If OPOL is not an option?

[ThatScottishLass]

The situation is that the minority language (English) is spoken at home and the majority language (Italian) is spoken outside and with guests. Strict OPOL just doesn’t work for our family. She still hears both languages on the regular, and both parents are fully bilingual. The literature I have read reassures me that this method is valid and works, but in forums the only method I see espoused is OPOL... is that really the only option? Is there anyone here with positive experience of another way? I did want to try OPOL initially but dh won’t speak Italian when he gets gone, finds it awkward because we’ve always spoken English at home when we don’t have people over.

[ChilliMum]

My friend does like you, both parents speak the minority language as their first but are fluent in the local language so L1 at home and with family and L2 outside the house and with friends. All the kids are fluent in both languages so it seems to work just as well as OPOL and is probably more natural if both parents have the same L1.

Even in a less ideal situation it can work, we are English and live in France, so speak English at home and my children refuse to speak french with me ever as my accent is apparently both embarrassing and painful to their ears, they suck it up around friends but are absolutely mortified if I try to speak just between us in public. But they speak french at school, hobbies and with friends so speak both perfectly well.

I think as long as the children get enough exposure to both languages and have to use both languages they will adapt to whatever works for you.

[UntilYourNextHairBrainedScheme]

ThatScottishLass what you do is what we've been doing for 14 years. All my kids, aged 9-16, are completely bilingual and the older two completely biliterate. The youngest is formally diagnosed dyslexic but reads fluently in both languages and spells badly in both...

None of my children have ever refused to speak either language, nor ever responded to a question in one language with an answer in the other - a lot of one parent one language kids seem to have long phases of refusing to actively use the minority/ non community language.

I actually think that if both parents are completely fluent in the minority language and one of their native languages is the community language, then minority language at home works significantly better than OPOL, though I know that's an unfashionable opinion

[Asiama]

I agree with @UntilYourNextHairBrainedScheme

OP I have a experienced this both as a child myself, and now as a parent. In my experience children are much more likely to become fluent in both languages if one language is spoken consistently by both parents at home, and the other in the community. I think that's a more successful way to learn the languages than OPOL.

[ThatScottishLass]

Thanks! It’s good to hear other experiences, and it’s a bit of a relief

[ThatScottishLass]

Sorry my phone posted before I had finished writing... we’re under pressure from MIL who is convinced our daughter will be at a disadvantage when she goes to school because her strongest language is likely to be English at that point. I keep telling her that Italian will take over, but she’s convinced herself that we’re setting her up for failure and she got me questioning everything!

[RainingBatsAndFrogs]

There are countless families in the UK where one language (e.g Urdu) is spoken in the home whilst English outside. And the children grow up bilingual. But it ‘just happens’ and is not part of a conscious much discussed educational strategy.

All my kids’ cousins are fluently trilingual and have excellent degree level education, jobs and social lives in English (able to use RP as well as local accent and dialect slang) while being fully fluent in a ‘home’ language as well as a language used in popular soaps and films in the home.

[museumum]

Here )English speaking country) children start school with barely a word of English all the time and there’s barely a difference after one year of schooling. Any differences later may be due to no English-speaking parent at home to help with homework but that’s not the situation for you.

[Gerla]

We did OPOL with first ds but with the younger two it was hard to keep up as we were often with Italian speaking friends. For a long time the younger two found it really hard to speak in English but in the last year or two things have got easier (they are 11). They are still behind their big brother though. I think a lot of factors influence this though. My elder son read loads from an early age which really helped him and he expresses himself really well. You wouldn't think he was Italian from hearing him speak. My younger son has a strong Italian accent which is strange as he has a really good ear for different Italian accents but doesn't seem to pick up a British one!

I think as long as you have enough input in both languages you should be fine.

[ConstantlyCooking]

According to Bilingualism Matters- a group studying language development in multi-lingual families- a range is strategies work. Their work is backed by scientific research and they are usually happy to discuss issues with parents.

[AnotherEmma]

We are a French/English bilingual family living in England. We are doing MLAH because otherwise the children just wouldn't get enough exposure to French. I do speak English to the children when DH isn't around, but when he is we speak French. DS has started speaking French more since we did that and I don't think it's a coincidence.

IMO the language of the country you're in is so dominant that you have to prioritise the other language(s).

Ignore MIL!

[UntilYourNextHairBrainedScheme]

All my kids were ahead of some monolingual peers in the community language when they started kindergarten age 3 despite not speaking the community language at home. I made a big effort to take them to lots of toddler groups with no English speakers (I know that's temporarily not an option) and virtually lived in the village playground during the rest of their waking hours to ensure lots of community language exposure before Kindergarten, but they didn't go to any childcare before Kindergarten age. They did have time with the German inlaws who didn't speak any English - including overnight stays about once a month to once every 6 weeks from age 2, but not before that.

A strong mother tongue is the basis for astrong additional language. Kindergarten were astounded that my children's grammar was correct and fairly complex in German, and I was told at settling in review meetings that their German grammar was ahead of average monolingual peers, which astounded me too as mine wasn't at that stage

One big tip is read to your kids for as long as they'll let you. This really helps keep an age appropriate vocabulary and syntax building - I still read to my nearly 14 year old and the 16 year old stopped listening at about 14, by which point she was reading and enjoying Jane Austen. Her German is as good as her English and her essays are often shated as examples of what the teachers are looking for. DH is German and read to the kids in German until they started school, which is all in German, and I read to them in English.

[Coyoacan]

We live in Mexico and my dd and I mostly speak in English to 8-year-old dgd but sometimes in Spanish, as we are both bilingual. Dgd mostly watches English-language programmes on the internet, but otherwise the rest of her world is in Spanish and she is really fluent in both languages.

[Melassa]

My DD started nursery with stronger English but had no problem with Italian at all. We did OPOL mainly because DP doesn’t speak English. The community language always comes out stronger unless the children are shielded from it (eg. Expat communities where the kids are sent to international school and don’t mix with the locals). I have a friend living in S. America who is Italian and married to a German. They spoke both languages to their DC but since they went to local school Portuguese has overtaken the parents’ languages.

With my DD during the primary years Italian was stronger but then after middle school it flipped to English again. Now she is fully bilingual and biliterate in both languages and has a better vocabulary in either language than many of her monolingual peers, as is often the case with bilingual kids.