Raising a French-speaking child in a English/Spanish speaking environment
Being able to raise the girl as a multilingual, multicultural person is one of the big motivations for us to move back to Abidjan, if only for a year or two.
First let me talk about our specific situation and why it’s challenging for me to teach French to the girl. Then I’ll share the different tips I use to do it anyway!
Our multilingual family structure
Every multilingual family is different and faces its very own challenges. Our structure is the following:
- We live in an English speaking country, most specifically in an English/Spanish speaking community.
- One parent (father) speaks English (native).
- The other parent (mother- moi) speaks French (native) and English (as second language).
- Parents communicate with each other in English.
- No one in my family speaks English, no one in my husband L’s family speaks French.
- English is the “dominant” language in our family. French would be considered the “minority” language (that’s about to change when we move to Abidjan – Ha! Ha! Ha!)
Why is it challenging to raise a multilingual child in our specific situation?
Because of the way our family unit functions and the environment we live in, it can be pretty challenging to teach French to the girl. At home, she hears mostly English. She spends afternoons with her dad when I go to work and obviously, they communicate in English. At preschool she learns English and a little bit of Spanish, because well, it’s Miami.
When we were deciding which daycare/preschool we would put her in, we briefly considered the one and only French speaking option. But it ended up being too far from our place. Plus we did not like the neighborhood. I thought about putting her in a private French school, but the 10K per year tuition quickly changed my mind.
I realized that if I wanted her to be fluent in French, I was going to have to teach her on my own. Here are a few tips I’ve learned while doing it.
Be intentional
You have to be intentional when talking to your little one
I constantly have to remind myself to speak with the girl in French. Otherwise, it’s so easy to revert to English, because we are surrounded by English speakers.
Research shows that babies can learn their mother’s languages from the womb. Even when the girl was in my belly, I spoke to her in French and sang her a Togolese lullaby that my mom and dad used to sing to me (Tutu gbovi, anyone?). You have to start early – but it’s never too late! – and be intentional.
Hello multilingual book collection
You have to be intentional about books you read to your little ones. From the beginning, I built the girl a bilingual book collection.
When her auntie who lives in Canada asked me what gift I wanted for her, I told her French books.
When my sister-in-law came from Abidjan to stay with me after I gave birth, and asked me what I wanted, I told her French books.
When we traveled for the first time the three of us to Abidjan for vacations, most of my vacation budget went into buying her, you guessed it, French books.
When there’s a book she likes in English, I tried to find out if there’s a French version. It’s not always the case, but it’s worth looking at.
Multilingual music too!
Music is a great tool to learn a language – I’m thinking about all the American songs I knew by heart even before moving to the US. It makes learning fun. Kids seem to learn so much faster in songs.
That’s said, this one is a bit harder for us. I was a big fan of Chantal Goya when I was a kid (No shame! I stand by my choices!). And I tried to pass it on to the girl, but that did not really work out.
In my opinion, it’s much harder to find good catchy children’s songs in French on platforms like Spotify. Maybe it’s because I live in the US, so the French selection is not great? Not sure. But we try. If you have any good recommendations, let me know!
If you have a spouse or a partner, include them in the process – but not too much
Let me explain that one.
Get your partner onboard to raise your child multilingual…
Of course you need your partner’s support if you’re going to raise your kid bilingual. It’s hard work and requires commitment and consistency. L and I talked about it when I got pregnant. He knew I wanted the girl to be fluent in French. And he totally supported it. That’s said…
But also, ignore them (a little…)
Once you agree with your partner that you’ll raise your child bilingual, you should not worry about whether or not your partner is understanding what you’re saying to the child – personal opinion here!
In my case, most of the time, I’m not translating everything I say to the girl in French to my husband L. That would require too much time and effort, and ruin the spontaneity of the whole thing. If he wants to know what I tell her, he looks it up. Along the way, he picked up some words.
Be thrifty
There is no need to break the bank to have access to bilingual resources.
Use your local library resources
I love books and I want to share that passion with the girl. But if I had to pay for all the French children’s books I wanted for her, we would go broke and run out of space quickly.
So one place I look for French children’s books is our local library. I can browse their catalogs and filter what I want to see. If a book is available in the library system but not at my specific location, I can request them to ship it to my local library.
You would be surprised by all the resources local libraries offer. It is not always a win but I had some good finds.
Online bilingual TV shows
Again, there are lots of resources out there.
I absolutely love the YouTube channel “Comptines Africaines”. They have beautiful videos with entertaining and engaging songs. It’s a mix of French and different Africans dialects and it works for us. We also tried channels like “Comptines and chansons” or “Hey Kids”, when the girl – and I – were obsessed with the song “Ah les crocodiles”.
A lot of popular kids channel in English also have versions in other languages (think Little angel and Little baby bum)
If you have any of the streaming services, you can also put many of the kid shows in French.
Video calls with the family
The girl used to sit on my lap when I was talking to my family in Abidjan. Unfortunately, she is now in a phase when she does not want to do any video calls. So she’ll just run to the other side of the house if I’m on WhatsApp with my sisters.
But talking to family on video calls can be a powerful way to help your little learner improve her language skills and see the benefit of learning the language at all.
Embrace the messiness of it all
I’ll say it again: raising a multilingual child is a lot of work, especially when you are the one teaching the “minority” language. The child will mix up languages. You will mix up languages. It’s ok. It’s normal. It’s not a reason to give up. Make sure you don’t reprimand your child. Just repeat the correct sentence and move on.
Multilingual children speak fluently later. That does not mean they have a language delay. It’s just that they are learning more and need more time to figure it all out. And when we think about it: what is a few months delay in language proficiency versus a whole life of being able to speak two languages fluently?
Ignore the rest of the world
Finally ignore critics and naysayers: the ones that say that your multilingual child will be confused, or will have issues at school. It’s actually quite the opposite. Learning two languages can actually lead to higher educational achievement.
Ignore the looks in public or the awkwardness of speaking a language that no one else understands. Where I live, parents speak Spanish to their children all the time, whether other people understand it or not. So I feel empowered to speak French to my girl.
Most people are usually intrigued and ask what language we speak. It leads to some fun conversations and exchanges of tips.
It’s ok if no one else understands you as long as your little one does.
Le mot de la fin
My method is not perfect. It is easier said than done. So far, the girl is dominant in English. I speak to her in French and she answers me in English or Fren-glish. But I am not discouraged.
Sometimes she will say a sentence in French with the perfect pronunciation. Those times, I do a little victory dance in my head. I know our move to Abidjan will be a huge adjustment for her. But I also know that she will gain so much out of it: mainly becoming fluent in two languages and fully embracing her multicultural self.
Do you have other tips or recommendations to raise multilingual little people?
