Teaching multiple languages you don't know

[TmS]

Hi All,

We've had a little breakthrough here and I wanted to share it with you all.

Since birth Sabian has been constantly exposed to as many languages as I could possibly get my hands on. As a young baby we didn't choose between languages. Our aim was to keep his ear open to all the sounds of all the languages. I'm sure we missed a few but we did our best to keep the pathways open.

From around six months we started to concentrate on three languages - German, Japanese, Chinese. We also kept up, with less focus, Spanish, French and Italian then on odd occasions any other language we could expose him to. We never spoke these languages and never really made an attempt to learn with him. We picked up words obviously particularly from the songs but that was about all. We were frightened of influencing his accents.

When he started being able to talk I started a very basic (and really quite slackly didn't stick to it very well or very often) of each of the languages. The reason I didn't persist with these much (besides having a million other things to do with him) was that he kept translating. I knew he could read the words - he got too excited about some of them to not be knowing what picture was going to follow or whatever and a few times I thought I heard him read things off the IAHP picture dictionaries. I knew he understood the languages because he was following instructions in them for his Little Leaps games. I just couldn't get him to read them for me.

We recently realised that when we weren't in the room he would read the word in its written language and when we were he was translating. I had thought the he knew "erdberren" meant "strawberry" but couldn't say it.

I was wrong - he knew I didn't understand German!!! 

So we changed tacks and decided that despite our complete lack of talent for languages and our atrocious accents that we would start trying to learn alongside him.

That was a few weeks ago in that time we have done no more than learn a few words in each language and use them in front of him to each other.

All of a sudden my boy is running around talking in who knows what language or combination of which languages!!!!

It's amazing sentences in German with the correct syntax!!!! The german is easiest for us to pick up on but we've noticed the Spanish and Chinese and Japanese as well.

Once things settle after xmas I am going to use the Doman "teach your baby to write" as a method of teaching the foreign languages to all three of us. I will let you know how it goes.

I hope this helps other people who have been worried about teaching languages you don't know - it's easier just to remember that your kid is smarter than you and no matter how badly you teach it something will manage to sink in!

[reei]

thanks for that..
i'll keep up with the japanese and spanish then..

[aangeles]

That's so great, TmS! Thanks for sharing and inspiring me to keep up Ella's exposure to different languages as well. Aside from English, we are teaching her Chinese, Filipino, French, Spanish, and Japanese. Aside from Chinese and Filipino, the rest of the languages are non-native for us too. Can you share with us the list of resources and educational materials that you use to teach him all these languages? And how do you schedule his language exposure - one language per day or different languages at different times of the day?

[mom2bee]

This is highly encouraging. How did you expose your child to so many languages?

I want to raise my children in Spanish, regardless of what the Community language is (unless its Spanish, then I will make sure that they learn English) but I also want to expose them to several languages, such as Mandarin, Cantonese, French, Japanese, Esperanto, Italian, Arabic, Russian, German, Tamil, Serbian, etc...

I want to have a good mix of European, Asian and African languages, I'll probably try for a health balance of 3 from each family.

[TmS]

I used a whole heap of resources - as young baby mainly community radio and SBS tv on in the background. CDs with nursery rhymes in different languages etc.

I'm running out the door will post my full list later - but honestly I don't think it would have mattered what we used as long as we did something.

[blueprincess869]

Wow, that's amazing!

I do believe that exposing multiple languages (in all different formats i.e books, cds, tv music etc) is great for your little one.

I speak English, Cantonese (and sometimes French) to my little girl since she was born and my partner speaks Hebrew.

She is now 15 months and has shown signs that she understands all four languages. I often test her and ask her ' where the duck is? Ou est la balle etc etc and she would point to the object. My partner regularly sings to her in Hebrew (along with a Hebrew nursery rhyme CD) and one night, I put it on before bedtime and she started to point to her nose and head. I asked my partner the next day about the CD, and he told me that it was the equivalent to 'Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes'.

I really felt proud!

So, I think its great to expose babies to different languages, and anyway, what harm can it do? As long as it is fun for them and they don't feel like its forced learning, I would embrace it.

Linda

[annisis]

TmS,

I am really interested in knowing all the products and your scheduling, too. My husband and I want to learn a lot of languages as the years go on, but I want to expose Josiah to as many as possible, so it will be easier for him later. Ya know, when mommy and daddy catch up!

So a list and some info would be awesome!

And that is truly amazing! Congratulations on your great success!

[blueprincess869]

I don't really have a set time or schedule, but I guess it would be good if you had one and then they know when to expect it.

I play foreign nursery rhymes CDs, read foreign baby books, watch 'Youtube' videos and talk to her in the foreign language.

When we go out, I point out object and say them in the foreign language.

Also, we have Little Math, which allows us to import foreign languages, so I play the numbers in French, Chinese, Japanese and English. Its great because they are listening to the numbers in different languages and they don't even realise they are learning to count!

I can't wait for the Little French to come out and will definitely think it will be worth it for my little one to learn her vocabulary.

Hope this helps.

Linda

[hypatia]

I can't wait for the French curriculum to come out either 

[Ezhik]

Maybe I should re-think my strategy then! I initially wanted to teach Nikki loads of languages. My list was (other than English and Russian, which is his father's native language) Chinese, Japanese, French, German, Spanish, Italian,(lots of very widely-spoken languages) possibly adding more random ones like Korean and Finnish just for kicks. But I have been such a slacker in all respects, I doubt he knows very much Russian (although I am capable of at least talking/reading to him) - then again sometimes it seems like he doesn't understand much English and I know that can't be true!

