Need to rant re people reaction to OPOL

[StoneBaby]

We are an OPOL family with my language (French) being the minority one. I am started to get fed up with the comments I or DH get from people who don't understand that a child don't automaticly come with English!
DS is 20 months old and so far I got:

• Do you think he understand you when you speak French to him? (from a friend who knows we're OPOL!)
• Do you translate into English everything you tell him?
• So you're teaching him French too?
• How can he understnad what you're telling him?

If I was to get those comments once in a while I could cope but I hear them so often that I just want to tell people to think for just 1 second before they make those comments.

Sorry just needed to rant before I explode!!!

What is OPOL?

One Parent One Language - it mean that each parent only speak their own language to the child.

I think that language is one of the greatest gifts you can give to a child, and I wish that I had the language skills to enable my children to speak another language fluently. Keep doing it!

Don't worry about it, you're doing the right thing for your family and you know that it works. Lots of people believe that one language (English usually!) is the norm. My daughter was once congratulated for speaking Welsh so well - I'm not sure what they expected since that's the language we speak as a family. Lots of people don't understand bilingualism. Good luck! Don't change anything. x

Agree - don't worry about it. Just ignore them. The English are notoriously bad for their abillity to learn foreign languages. At 43, I constantly feel ashamed that someone half my age can easily swap between speaking English, French, Dutch and German with comparative ease. You are really doing a great thing! Keep at it.

I know what you mean!! My OH's sister thought my DS would "automatically" speak spanish, and we would have to teach him English!

My father is very derogatory about the fact my DS is in a OPOL situation. He thinks I'm 'holding' him back.
Even though my DS is two and half and speaks both languages equally. If you lived in switzerland I bet nobody would ask you those questions!

My SIL told my DH to stop talking his language to DD as she (SIL) couldn't understand it so it was rude.
People also queued up to tell us she would speak later. Total bollocks, in our case.
Now I just get funny looks from people thinking we are pushy parents.

You can't win, it's best to just ignore people TBH.

I should add that I live in Belgium - and thank the Lord for all the people who speak fantastc English! Dd is now about 50/50 I think in English/French. Dh totally disagrees with my opinion that as she should watch more FRENCH tv than English, as she is educated in that language, we don't speak it at home and she NEEDS to learn vocabulary.

StoneBaby - maybe people are just curious because they don't understand how children acquire language. If you don't come from a multilingual family you wouldn't automatically know how it works.

Stone

What can I say? There is no shortage of cretins in the world.

The same people who would not dream of challenging a doctor, lawyer or even a window cleaner - because they know nothing about these things - will gladly share their theories on the place of language in education with you, "because it's obvious".

I personally just do my best to ignore them.

And some of those idiots are involved in language education. It doesn't occur to them that bilingualism can develop perfectly naturally from birth - several of my colleagues are shocked that I speak to DS in English already, like it'll prevent him learning French.

I've been treating him like a mini experiment - at 5 months he already understands there are at least 2 languages, some people speak one and some the other and he babbles differently. Daddy is the only person allowed to switch freely, everyone else gets a funny look which I suspect is intonation based but we don't know any other perfectly bilingual people to teat that and I might be intonation based.

Hang in there love.

By the time they are properly verbal most of the faces have turned into impressed faces as small people flip from one language to another.

Although there will always be a tiny hardcore who will take issue and leap on any invented word made by squashing two languages together like its proof you have FUCKED YOUR CHILD UP! FOR LIFE !!

Look up any random bilingualism expert with a name you can remeber and when they rant just say

"So was it the methodology or the interpretation of the findings that you took issue with in Professor Colin Baker's latest study? I can see why the sample size might give pause, but did you not feel the conclusion took that into account ?"

Say it all interested faced, like you are just delighted to have found somebody else into and informed about the ideas and issues in the field.

Watch them squirm, and beat a hasty retreat in case you ask them more diffiuclt questions that reveal their entire postion is based on knee kerks, snap judgements and anacdote which would make them look silly.

It's all about twisting an attack into a need for a defence, without breaking into a sweat

The one that gets me these days is "isn't he lucky?"

No, 11years of blood, sweat and tears is not usually called
luck, it's called effort.

