teaching him my language could have caused him to have stammer???

[AnnamariaHun]

hi everyone
I've already posted this thread somewhere else but my son still has very strong stammer so please read through his story and any comment would be appreciated...

Ds1(now 2year 9month) was a very early speaker and a lot more advanced than his friends at his age.
he started to stammer when ds2 was born, i am hungarian but my dh (british) and i thought we would make sure his english is good before i teach him hungarian (wrongly)so we waited and so when ds2 was born (ds1 was 2) i decided to start teaching him and so i'd say a sentece in hungarian then follow it in english and as i can remember his stammer started just after this .
i quickly gave up on the hungarian and was hoping that the stammer would go away
his stammer was first like m-m-m-mummy, then it became like streching the words as mouuuuuuuuse and that's what's like now.
we had our first appointment with the speech therapist yesterday who said it's possible that me trying to teach him hungarian suddenly at 2 and also just had a sibling born, could have caused this.
she told me that i should have spoken to him hungarian only from when he was born and never switch to english and that i missed the chance of him being bilingual now (due to his age) and that i should stop any hungarian and don't expose him to any new stress right now and maybe later on if when this gets sorted i could possibly teach him hungarian (but only as a second language),
im very upset that i could have possibly caused this and that if i had this information when he was born , i may have been able to avoid this.
Anyway i know this is a lot of what ifs...

we have been given a lot of great advice and will go back again to see the speech therapist.
im just very woried now as it's been going on for longer than anyone i've read on here and also the speech therapist said that it's unusual for temporary stammerers to have this streching the word type of stammer it's more usual have the m-m-m-m-mummy kind of stammer

so i had the first appointment at the end of april and just got the letter through and the 2nd is not until the 12th of july
Right now his stammer is bad again however it does not seem to bother him in a way that he doesn't stop talking and doesn't tell me that he can't say things(like he did before) in fact he talks more than ever. i've never heard any 2 year old talk this much but im really worried about the stammer as it's been going on for over 8 month...

So was just wondering if anyone had similar experience or any suggestions or advice
thank you

PS sorry for the long story

I don't think it's a language problem, it could be stress related, a new baby AND a new language at the same time, but not just the language.

Maybe leave the language for a bit.

Ideally, yes, you should speak your language from birth but saying he can't be bilingual is just silly. I know of people who moved to France and Spain with children, sometimes teenagers who quickly became fluent.

In many parts of Britain children learn their 'community' language' at home and only start to use English at nursery, they still learn English.

You have done nothing wrong.

I agree with sashh I don't think talking hungarian will have caused the stammer. It is more like to be a new baby thing or something completely unrelated.

My ds stammered for a while but now he is a little older it has almost disappeared. He is 5 and a half and only speaks English. His stammer always sounded like his brain was going faster than his mouth which was cute but we helped him stay calm and practice his sentances. My ds did not seem bothered at all by it nor his friends when he started school.

I am sure he can still be bilingual. What about singing some songs in hungarian so he can just listen. I think it would be good to have some of the language around especially for your baby.

I'd think it's more likely to be something like the arrival of the new baby, or simply his brain working faster than his mouth can keep up with.

We move to Belgium when DD1 was 18 months old. She went straight into a French-speaking crèche. She picked up French that way - with very little difficulty (lucky thing). I wouldn't say there will be any difficulty in your son picking up Hungarian, even if you wanted to leave it until he was a bit older.

Have you Hungarian CDs, DVDs etc that you could have on in the background as you go about your day - this way he is exposed to the sounds and rhythm of the language without being 'taught' it.

Agree - my ds had a stammer when he first started to speak fluently, because his brain was basically able to think of the words faster than his mouth could say them.

I'd also ensure his passive exposure to Hungarian continues through songs and perhaps hearing you speak it with other people, but keep it totally stress-free. I feel the speech therapist has not helped in the way he/she has suggested you've 'done bilingualism wrong' - I know several people who are bilingual who started their other language later than your ds.

I think it is very common for children to stammer at that sort of age. Both DSs did it and they only speak English and did not have any kind of stress in their lives.

