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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To feel a bit bad for the kid in our nursery who doesn't speak the language?

31 replies

toomuchtooold · 21/01/2015 21:53

Not to out myself but I live somewhere where a few languages are spoken and there's a little kid at my girls' new nursery who doesn't share a language with anyone who works there. I know he's going to have to learn the local language before he goes to school, but it just seems quite harsh to put him in there, he's there for 10 hours a day, and as yet he can't even ask for the toilet?

Tell me your great stories of your kids who moved country and adapted and were really happy, please! He worries me a little...

OP posts:

betweenmarchandmay · 21/01/2015 22:01

He'll be fine, trust me. :) by the time June comes round he'll sound like he was born wherever you are from :)

TiltedPenguin · 21/01/2015 22:03

My DH had a boy who joined his class without a word of English aged 5. Six months later, he was completely fluent with a broad local accent They learn unbelievably quickly before the age of 10 and will make themselves understood, both for essentials and fun. Immersion is a great teacher, even if it seems terrifying to us!

AmantesSuntAmentes · 21/01/2015 22:03

Children are often in creches from when they are pre-verbal. I know it's not quite the same but there are other ways to communicate

OstentatiousBreastfeeder · 21/01/2015 22:03

DS attended nursery with a little French boy who didn't speak a word of English. By the time he 'graduated' he was perfectly fluent. It was amazing how fast he learnt

lem73 · 21/01/2015 22:09

It is sweet of you to think of him. I used to teach EFL to kids abroad and it is amazing how well they settle in. Kids that young are so accepting of differences.

SocksRock · 21/01/2015 22:10

My husband moved to England from Wales aged 4, having never really spoken English. MIL really worried about him starting reception with no English. She went to pick him up 3 days later to see him at the top of the climbing frame shrieking "I'm the king of the fucking castle". They learn so so quickly as small kids, he will be speaking the local language soon.

FryOneFatManic · 21/01/2015 22:14

And on the plus side, learning a 2nd (3rd, 4th, etc) language so young does have many benefits, much better than when they are older.

Idratherbetheboss · 21/01/2015 22:14

When I was a nursery nurse we had a lovely polish boy join us, we also happened to have a little boy called Charlie who was into everything.

After a week the polish child started using Charlie's name for everything- milk, snack, toilet, any toy, book, anything.

It took us a while to work out it must've been the staff saying "charlie!" a hundred times a day in all situations that had led him to believe the whole world and its contents were actually called Charlie

He was great, such a happy little boy and he settled in fantastically.

I also nannied for a Norwegian family and although they couldn't speak a word of English the day I started, all was fine. Can't remember any problems whatsoever and they were both fluent really quickly

littlejohnnydory · 21/01/2015 22:17

I started school in Wales aged 3 having just moved from England and not knowing a word of Welsh. Obviously the teachers did understand English but speaking English wasn't allowed at school and was a punishable offence! ( I'm sure that's changed these days although imagine it's still strongly discouraged). The other children in my class were mainly from Welsh speaking homes. I was fine, fluent within a term. Bilingualism benefits a child in all kinds of ways (although I'm not sure about being punished for speaking their home language!!)

KiaOraOAotearoa · 21/01/2015 22:19

Don't worry :)
DD went to a multicultural/multilingual nursery, 80% of the kids did not speak English at home.
She came home a few times asking for stuff in whatever baltic language she heard that day, but all was well in the end :)

HollyBdenum · 21/01/2015 22:22

I think he's licky, getting the chance to become fluent I more than one language. My niece speaks one language with her mum, another with her dad and a third at school, which neither of her parents speak.

Longdistance · 21/01/2015 22:22

I started school just speaking Hungarian. I had zero help with the transition. I'm now all cockerney and am bilingual in both languages, and can flip from one to the other without needing to think.

He'll be fine.

Thenapoleonofcrime · 21/01/2015 22:23

Some (now) friends of ours came to England when their son was 6 and he couldn't speak a word of English- he used to take me by the hand and lead me to the fridge and point if he wanted a drink. He picked up the language so quickly, within 6 months and now he's 11 and in the top groups at secondary, just no issues at all.

I don't think it is always easy to be that new child who doesn't speak the language, and I have seen very young children upset over this, one of our other friends whose three year old used to shout 'don't speak like that, don't speak like that' when they spoke English and cover their mouths, they moved country and it can be traumatic if children are used to routine. However, many years on she doesn't remember this and of course now speaks perfect English!

Redhead11 · 21/01/2015 22:34

Some Polish children moved into DD2's primary school and the school used DD's idea of a picture book to help with basic words like toilet and so on. It was a huge hit and the kids were soon chattering away like English was their first language, not their third. they spoke Polish and Russian at home, as they had one parent of each nationality.

alteredimages · 21/01/2015 22:39

King of the fucking castle

DD started school in France with no French. She loved it and made lots of friends even though they couldn't talk to each other at first. She still asks for them and prefers them to her new classmates who she sbares two languages with. He will be fine.

JADS · 21/01/2015 22:41

I was that kid who was sent to French speaking school. I wet myself the first day as I didn't know the word for toilet. I only did it once.

