. So they are trilingual but later when we wanted them to be introduced to more languages we just took a teacher because just suddenly speaking a language they don’t know to them when are 4 or 6 would he more difficult we thought. Also we didn’t want to take time away from their other 3 languages so I stick to mine, dad to his and they go to lessons for the additional language and have homework for 5-10 minutes per day. Since it’s your language you can also speak it more and translate everything you say but if i were you I’d also take a teacher to help.

 

[aldredian]

@seekertruth72 These articles might help.

https://chalkacademy.com/speak-minority-language-child/

https://chalkacademy.com/encourage-minority-language-trilingual-family/

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

I think with the 6yo, see if you could find a private tutor who knows how to work with children and do almost a "kick start" to learn the language and then you can start speaking only Italian again.

You could even make it a competition perhaps if your partner's up for it.

"Let's see who can learn Italian faster? You or mummy?"

 

[gellmannamnesia]

@seekertruth72 Good luck! If your kids are getting screen time I would change all their shows to Italian. If they are already reading or starting to read get some children’s books they already know and practice reading in Italian. I would also get them a little children’s dictionary in Italian. Make it fun, like a game. Can you sell it to them as a preparation for a big holiday to Italy where people don’t understand English and they need to skewed Italian to order ice cream and play with children. Best case scenario your partner is willing to learn together with them.

 

[floydk]

@seekertruth72 We live in the Netherlands so the language spoken everywhere is Dutch. For this reason we’re going to speak English at home and Dutch outside or when the Dutch family is over. They’re eventually going to learn English in school but before that I want them to be able to communicate with my side of the family. My child is still brand new, almost three months old, so this is my plan. But I was raised multilingual (I’m not introducing the third language at all because of the similarities with Dutch) and my one parent spoke English and my other parent Afrikaans. But it was also common to speak both languages outside of home.

 

[seekertruth72]

@floydk Of the other Italian families that live nearby, the only ones that successfully have bilingual kids are the ones with both parents speaking the native tongue, and then kids getting English at school. The rest of the families, myself included, with parents speaking English cause the spouses didn’t have the other language in common, have kids that only speak English for the same reasons I couldn’t teach mine. But I read on this chat room many of you having success even with three languages. So I figured I’m doing something wrong.

 

[snjeri]

@seekertruth72 I'm Hungarian, living in Denmark, with a Danish boyfriend and Danish mil. My oldest didn't speak more than 5 words until 2 when she already started daycare. She's 3 now. I also have a 17 months old who already has a vocab of around a 100 words. I haven't said a single Danish sentence to them directly since they were born, I translate all Danish books on the fly (as in, I check what's written and only say it out loud in Hungarian) and we also have a lot of Hungarian books. We either speak Danish or Hungarian in front of them with dad, although we try to remember to stick to Danish more nowadays. Because dad basically learns Hungarian with them by hearing, he can say some short sentences and mostly get what I tell them, so I don't have to translate. Both kids understand almost 100% what I say (to the point of laughing at jokes in case of older one), my son has mostly Hungarian words. My daughter only speaks Danish, although sometimes she will insert some Hungarian word into a sentence or repeat something in Hungarian when I ask her to. She is resistant a bit, probably because she was a late talker. I usually reaffirm most things she says in Hungarian before I reply to her and she's fine with that. So I'm focusing on passive knowledge now and wait it out.

 

[floydk]

@seekertruth72 That does make tricky. If I think about my upbringing, my dad could understand Afrikaans but not really speak it properly. So I could respond to him in Afrikaans if he would say/ask something in English. And my mom could just speak English so there wasn’t a pressure to speak English (school was in Afrikaans) until I wanted to play with my cousins who could only speak English. So I needed a motivation/push. So maybe your kids are the same. There was a lot of great suggestions with the books/movies or using frequently used activities. Another options is to get a tutor (maybe online?). But I would try to lean into interests, so if your child loves movies to find children movies that’s in Italian and that you can help translate. Or maybe start with putting on the Italian version of a movie they’re already familiar with? Because then they’re familiar with what is said but now it’s being said in Italian? Would your partner be open to also learning a bit of Italian? Then it could be a daily activity for the whole family.

 

[jamesmason10]

@floydk This is exactly it. My daughter has never really spoken English to me, even though I've always spoken to her in English, until last year we went to visit my family and she wanted to play with her cousins.