How to raise multilingual children

How my kids became trilingual

I often get the question how I teach my children Swedish. My answer is:

I don’t TEACH them Swedish.

I talk Swedish with them and “live the language”, just like every other parent do with their children. There is a big difference here. Swedish is our everyday language and the language me and my kids use to communicate with each other. I was taught English at school. I started speaking English and living the language when I moved to the US.

Worth mentioning here is that my husband applies the same methods as I do, but in Hebrew. He talks excludingly in Hebrew with our children.

Why multilingual?

If you haven’t yet decided whether or not you would like to raise your children to become multilingual, if you’re not sure what the benefits are, you can read my blog post “Why raising multilingual children”.

This post might contain affiliate links, which means I receive a small commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase using this link.

Difficulties in raising multilingual children

In our local Swedish school there are many levels of Swedish spoken. While some children barely seem to understand the spoken language, there are children who understand but always answer in English. There are also children who don’t seem to have a problem at all, children who speak, read and write fluently. It’s hard to say why this is happening, we all come from very different places in life. Some families lived in Sweden, some have two Swedish parents, some have a third language at home and some speak only English at home.

It is not easy to raise multilingual children and it takes a lot of commitment and determination. Following are some things we did to help our children to become trilingual.

12 tips on how to raise multilingual children

1) Decision – Make a decision whether you’d like your children to learn the minority language (in most cases your own mother tongue) or not. What level of fluency are you aiming at? Just everyday conversational language or academic levels? I believe both are possible, you just need to be prepared to commit.

2) Start early – We started exposing our children to Swedish and Hebrew as soon as they were born. It’s wrong to think they are only babies and that they won’t know anyway in what language you speak. They absorb every little bit of it. I would sit for hours and talk or sing in Swedish, especially to my first born. We listened to music and lullabies and read books endlessly.

3) Join a community who speaks the minority language – It’s important for children to hear others speak the language too. Try to see if there is a playgroup or even a school in your area. When my first born was just a few years old, I found out about our local Swedish school. This is an 2 hours/week after school program, but at least the children get to hear the language spoken from someone else other than their mom.

4) Be consistent! – I think this might be the most important thing I have to say about this subject. BE CONSISTENT! Choose your language and keep at it. I ALWAYS -with no exceptions- talk in Swedish with my kids. Sometimes it feels awkward and even rude to the people next to me who don’t understand. Just explain the situation to them and they’ll understand. When the children start preschool and school they might start to answer you in the majority language. Don’t get discouraged. Remind them that this is not the language we speak at home. I won’t let my kids answer me in English. I require them talk to me in Swedish -I know they can.

5) Keep on reminding them – It’s common for multilingual children to switch words in a sentence to the majority language. My experience of this is they mostly do it out of laziness, but sometimes they might not know the word. Remind them how to say the word in your language.

6) Read, read, READ… I can’t emphasize this enough. When my children were younger we only read to them in the minority languages. When they became older I felt this to be a bit narrow, because we LOVE books -no matter the language. It’s hard to find books in Swedish and Hebrew here… But every time I visit Sweden or if someone come to visit us, I make sure the suitcase is packed with books! We started reading to our children when they were babies.

7) Watch movies – Try to find movies to watch in your language. With the wide range of selections online today there is most likely good things to watch.

8) Listen to audio books – Oh, how many times I have heard the same stories over and over again! But it sticks and my kids still enjoy listening to audio books in the car. Another idea is to find a podcast for kids. I’m pretty new at podcast-listening, so I’m not familiar with the selection just yet. Might be worth looking into.

9) Travel – Try to travel back to your home country whenever you can. I know -it’s expensive. Tell me about it! But it is really the very best way to keep a language alive. Especially if your kids can find some other kids to play with. Kids learn best from other kids.

10) Skype or FaceTime – Call family and friends often and let your children speak too. This motivates them to keep on learning. With today’s technology there is no excuse! I remember the time when it cost a fortune to call home..

11) E-mail or snail-mail – When the children become older, it might be a good idea to have them write emails (or regular mail) to family members or friends in the minority language.

12) Hang on to the traditions – Celebrate the traditions you grew up with. Explain to your children why we celebrate and what it means. This makes them feel proud of their heritage and helps for a richer and more meaningful experience. Knowing a language without the traditions is only half the experience. Look for other groups in your area to celebrate with. I’m lucky to have a few Swedish organizations in our area.

Conclusion

Clearly, this is a subject very close to my heart. I could go on for hours about how to raise multilingual children. But I won’t. I just want to add:

Don’t give up. If we could do it, you can too. Keep at it and be consistent. When you look at your minority language positively and something to be proud of -so will your kids. Let’s end with a thoughtful quote:

To have another language is to possess a second soul.
Charlemange

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