YANBU but he will soon pick up the language

DanyStormborn · 21/01/2015 22:41

At nursery age the child will learn the local language incredibly quickly so it won't be an issue. A lot of bilingual kids don't learn English till they start school but is doesn't usually hold them back, more often then end up benefitting from knowing two languages fluently.

waitingforthegroundtoopen · 21/01/2015 22:57

I looked after a lovely little boy who had english as an additional language. He spent his first few weeks really distressed, more that mum had left him than us being unable to understand him, he could always make himself understood! But as soon as he was settled he was the biggest chatter box in my room and picked up english very quickly and taught me a fair bit of his language too.

Also if it's such a diverse area I'm sure the nursery staff have been through it before.

Dinosaursdontgrowontrees · 21/01/2015 23:07

I worked in a nursery little girl started on the Monday having moved from rural France on the Saturday. She was about 2and a half. She cried all day for the first day (broke my heart) but by day 5 she was understanding most things, 2 weeks later her language matched the other children. She was amazing.

Karoleann · 21/01/2015 23:07

I looked after a little boy who had a Somalian mother when she was going to see the "hospital doctor for down there" I dread to think what it was, but she needed childcare and I was volunteering and nearby.
First time he pointed, two weeks later he knew my name and the third time he asked for Dora (the explorer). Only 6 weeks apart, little ones pick it up so quickly.

Worksallhours · 22/01/2015 00:05

Idratherbetheboss That is a totally brilliant anecdote.

I taught English language in Europe and the ME at secondary level, and many of my pupils were bilingual. A young boy from one particular family flummoxed me for ages because I knew he could speak fluent English, but he would never speak English to me in class. If I asked him a question in English, he would reply to me in the local dialect.

After a few phone calls and a meeting, his parents and I finally figured out what the problem was. His mother was Lebanese and his father was American-Lebanese, and they had brought the boy to be bilingual by each speaking to him in their primary tongue at home ... so this little boy thought that you spoke to men in English and women in Lebanese Arabic.

I have to say ... I found that pretty adorable.

TheNewStatesman · 22/01/2015 00:27

I am raising my child bilingually in a non-English speaking country (as are many of my acquaintances).

Most children I know are already speaking the country's majority language before they start nursery school. However, I have seen a few children put straight into a nursery environment at three with no knowledge of the language whatsoever.

Of course they start picking it up before long. However, I have seen different children react very differently to this kind of situation depending on their personality--some (especially if they are confident and outgoing) take it in their stride, while others can become very stressed and upset, and it can make the transition to nursery (which is stressful enough for some children) quite traumatic. Some are still having a lot of issues with adapting months later, and express stress about not being able to communicate with others fluently. In the case of a sensitive or clingy child who is not good at change, it can really get them off to a bad start with nursery school.

I think it is unfair to put a child in this position unless it is literally unavoidable--better to try and get your child at least some exposure to the country's majority language before nursery, via playgrounds, story time at the local library or just trying to strike up conversations and acquaintanceships with local mums in the park or children's play area, as preparation before starting nursery.

Even if the above is difficult, as an absolute bare minimum it is absolutely parents' responsibility to make sure that a toilet-trained child has the ability to ask to use the toilet, ask for a drink of water in the majority language, and things like that before they go to a majority language nursery school. It is stressful and humiliating for a child to be suddenly plonked into a situation where they are not able to ask for their basic bodily needs to be met--how would we like this if someone did this to us? It isn't fair.

TheNewStatesman · 22/01/2015 00:35

By the way--don't be fooled by the fact that you can see a child participating in the majority language just a few days or weeks after starting from zero. This does not mean that they have somehow magically acquired fluency in an incredibly short space of time. It means that they have picked some initial, surface fluency in the language, but it doesn't mean they will be able to express anything more complex than that.

It takes around 2-3 years for a child to get to zero to 100% in terms of conversational fluency--having a strong vocabulary, being able to talk about anything easily and fluently, that is. That is why, like I said, children who start nursery school with a level of zero usually find it takes quite a while before they have no communication difficulties at school, especially when they want to talk about about remotely complicated. And when it comes to fully mastering a language at the academic level (having the reading speed and complex vocabulary necessary to master school work and read basic children's textbooks), it typically takes four years or so before they are fully at their peers' level.

I am just stressing this because I think a lot of people can be very naive/sanguine about how bilingualism works. Children's language learning functions are impressive, but they are not magic and it does not happen instantly.

ManyMayhem · 22/01/2015 00:54

I used to live in a country where kids were often started school with little or no knowledge of the local language and I disagree with the notion that kids just pick up second languages easily. Some can easily but many struggle and, for some, it's really, really difficult and it can affect their learning in other areas.

I think immersion is perfectly ok but parents need to be on the look out for any problems.

Some of my DC were in classes with some children from China who had to learn the local language with almost no parental help and had to learn to write their 'western' alphabet. I don't know why but they all mastered writing within a year and they all had the most amazingly perfect handwriting.

Welliesandpyjamas · 22/01/2015 01:12

Oh, I have been that little boy. I did learn quickly, but still remember the dread and panic, decades later

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