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You're lucky. I wish I could speak with my 3yo in my native language but my wife can't speak a word of it. My son refuses to speak my language because his mind

You're lucky. I wish I could speak with my 3yo in my native language but my wife can't speak a word of it. My son refuses to speak my language because his mind refuses the idea that things can have two names. Maybe when he grows up he'll want to learn but right now there's just now way, I tried and failed.

lhorie 9y ago
I'm the only person that speaks my mother tongue at home too. Something that worked well for me was making it a game when the kid wasn't expecting it. The first time was over breakfast. I brought a boogie board and told him we were gonna learn some portuguese. I drew a happy chubby boy and asked him who it was. He shrugged. I told it was him. Now I had his attention, so I drew a strawberry and asked him what that was. Once he answered, I told him "yes, morango". Then, I drew him eating it and said "Calvin come morango" (pointing to him and the strawberry as I said the respective words). Then, I said "Calvin come..." and picked up a real strawberry. Now, the exercise was kind of a guessing/memory game for him. I only covered a few words and it involved a lot of repetition and high fives, but he became a lot more open to the idea of learning portuguese after that. When my kid was learning to read, making some flash cards also worked really well - drawing on one side, word on the other. The trick is in making a few verb ones, and nouns that can complement, plus one with a drawing of the kid, then do permutations, e.g. "Calvin come bolo" (cake), "Bolo de morango", "Calvin come bolo de chocolate", etc. "Eat" is a good starting verb, "go" is also very versatile in combination with types of vehicles and places, then you can try expanding to other daily things. Would love to hear how that works for others
- luckydata 9y ago
  I'll test this out, sounds like a good strategy. I have also done something slightly different which is giving him a word without telling him the meaning, just playing with the sound. After a while once he can repeat it and say it fluently, I would explain what it means. By the time I do that, he's already said the word a bunch of times so I tricked him into "knowing" the word and there's nothing he can do to go back in time :)
jjav 9y ago
When he grows it'll be very difficult to learn, now is the time when a child can learn many languages very easily. Take the opportunity now! I speak to our toddler in a language my wife doesn't (Finnish) and she speaks to him in a language I don't understand (French). He is fully fluent in both, in addition to English (from daycare/friends).
- stevekemp 9y ago
  We're trying to do the bi-lingual thing here, with a 13 month old child. My wife speaks Finnish exclusively, I speak English. As we're in Finland I assume that he'll have a Finnish accent when he gets a bit more proficient, but so far things seem to be working out. I expect he'll learn English pretty well, partly via me, but also via random conversations, TV, etc. One of the pleasant surprises were that his first two words were "Daddy" and "Äiti", respectively.
- luckydata 9y ago
  how do you deal with things that require your wife to understand too? Do you spend your time saying things twice?
  - jjav 9y ago
    It varies. Sometime saying twice, but most often he (son) will do the translating for us which is great practice. But we also have another shared language we can use (which our son also mostly understands).

lhorie 9y ago

I'm the only person that speaks my mother tongue at home too. Something that worked well for me was making it a game when the kid wasn't expecting it. The first time was over breakfast. I brought a boogie board and told him we were gonna learn some portuguese. I drew a happy chubby boy and asked him who it was. He shrugged. I told it was him. Now I had his attention, so I drew a strawberry and asked him what that was. Once he answered, I told him "yes, morango". Then, I drew him eating it and said "Calvin come morango" (pointing to him and the strawberry as I said the respective words). Then, I said "Calvin come..." and picked up a real strawberry. Now, the exercise was kind of a guessing/memory game for him. I only covered a few words and it involved a lot of repetition and high fives, but he became a lot more open to the idea of learning portuguese after that. When my kid was learning to read, making some flash cards also worked really well - drawing on one side, word on the other. The trick is in making a few verb ones, and nouns that can complement, plus one with a drawing of the kid, then do permutations, e.g. "Calvin come bolo" (cake), "Bolo de morango", "Calvin come bolo de chocolate", etc. "Eat" is a good starting verb, "go" is also very versatile in combination with types of vehicles and places, then you can try expanding to other daily things. Would love to hear how that works for others

luckydata 9y ago
I'll test this out, sounds like a good strategy. I have also done something slightly different which is giving him a word without telling him the meaning, just playing with the sound. After a while once he can repeat it and say it fluently, I would explain what it means. By the time I do that, he's already said the word a bunch of times so I tricked him into "knowing" the word and there's nothing he can do to go back in time :)

jjav 9y ago

When he grows it'll be very difficult to learn, now is the time when a child can learn many languages very easily. Take the opportunity now! I speak to our toddler in a language my wife doesn't (Finnish) and she speaks to him in a language I don't understand (French). He is fully fluent in both, in addition to English (from daycare/friends).

stevekemp 9y ago
We're trying to do the bi-lingual thing here, with a 13 month old child. My wife speaks Finnish exclusively, I speak English. As we're in Finland I assume that he'll have a Finnish accent when he gets a bit more proficient, but so far things seem to be working out. I expect he'll learn English pretty well, partly via me, but also via random conversations, TV, etc. One of the pleasant surprises were that his first two words were "Daddy" and "Äiti", respectively.
luckydata 9y ago
how do you deal with things that require your wife to understand too? Do you spend your time saying things twice?
- jjav 9y ago
  It varies. Sometime saying twice, but most often he (son) will do the translating for us which is great practice. But we also have another shared language we can use (which our son also mostly understands).