Anyway, I had planned to cut it down in the new year to just Chinese and Japanese (since European languages are so much more available for later study) but reading this thread has made me think that perhaps I shouldn't give up too soon! Maybe I should just find more resources!

Ali

[mtb999]

wow - that'as great news TmS!!!

I am also looking forward to hearing how you fit everything in to a regular day/week!!

[andreasro]

Great discussion! Now I feel somewhat ashamed that I listened to my fears and didn't talk to my kid in the languages I want to learn and I would like him to learn too... if he likes it... My whole list initially for me was: English, Italian, French, Spanish, German, Chinese, Japanese, Greek and Russian. I'm fluent in some (English, Italian, French), only can read and understand few words in German, only read in some others (Japanese, Greek and Russian), and I know only few words in Chinese (and can't read at all).
Looking closely at this list, you've inspired me TmS and all. I need to review my thoughts and try again, with confidence and perseverence, as I understand from you.
In fact, our kid can hear all those languages. For most of them there's always someone in our family who can at least read him in one of the languages. And as we all know, the Internet has a lot of stuff to offer. But, I also need help with ideas in organizing materials in foreign languages - that was another thing that made me quit...

Any help or idea or advice will be appreciated, thanks!

Andrea

[haydeejamison]

i dont have my own kid yet im very attach with my nephew's. i start teaching my nephew english language, its not native labguage for us so i find it good is he learn it at the same time..after some time im considering teaching him another language, japanese.

[TmS]

I finally have five uninterrupted minutes to type my resources and schedule (knock on wood  ).

Resources

• IAHP - Doman Picture Dictionaries - These are great, I only have three because unfortunately postage to Oz is prohibitive. Otherwise these are fantastic value. Great for vocab building but not for conversation. Each CDrom has 10 categories with fifteen words in each category. You can view each of these in five languages - English, Spanish, French, Italian, Japanese. They flash really fast so it was difficult for me to learn from them but the bubs loves them
• Lyric Language - Music DVDs & CDs For $20 you get the DVD and CD. We have German and French. The songs are extremely well written (so catchy that my muso hubby and I walk around singing them). They are bilingual which has really helped us to understand the syntaxes. In particular we learned a lot of German - we never tried though it just sifted through. Excellent value, Sabian has watched these repeatedly for two years and it is only now that he turns it off - but still not straight away. I believe these are my favourite, except that the songs are the same for every language. Which has advantages and disadvantages I guess.
• Teach Me Tapes - Singalong CDs with Books - Also only $20 comes with CD and student book and teacher guide book. The books are ok, helpful I guess but not great. The CDs are good, the Japanese recordings were better quality than the Chinese though. Some cross over on the songs but not too much. Some songs are bi-lingual others are immersed. There are also some short conversations mixed in throughout the CD. As a baby and young tot Sabian got very very excited when we played these.
• Nursery Rhyme CDs - we also had a nursery rhyme cd from France that he used to really really love. Beautiful background music. He would giggle hysterically at one of the poems so he obviously enjoyed it.
• Leapfrog Little Leaps - These are great. Game console that works through the TV. DVDs games can be played in English, German, French and Italian. Typical leapfrog, good quality that the kids loves and just keeps going back for. It's great to watch your little one following instructions etc in another language. Good for conversations as well as vocab building.
• Wink to Learn - Dvds - speak and read Chinese and Endangered Species - I only have one of each but i want them all. Excellent value for money especially since no postage costs. The speak and read great for vocab and the other is great for syntax etc as well EK.
• Fun Learning for Kids - DVDs. These are quite possibly the worst product I've bought. Having said that for five dollars at Dick Smiths they are enormous value. Bubs will only watch one small five minute session from these because the presenter - well he possibly should have paid someone else to put his idea on the screen. I am now using these for vocab for ourselves to incorporate into the new program we're going to do so they're great for that.  They cover English, Spanish, German, French and Mandarin and are organised into categories eg one DVD is Transportation another in In the Zoo and there are hundreds of words. I've got five but I've no idea how many are available.
• Let's Learn Japanese - We're using this for our programming. It's pretty good actually, basically a text book for adults. Only cost me $10 though and I have so far (three chapters in) learned my lessons well and am able to use what I have learned so I'm pretty happy with it.
• Diego My boy isn't allowed to watch Dora (she drives me insane and I find it condescending) but Diego I can tolerate and he adores. Has helped with his Spanish words and he's learned a lot about animals from it. I actually don't mind this show. (high praise for a cartoon from me).
• Movies - swapping languages on normal dvds that he has watched multiple times. He never seemed phased by it so we just keep doing it. Doubt it can hurt

As for the schedule it has changed many times over the course of 2.5 years. He has always been exposed to two foreign languages a day minimum.

At our peak (which was between 1.5 and 2) he was doing one wink to learn a day  (he was never interested in only doing one of their sessions, had to do the whole dvd - after YBCR 8 minutes lessons are too short), two sessions of picture dictionaries doing two languages per session covering all categories (sometimes he cried so much when we stopped that we'd give in and let him do all five - I know I shouldn't but he was so upset and loved it so much). One other language tv activity so either little leaps or diego or lyric language or a movie. Cds put on in the background while playing and while travelling he could watch and listen to as many as it took to stop him going crazy on the 19 hour drives we were regularly doing at the time.

We will be starting our new schedule after xmas dies down. I will let you know how it works out.

[sarahjean]

What a FANTASTIC story!! Children are so brilliant!

You've inspired me!! We already do a lot, bu I think I'd like to step up our language exposure...

We already do Chinese, French, and ASL. I've been wanting to also teach some others such as Spanish, German, Japanese, and Latin but thought I would introduce them later. Maybe I shouldn't wait!!

Thanks! KARMA!!

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