Non English kids

[fyimate]

Am I wrong in getting annoyed at non English parents for NOT teaching their kids English (even though they -the parent- can speak it)?
I've seen my DD confused by other kids because they dont speak English when playing with her, and then I hear the parent speaking another language to the child even though they (the parent) can speak English.
Why dont they teach their kids English?
It annoys me more because of the amount of money taxpayers have to fork out in translators which appears to be avoidable?

The problem is if the kids arrive at school with no English, they drag the standards down and also occupy a dispproportionate amount of the teachers time.

I would say kids who are not taught English at home should have to reach a certain standard before being admitted to school.

The OP is displaying a very common ignorance of bilingualism - and it's the sort of attitude that makes the British infamously poor at speaking other languages (and therefore making themselves more employable).

Small children living here can't help but learn English - they're surrounded by it. And as others have said, total immersion when they start nursery or school means they pick up English very quickly, they certainly won't need translators.

There's lots of research to show the benefits of bilingualism from an early age - not least that it makes it far easier to pick up a third and fourth language later on.

So, stick with your attitude by all means OP, and then sit back and watch those pesky "foreign" children surpass your own dc educationally.

Bessie - rwyt ti'n ddrwg iawn.

"Well if 1 in 6 school age children do not speak English as a first language I would say that was a pretty major problem, yes. "

Are there schools where 1 in 6 children start without speaking English though? My local nursery is about 80% children who speak a different language at home, yet they all seemed to understand English.

I keep speaking strine at the boy but he will persist with the pommy.

Is very frustrating, half the time I can't understand him.

Have travelled the world with the boy and have never encountered a language problem between young children. They all speak kid.

What age are these children you are talking about?
My dc learnt English at nursery, by the time they were 2.5 they were perfectly able to play with English children without resorting to their mother tongue.

Of course if you are talking of children who've just arrived to the UK, it is not shocking that they still don't speak the language.

Also, lots of english expat children live in foreign countries without learning much of the language, thanks to the availability of english schools.

fyimate, I'd advise you to start teaching a second language to your kids because obviously all these "foreign" children already have an edge.

You fool globalisation goes both ways.

I love these threads that are basically about multiculturalism - such a lovely competition.

facts are there are plenty of parents who speak enlgish that don't bother to teach the kids english preferring to leave it to tv and then schoo.l. That's a fact actually and I know plenty of my relatives bought up this way and also those of my husbands (different countries entirely).

My ds has mates that speak english and those that don't - I don't give a shit neither does he but I would have an issue if he went to a school where the majority of kids didn't speak english and that's from someone who is from a trilingual family.

I would say it's not that rare for English speaking people to leave the english tuition to schools. Not that common but equally not that rare.

There is one child at my son's nursery that only has english - the mother feels bad - why? Fact is that the majority of us who speak other languages early on are due to family. Not people's fault if they are not 'multicultural' families no?

Although I'm delighted my ds has language opportunities, I do dislike this language snobbery.

I was particularly shite at learning languages in school.

Grief fyimate, loosen up a bit. I've lived in Germany for 22 years, speak fluent German and have 3dc that I always speak English with. They not only learn German at school etc but they have learnt it differently to me, as a native speakers would rather than as a second language. If I spoke German with them I would be passing on my German accent or way of using the language It is the most natural thing in the universe for parents to speak and pass on their mother language to their children. Try to understand that and make the world a better place!

I might well get roasted alive for saying this, but I really feel for the kids who are in Britain and can't speak English (not those who can but don't/prefer to speak their home language, but those who seriously cant).

It must be a scary place to be, living in a country where you cannot understand what people are saying, apart from your immediate family. If I was to take DD to live in another country, I'd make a concerted effort to ensure that she can speak and understand the native language for her sake (age specific of course!)

I'm not saying that fyimate is in the right in the scenario they have described, but I think parents should teach or ensure that, their children can speak and understand the language of the country they inhabit, but for their sake, not anyone elses.

When we were on holiday DS2 who is English and only speaks English made friends with a group of boys from Spain, Germany and Romania, they did not speak English and only spoke in their native language, but they all played lovely and had a great time despite the language barrier,

However If I were to move and live in another country I and my children would learn to speak the language of that country as It would be rude to expect everyone to pander to the fact we were too lazy to bother to learn to communicate with out translators or expecting everyone to speak English

I have to add I think the English are very lazy when it comes to learning another language, thankfully DS1 is learning French, German and Spanish.

I always make an effort to learn the basics such as please and thank you, excuse me and so on, sadly swiftly followed by do you speak English or shove DS1 forward to speak for me

BF learnt Turkish before he learnt english. Hes a science teacher.

I wonder if theres a statistic on teachers/doctors/lawyers who dont have English as a first language. It might show that being bilingual is a good thing and stop people looking down on children who dont have english yet.

