Are 3 languages too many for my toddlers ?

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Permalink Reply by tc on March 21, 2009 at 11:41am

Hi Lucile, thanks for the invite. Just joined the group. Look forward to connecting with other multi-lingual families, as I find it a very fascinating subject.
All the best,
Tze Ching

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Permalink Reply by Stacey on March 21, 2009 at 5:08pm

Hi there. I think it is great that you are exposing your little one to all three languages.

My husband speaks fluent French and his native language, Ewe (from Togo, W. Africa). We've decided that he will speak French to our little guy and I, of course, will speak English. We know the chances of him ever speaking Ewe are slim to none. It is not a written language and no one around here speaks it. At least he will be bilingual...we hope.

Our friends would speak strictly Ewe and French and the kids learned English in school.

They are little sponges, give all you can to absorb!

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Permalink Reply by Lindsey on March 21, 2009 at 5:53pm

Hi! I am a student of education. Learning a language opens up neuropathways in the brain that cannot be matched by anything but math! I think that your children are off to a wonderful start in life, and are going to be wildly intelligent! Plus, please keep in mind that Americans rank much lower in I.Q. and intelligence than European countries, where the average amount of languages spoken is 3. When I lived in Europe, I often met people who knew 6 or 7 languages. Way to go!

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Permalink Reply by tc on March 22, 2009 at 12:10am

Hi Lindsey, this is interesting. I speak 3 languages fluently and understand some others. Does that mean my IQ is possibly quite high ?? hehe.... :-) x

Lindsey said:

Hi! I am a student of education. Learning a language opens up neuropathways in the brain that cannot be matched by anything but math! I think that your children are off to a wonderful start in life, and are going to be wildly intelligent! Plus, please keep in mind that Americans rank much lower in I.Q. and intelligence than European countries, where the average amount of languages spoken is 3. When I lived in Europe, I often met people who knew 6 or 7 languages. Way to go!

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Permalink Reply by Lindsey on March 22, 2009 at 8:47am

Lol! Thanks for responding! I would argue that your language skills are way advanced beyond mine! There is evidence that learning languages as a young child is great for your learning skills later in life, assuming that those learning skills are not exploited or dumbed-down by too much passive entertainment or bad teachers. I hope this answers your question and maybe brings up more questions! I can look up some reputable research sites about bi-lingual children in the school place when I have more time if you'd like. Do you plan on homeschool, private school, public, school, or charter school for your children?

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Permalink Reply by tc on March 22, 2009 at 3:15pm

Hey Lindsey,
would be great if you could forward to me anything you find of interest ! I'd just like to find out more, as I find the subject very interesting.
As for schooling, I know I should have thought about this already.... but I haven't. I think depends on where I will be at that time ... ie. if I am still in London by then, it would probably be private, but if for some reason I moved back to Sweden, we would go public...
However, I don't think I will be home-schooling because of various reasons. One being that I don't think I have time and enough knowledge to home-school, second being that I believe it is good for children to interact with other children and to learn out of their home environment .

Tze Ching


Lindsey said:

Lol! Thanks for responding! I would argue that your language skills are way advanced beyond mine! There is evidence that learning languages as a young child is great for your learning skills later in life, assuming that those learning skills are not exploited or dumbed-down by too much passive entertainment or bad teachers. I hope this answers your question and maybe brings up more questions! I can look up some reputable research sites about bi-lingual children in the school place when I have more time if you'd like. Do you plan on homeschool, private school, public, school, or charter school for your children?

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Permalink Reply by Lucile on March 25, 2009 at 5:44am

Hi all,

Tze Ching, are you sure you have joined Familingua? I can't see you in BigTent nor in Twittermoms.

All, please continue joining the group. We need an additional 5 persons to join Familingua on Twittermoms today in order for the group to continue on TM. Please join now. Some interesting discussion is already starting taking place.

Familingua: a new group for multilingual families:
http://www.twittermoms.com/group/familingua
https://www.bigtent.com/groups/familingua

Lucile

Tze Ching Yeung said:

Hi Lucile, thanks for the invite. Just joined the group. Look forward to connecting with other multi-lingual families, as I find it a very fascinating subject.
All the best,
Tze Ching

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Permalink Reply by tc on March 25, 2009 at 6:05am

Just joined on TM again. Not sure what happened b4... look forward to getting to know other multi-lingual mums. x

Lucile said:

Hi all,
Tze Ching, are you sure you have joined Familingua? I can't see you in BigTent nor in Twittermoms.
All, please continue joining the group. We need an additional 5 persons to join Familingua on Twittermoms today in order for the group to continue on TM. Please join now. Some interesting discussion is already starting taking place.

