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I was recently interviewed by Julia Grey of The Bilingual Kids YouTube channel and had a chance to respond to a wide range of interesting questions about my personal and professional experience involving bilingual and multilingual children. Here are just some of the questions we touched on in our lively hour-long conversation
The bilingual journey of this Spanish family is an encouraging example, in a number of ways, of non-native parents nurturing early success. It shows that, despite being non-native speakers of the target language who acknowledge shortcomings in their own language skills, Cristina and Pedro have nevertheless been able to generate significant progress in their children’s bilingual ability through their attitude and actions. And even when faced with difficulties along the way
Victor and Olya may have grown up on opposite sides of the Earth, but their mutual love of languages ultimately brought them together somewhere in between, in a small city in the American heartland. They both had studied German and shared a mutual interest in the mechanics of German
I recently had the pleasure of speaking with Dolores Guiñazú, the executive director of Lift Value, a company that provides a range of helpful language services to clients worldwide. Dolores also offers a very thoughtful podcast called Attitudeable and I was honored to join her to share my personal perspective on raising bilingual children.
I recently spoke again with Amanda Hsiung Blodgett, popularly known as Miss Panda Chinese, about our experiences raising bilingual children. Our first conversation (that video is also below) took place four years ago
The other day I had the pleasure of speaking to Scott Davison at The Dad Train for a podcast episode about Raising Bilingual Children. We had a great conversation and I hope all you dads (and moms) out there enjoy it! Raising Bilingual Children, with Adam Beck – Episode 18 And if you’re in the mood for more interviews that I’ve taken part in previously, here are those links, too… Podcast Interviews Raising a Bilingual Child – Episode 37 Preschool
I’m so pleased to tell you that there’s a new organization which is quickly proving to be an empowering source of support for bilingual and multilingual families around the world. HaBilNet stands for the Harmonious Bilingualism Network and as the homepage states: “HaBilNet promotes and carries out research on harmonious bilingual development. Through HaBilNet you can gain access to research-based sources that will help your family develop bilingualism in harmonious ways.” HaBilNet is the brainchild of Dr. Annick De Houwer,
To successfully raise a bilingual or multilingual child, the main requirement is language exposure: the child must receive an ample amount of meaningful input in the target language (or languages) on a regular basis. And the more of this input you can provide, from yourself and/or from other sources of exposure, the greater the odds of fostering active language ability. The two central pillars for providing this exposure are abundant speech (from you or from other speakers of the target
When Victor Santos contacted me earlier this year, to share the innovative language-learning flashcards that he and his wife developed for their young son—and now for children throughout the world—I was immediately impressed with the thought and creativity that have gone into them. The fact is, these flashcards are unique, unlike any others you’ll currently find on the market, and could well be a valuable addition to the resources you use to promote your target language(s). I was also impressed
Two years ago, I shared a creative project that was carried out by Nellie Robertson and her two children. They live in the U.S. and Nellie is originally from Hungary, which means that English is their majority language and Hungarian is their minority language. The project took place over the course of a full year and involved a stuffed alligator named Alfonzo, who they sent on a worldwide trip to enjoy “homestays” with a number of families (including mine!) who
Have you ever thought about writing a children’s book? I think this idea has crossed the minds of many people, particularly parents who read a lot of picture books to their own kids. And some of these parents, of course, are seeking to raise bilingual children and so the book they imagine writing would be in their mother tongue, to help their kids—and other kids in the world—learn that language and appreciate that culture. Well, one parent who has fulfilled