This child may well overtake yours in the future.

Narabug - I didn't speak the language of the country my parents brought me up in. They didn't teach it to me because their command of the language was pretty poor. By the time my siblings and I were in double figures, we were much better at speaking it than they were and used to do all the talking at the post office/bank etc.

Like others have said, that early exposure to more than one language has stood me in very good stead - I can speak five languages now.

When my niece started school she didn't speak the language very well and within a few terms was fluent. Then her parents moved to another country where they spoke her mother tongue (which by this time was a bit crap, given she spoke the other language the whole time except with her mother). Within weeks, she was fluent again.

I don't think either of us held anyone back and if those children do at first, I promise you that by the time they are year 2, you really won't notice a difference between them and native english speakers

Oh and the point was it wasn't remotely scary. actually some times it was really pretty handy to pretend you couldn't understand

@ LadyBiscuit, I wasn't criticising, I promise, I hope it didn't come accross that way. I have no experience of living in another country so I can only speak from my Anglo-centric point of view!

I get what you're saying about pretending you couldn't understand , that must have been handy sometimes!

My xp who is Portuguese felt too embarrassed to speak his native tongue to our DD when in the playground and other public places for fear of bigots and their reactions to him, but more importantly to our DD. He only spoke Portuguese to her at home but as she spoke more and more she was becoming confused as to why he kept switching languages and in the end only spoke to her in English.
As a result she now only knows a few words of Portuguese and is cut off from her whole Portuguese family as they cannot speak English.
I'm so angry at him for not persevering but I understood his concerns as we do live in white middle class heaven (hell) and I'm known locally as 'the girl who got with that foreign bloke'!!!
Why the hell shouldn't foreign parents speak to their children in their mother tongue???
YABVU to think the parents should have spoken in English to their DC in your presence, but I do think perhaps a few basic English words could be taught to DC of foreign parents such as please and thank you, hello and goodbye etc but only so the DC don't feel cut off so much from a playground full of English speaking kids!
Sorry, long post and it probably makes no sense

May I add that I have noticed a general feeling on these threads that English ex pats are too lazy to learn other languages and expect foreigners to speak English to them all the time and that they should make an effort to learn the language of their adopted country etc..
But the mere mention that immigrants to this country should have a decent command of English is met with outrage

I agree with you, brightyoungthing.
My bf is actually Portuguese but he doesnt teach my DD because after being in this country for so many years he has almost lost touch with his own language. I really want my DD to learn Portuguese so am left learning the language myself then teaching her! Which is difficult.
I accept what everyone is saying, that bilingualism is good.
But as few have said, doesnt it cause a strain for teachers to have to teach children English, then get on with the lesson?
I would be interested to hear from some teachers who could give their experience.

In the beginning I felt very uncomfortable speaking German to my daughter in public for fear of being judged (or thought to be a tourist...), but got used to it now and make a point of only talking, reading, or singing to her in German.

She's in nursery full time, her dad is English, so her exposure to German is very limited anyway, so I do worry whether I will succeed in bringing her up bilingual.

My mum (primary school teacher) once had a 10 year old girl come to her class from Spain with no English. She did a bit of basic stuff with her using the early years picture/word books when she had time, but she mainly just got on with the lesson and the child had to just pick it up.

She was pretty fluent within a term even though she had the option to just speak Spanish at home.

The other children were pretty excited by the novelty and helped her a lot and her cousin in the same class, who was bilingual, helped her.

I hate the way this is branded as BNP! Its not unreasonable to expect that parents make some effort to equip their kids with English skills before they start school. If I moved abroad, I would certainally do so

and I think its bloody cheeky that we have to pay for translators for some people that have been here for YEARS!

so go on, accuse me of being at Nick Gs knee

FFS

Oh and I speak 3 languages other than English and DS is bilingual, not boasting just saying that if i can, others can!

One should not automatically assume that parents who do not speak English to their children are a)incapable of communicating in English themselves b)unwilling to help their children to get on in English society.

It could equally be that they have thought seriously about this and taken on board recommendations that bilingual parents should speak their own language to their dcs to promote bilingualism. Or simply that they don't want to teach their children to learn English with poor grammar or a bad accent. I can't remember the times I have been shouted down on bilingualism boards (not so much MN, which tends to be more tolerant) for confessing that I do actually speak English to my children from time to time, even though I am not English. Apparently, I am seriously compromising their chances of ever coping linguistically by using what is not My Language. Actually, I use both languages but that is seen as even more dodgy.

Ime the children who have started school speaking no English have tended to catch up very quickly. But the children who have not been encouraged to speak their minority language at home have lost that language. There isn't actually much of an advantage in learning substandard English from foreign parents who speak it badly. (I defend my own use of the language in front of dcs by the fact that it is not substandard).