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Quadlingual - any suggestions on doing it better or any experiences?

post #1 of 6
Thread Starter 
My 21 month old DS is growing up with four languages. I dont know any other kid with similar exposure. Some people wtih expertise in speech, language study said its a good thing. I and my hubby are trilingual ourselves. But I thought I will post here since so many moms here seem so smart:)

I speak a native language and am at home with him so he understands that most. He can follow directions, understand small discussions directed at him. My hubby speaks his own language which my DS understands least since hubby is home only three hours( while we are awake). The third language is what hubby and I use to communicate, since our natives are different. I know DS understands that language a bit too. For eg, if we are talking about offering him water, he would go and fetch his cup. The fourth language is english since we are in US. DS vocabulary consists majority of english words. I read him book in english, we hear english toddler songs while driving, other kids speak to him during playgroups etc. Unfortunately he has very less one to one kids interactions. I try taking him to pllaygroups but thats about it. We afe in a new city for just a year, so we dont have close friends or family.

He doesnt speak two word sentences. Started saying Mama finally at 18 mo. Still does a lot of pointing and gesturing. He can speak clearly though. He is not silent, he keeps yapping away all day, half of it in his own language.

I guess I wanted to know of anyone has any kind of input. I am not worried to be honest. DH was a late talker( growing up in a single language household) and still speaks much lesser than average. But, if anyone has any sugestions on doing this in a better way, please let me know!
post #2 of 6

Honestly, it sounds like you are doing everything right! At 21 mos. I wouldn't be worried about not having many words/sentences. And with 4 languages, I think it would be too much to expect to have all 4 be at an equal level of proficiency. I have 3 & my strengths are different in each one depending on whether I use it mostly at home, mostly at work or both. Congratulations on giving your DS such a great start!

post #3 of 6
Thread Starter 
Ragana, thats so nice of you. Thanks for reassuring me! redface.gif
post #4 of 6

OMG! My son didn't talk until he was 2 1/2! I did have one child who put sentences together at 20 months in both languages but I considered this way ahead of the game. She's linguistically very strong. My son's fine now. Your son has good comprehension so that means he's on his way to speaking! 

 

I would not try to teach him all three languages. Just concentrate on each parents' language. I'm sure he'll learn whatever language you two use together but interact with him in just your own languages. This will make it easier on him. A child who is fluent in two languages will learn others more easily (are these languages at all related?) 

 

Don't make any effort to teach him English if you're living in the U.S. He'll learn that really well on the outside to the point that he might try using it at home. Just be firm about sticking to your own languages. 

 

It's a good set-up. Don't worry if the languages are not all equal. They rarely are but you do want him to master and use both the home languages. 

 

Can you understand each others' languages at all? If not, you soon will! My dh now understands almost everything we say in English at home. Now he's into watching English language T.V. etc. 

 

Good luck and keep it up! 

post #5 of 6

yep, he'll get there. With so many languages, it will probably take him more time to figure everything out. I like to look at multilingualism like this with children:

A monolingual child is like a child who has one ball to play with. They can quickly familiarize themselves with the ball and learn how to throw it, bounce it, catch it, etc.

A bilingual child has two balls to play with, but one of the balls is an american football, so its characteristics are fundamentally different, so he has to not only learn how to handle two balls at once but also how to manage the different characteristics of each ball, but he can still do it.

A trilingual (or more!) child has three balls, all with different shapes and characteristics but still only 2 hands to handle them with, so he has to learn how to juggle them and how to handle each of them individually.

It's quite the task! But he'll manage it. Add into that the fact that every child learns how to handle their "balls" (languages) at a different rate and it makes it even more difficult for us to tell if they're delayed or progressing or what is going on with their minds. But in all likelihood, they're fine. Their minds are just very, very busy.

 

My son is almost 3 and a half and I spent (okay, still spend!) a lot of time worrying about his language development because I don't know anyone else in real life who is raising their child trilngually. But now he does speak in all three languages and you can really see his gears turn when he encounters a new situation and has to figure out which language is the appropriate language. One of the funny thing he likes to do is use me as a translator so he can speak to me in German and then have me ask everyone else the question in English :P But I've caught on and now when he asks me at a playgroupd if he can have some more chips, I tell him to ask the adult with chips "Can I have more chips, please?" in English and he does. His pronunciation is still pretty bad in all three languages, but from what I heard that's normal.

post #6 of 6
Thread Starter 
Sorry for the very late reply. Thanks so much for the positive responses. He has started saying two words since I wrote this. Its funny because he speaks mainly english words. I think its because he loves books and all the books I read are in english. But he doesnt understand spoken english yet:)
I agree teaching him english and the our third common language is not my job.

I loved the analogy of the balls...really useful trying to explain to relatives when they express concern.
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