Help! Bilingual DD learning to read

[cenicienta]

We live in a Spanish speaking country and my 4 yo is just starting to learn letters at school. I would like her to learn English as well.

DOes anyone out there have any experience with bilingual speaking children learning to read and write in 2 languages? Is it best to concentrate on one to start with, or is it possible to learn to read and write in 2 languages simultaneously?

My Dc are bilingual (Welsh and English). They learnt to read and write in Welsh first, then English afterwards. TBH they picked up reading and writing in the second language a lot faster than the first so it didn't take long.

Try posting this in language & bilingualism (apologies if you have already).

In general it's better to get reading well established in one language. A child only needs to learn to 'read' once, the rest is transferring that skill and matching up the words they know with the letters on the page. It's usually advised to start with the more phonetically regular language, however I would personally go with what's being taught at school (and hold off reading in the other language) or if the child is pre formal schooling then whichever they show more interest in. Starting with the majority/community language can be a good idea because there's more environmental reinforcement but again down to the individual.

So in your case I would focus on supporting the process of learning to read in Spanish but continue reading English books together. Your DD will probably at some point start trying to read in Emglish on her own, once she's figured out how it works, and very little a rial teaching will be needed - more guidance on the shape of words. Don't be worried or surprised if she reads in English by whole word recognition rather than spending things out phonically.

We live in Belgium. I taught dd the english letters and phonics sounds at home but never pushed reading. She started french speaking primary at 6.5 and I was a bit concerned when we had friends to stay and her dd, a year younger, read her book out loud.

DD started "proper" reading and writing in French in September, and just transferred the skill to reading and writing in English. All I have needed to do is explain that some letters sound different in English. It helps that they don't really do phonics here, rather a mixture of learning individual letters and total word recognition.

She doesn't even have reading books from school yet, though can write sentences. In English she is now on chapter books - yet spells English words she doesn't know phonetically. It's a bit of a mix, but she has gone from zero to reading in 2 languages in 6 months.

But what if the languages in which the child is bilingual have different scripts? Sorry to highjack the thread... I'm just wondering for my (still far too young) DD...

That one is beyond me....Mind you I learnt Russian at school and learnt the cyrillic alphabet at a much later age. You just teach the 2 together I guess. Children's brains are very flexible. Dd can tell by looking at a word whether to pronounce it in an English or french way.

In which case I would go with the community/school language first.

I stopped all English reading and writing practice (dd had got the basics) when she started school and it was full emersion reading/writing Italian. (they spend the first 3 mths literally doing just that, bums on seats, 3 hrs h/w a night etc etc)
I started again at the end of her first year in school. She's now reading more or less fluently in English. Haven't done any kind of writing with her as for the moment her schoolwork in Italian is so heavy I don't want her weighing down with more stuff.

Thanks. Interesting thread...

I think you have to play it by ear Breastmilk, dd did about half the english alphabet in phonic sounds at preschool, I taught her the other half. She could blend c-a-t for example but not 'read' as I didnt want her to be bored in reception as they went through the phonics daily there.

So in the summer holidays before school she learnt the arabic alphabet. Then we calmed down while she started school. Then once she was reading sentences in english. We went to words in arabic.

The only problem we ever encountered was her 'mirror writing' and which the school ignored saying it would just click and she would realise it looked wrong, it never did as she was used to reading right to left in arabic.

Spanish and English have the same alphabet so no problems there but the letters in Spanish will have different sounds from English. Also English is not a phonetic langauge (ie words not spoken as they are written) whereas Spanish is.However, this should not be aproblem for a young child at all. The brain will eventually decode it all. Main thing is : do not mix Spanish and English at home and all will go well Keep to the English and do as you would normally do if you were in the UK\English speaking country.

We are living in Norway. My eldest two are in school, youngest three in nursery. We have found it all very straightforward. The alphabets are essentially the same - a few exceptions. They are all biligual.

I think that if you can teach your DD English and school teaches her Spanish she will be fine. I think that at the end of the day 'reading is reading'. I do worry about my eldest son who is very reluctant to read at home and so all he basically does is read at school, ie, Norwegian. But then when I do get him to read in English he has improved. I think that a lot of what we do when we are reading - using pictures/context, using our voices, decoding words, phonics, etc, are universal skills. When she gets a bit better with her reading you could start approaching the peculiarities of English with her. I was in Cambridge last week and bought my eldest two books about English grammar but they are now aged 9 and 7.

Good luck.