Familingua: a new group for multilingual families:
http://www.twittermoms.com/group/familingua
https://www.bigtent.com/groups/familingua

Lucile

Tze Ching Yeung said:

Hi Lucile, thanks for the invite. Just joined the group. Look forward to connecting with other multi-lingual families, as I find it a very fascinating subject.
All the best,
Tze Ching

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Permalink Reply by Ann Marie Curling on March 25, 2009 at 8:13am

I don't think you can teach babies/young children/children in general too many languages. There are plenty of people who are multi-lingual, and children growing up in Europe are routinely exposed to multiple languages. I say the more the merrier, you'll have highly educated kids and give them skills that they'll be thankful for throughout their lives. So I say you go girl!

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Permalink Reply by tc on March 25, 2009 at 8:27am

Hi Ann Marie, this is what I think too but I just wanted to make sure.
So far, I have only had positive replies... apart from a couple that suggested that speech development may get slowed down a bit and possibly even some future learning difficulties...

My little ones are now 15 months old, so will be interesting to see how there speech will develop as multi-lingual children ! Are they supposed to be starting to talk now/soon ?! But if they do prove to be "slow", how do I know it is because of their multi-lingual background that or because they are twins, as there has also been some research showing that twins are delayed in their speech development !

Ann Marie Curling said:

I don't think you can teach babies/young children/children in general too many languages. There are plenty of people who are multi-lingual, and children growing up in Europe are routinely exposed to multiple languages. I say the more the merrier, you'll have highly educated kids and give them skills that they'll be thankful for throughout their lives. So I say you go girl!

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Permalink Reply by Drea on March 25, 2009 at 12:16pm

I know the discussion is pretty much over but I just wanted to share a little bit of my own experience, in case you were worried for the same reasons I was. My oldest son has been exposed to 3 languages since birth. I speak to him in Mandarin, his first nanny spoke to him Malay (and now I just add to his vocab), and the language we speak at home is English. My son is now four and can speak all three languages. There was, however, a point in time that he was speaking all three at the same time (he was mixing up his words and his sentence structure appeared undeveloped) I thought I had ruined him and I was terribly worried that I had been too ambitious at the cost of his development.

I went to see language professionals, and turns out I was wrong. (yay!) Not only is it okay for children to learn multiple languages simultaneously, but as you've gathered for yourself it will be to their advantage. I also learned in my guilt fueled quest that If a child grasps a language before the age of six, that language will be stored in the same part of their brain as their native language. Sounds like i good thing to me. Just don't freak out if there is an appearance of seemingly awkward stage, I've been assured that it's only natural for children to learn at a time and method that's best for them, and sometimes that's their way of sorting it out. It's not so much a delay as much as it is a 'sorting' process.

In Singapore where there are four national languages, Over 95% of school aged children are bilingual. Second languages are required from ages 5-16 in the local school system (they are generally introduced at age 3). Singaporean teenagers also score exceptionally well in the international exam arena.

I think the more languages the better, and best to do it when language learning is a 'natural' part of development. Your children will thank you for it. Mine better :p

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Permalink Reply by tc on March 25, 2009 at 12:43pm

Hi Drea,
I hope this conversation never ends as I find it really quite interesting. I thank you for sharing your experience/insight and also, thanks for warning me of the "awkward" stage !
I am just in the process of writing a new post for my blog about this subject. Would you mind me using your experience as an exemple ?



Drea said:

I know the discussion is pretty much over but I just wanted to share a little bit of my own experience, in case you were worried for the same reasons I was. My oldest son has been exposed to 3 languages since birth. I speak to him in Mandarin, his first nanny spoke to him Malay (and now I just add to his vocab), and the language we speak at home is English. My son is now four and can speak all three languages. There was, however, a point in time that he was speaking all three at the same time (he was mixing up his words and his sentence structure appeared undeveloped) I thought I had ruined him and I was terribly worried that I had been too ambitious at the cost of his development.
I went to see language professionals, and turns out I was wrong. (yay!) Not only is it okay for children to learn multiple languages simultaneously, but as you've gathered for yourself it will be to their advantage. I also learned in my guilt fueled quest that If a child grasps a language before the age of six, that language will be stored in the same part of their brain as their native language. Sounds like i good thing to me. Just don't freak out if there is an appearance of seemingly awkward stage, I've been assured that it's only natural for children to learn at a time and method that's best for them, and sometimes that's their way of sorting it out. It's not so much a delay as much as it is a 'sorting' process.
In Singapore where there are four national languages, Over 95% of school aged children are bilingual. Second languages are required from ages 5-16 in the local school system (they are generally introduced at age 3). Singaporean teenagers also score exceptionally well in the international exam arena.

I think the more languages the better, and best to do it when language learning is a 'natural' part of development. Your children will thank you for it. Mine better :p

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