But I just smile (through slightly gritted teeth) cos that is just not knowing, rather than knowing nothing but still wanting to tell me what to do.

I particularly like "Do you think he understand you when you speak your language to him?"
Well no, I just like the sound of my own voice.

And the "lucky" bit as well - it is a lot of effort especially if you are doing the minority language. But I find my language improving as we muddle along and rediscover all those strange myths and stories I knew when I was younger. It is a lot of fun too.

Thanks for all your comments, it's good to know it's not just us!

Suckstobeme - had to laugh. I'm in Switzerland and someone at playgroup was genuinely shocked lo understood me when I told him off in English. Don't be fooled by the fact that Switzerland has 4 official languages, in my experience, most people are monolingual.

I find that some multilingual people are amazed that some children understand a language they don't understand. Don't know how that works. It's really odd.

Don't be fooled by the fact that Switzerland has 4 official languages, in my experience, most people are monolingual

Actually I'm thinking perhaps the whole "oh woe is Uk, the rest of Europe is chock a block with six year olds who can speak ten languages" is a crock of shit.

Maybe a select few countries manage one or two second languages to a reasonable degree of proficiency, but in Italy while two MFL are taught, very few go beyond the sort of very limited "school child" attainment that most of us managed with French at school too.

Friends in Portugal, Spain, Greece report the same.

In northern Europe (Scandinavia, Netherlands etc) most children are expected to reach some degree of proficiency in English by their late teens. Educated people, the kind of people who go on to university, might reasonably be expected to reach a level of proficiency in two or three foreign languages. Again, by their late teens, not in infancy. Most of my friends at uni spoke two or three languages well- some went considerably further. At uni we were expected to use books in some 3 or 4 languages (printing costs)- but that is obviously not the same as being bilingual.

However, in India and other parts of Asia, it is really common for families to be bi-or tri-lingual- I have been told that many extended families don't share one language, but need two or three just so all the aunties can get together.

Ignorant people ask ignorant questions. Silly people ask silly questions. I'm afraid you're just going to have to rant every so often, because there are an awful lot of ignorant people around and an awful lot of silly people around.

I am mightily envious of you and of your child's 'luck' in growing up with two languages.

In Belgium it is very common for people (especially the younger generations) to speak 3, 4 or more languages fluently or to reasonable level. The english speaking ability of my work colleagues puts my french to shame (less said about my Flemish the better )

(I know I said luck but I can't think of the right word right now, sorry )

My MIL came out with a few gems the other day,

"Speaking English to LO will just be confusing for them"

"Of course, you and DH will speak Dutch to each other once LO is born" (which actually all of DHs family seem to think)

and then when I tried to explain to her how important it was that LO speaks English by saying that it would be nice for our child to be able to speak to and understand MY family,
"Oh, but you only see your parents once or twice a year!" (not true and also slightly ridiculous - she's never heard of Skype!).

As long as you can laugh about it! DH and I are determined to do things our way and sod everyone else!

I've just finished reading "Growing up with two languages" by Una Cunningham and it's given me some good ammunition against annoying comments (am going to lend it to my MIL...in English of course!).

We're just starting down this path. My DH is Austrian and we live in Vienna so it's my English that is the minority!
Thanks for the books/ authors hints a few of you mention- we've no clue how to do this and aren't very rigid about OPOL. DD is a very descriptive pointer at the moment with associated degree of frowning to demonstrate how fast she expects her orders to be actioned.

Now, that's a thread I like. I am much the same but am a very stubborn OPOL parent so don't give a monkey about what people may say...

There's the 'Is it not confusing for the children?', that's one that comes back often... I just explain simply that no, the children may do code-mixing but just because they don't know the right word in one language and only when they know the other person understands both languages anyway, which we, as bilingual adults, do all the time too anyway, cause it's easy!...

Anyway, as everyone else said, you 'just' need to keep at it. I know that I myself have really missed out not being raised bilingual and therefore was not able to speak to half my family (my mum's) and once I knew I was going to have my children in (yet) another country, they would be bilingual so they could have the relationship I missed out on with their grandparents, cousins, etc...

best wishes to everyone!

thistlemuncher Oh! you have shattered my illusion of Switzerland being pretty near damm perfect!!!