Forgot to say that it just disappeared over time.

You seem to be dealing with people who know very little about bilingualism.

As sassh says, your situation is totally normal; many, many families have a home language that is different from the community language, which means exposure to the new language will start around the age of 2 or 3. Looking round the community we do not appear to be surrounded by stuttering Sikhs or Chinese.

And considering that Asian children have the highest exam results of any community in the UK (higher than any group of White British), it can hardly be true that you can't become bilingual by this type of exposure.

Stammering is very, very common in young children. Sometimes there is an underlying problem, but more commonly it is just a stage of development that they grow out of.

It might be little brother or it might just be that his brain is faster than his tongue.

Do whatever you want to do about the Hungarian; just don't allow either yourself or your ds to become stressed about it.

Just speak to your child exclusively in Hungarian, don't repeat in English, if Hungarian is your mother tongue. With an English speaking dad, he'll speak English from dad and Hungarian mum. Don't leave it.

thanks everyone for your comments to be honest right now the way i feel i don't even mind if he won't be bilingual or even talk hungarian at all im more worried about the stammer and if i can have a wish, it woud be that his stammer goes away.
when he has a clear word or sentence he does sound though as if he is rushing the words out so much you can hardly understand that i hope that it is just because his brain is faster than his mouth.
im so worried that if i start talking hungarian again, his stammer would get worse (even if it's just a 1% chance) that i'll probably not persevere with it until his stammer goes away :(

That speech therapist is saying some very silly things about bilingualism. Of course your ds can become bilingual at this age.

There is also nothing wrong with the approach you have taken.

Both dh and I are bilingual, and your approach is exactly the one we took with ds1. If worked fine, and now we are introducing the third language (dh's other language) the same way.

I know many people who have done exactly the same and their dc, now teenagers, are bilingual.

I also know many children who at around that age had funny ways they say things, sometimes stammers, sometimes other deformations of the language. They all lost it in time.

I would say this is rubbish but I'm not an expert. Perhaps read up about what causes stammers.

i thought we would make sure his english is good before i teach him hungarian (wrongly)so we waited and so when ds2 was born (ds1 was 2) i decided to start teaching him and so i'd say a sentece in hungarian then follow it in english

The ideal would have been OPOL from birth, you in Hungarian and dad in English, you avoiding speaking English directly to your son. Don't repeat what you say in English, the aim is to learn by immersion, not by translating from one language to the other.

she told me that i should have spoken to him hungarian only from when he was born and never switch to english and that i missed the chance of him being bilingual now (due to his age) and that i should stop any hungarian and don't expose him to any new stress right now and maybe later on if when this gets sorted i could possibly teach him hungarian (but only as a second language)

No of course you haven't missed the chance to "teach" Hungarian, I can see the speech therapist's point that suddenly introducing a 2nd language and the way in which you describe you do it must be very confusing, however I cannot see a reason why NOT to speak Hungarian now, if your first language is Hungarian and that is the language you are most comfortable in and have a wider vocabulary in, you should speak it and not your 2nd language English.

I wouldn't get too stressed about this stammer. There is a very good chance that he'll grow out of it and even if he doesn't it's not the end of the world.

I had a professor who had a very pronounced stammer; it never stopped him from gaining an international reputation and being invited as a speaker to conferences all over the world. Rowan Atkinson has a stammer (you can hear it in interviews)-it's hardly held him back as an actor.

You can't know what is causing your son to stammer so you could end up lunging from one explanation to another, stopping one thing, starting another, making you both nervous and stressed. Just go with the flow: if you want to speak Hungarian to him, then do so.

I spoke only English to my DD from birth and she is 2.6 now with a bit of a stammer when she gets excited. She says a 'yo-yo-yo' and then her words. She hardly ever speaks English to me but understands it all.

At this age children are like sponges. Why not start speaking only Hungarian to your new baby and let your DS soak it all in. Don't get worried if he doesn't choose to speak it back, it's no reflection on his ability to understand.

He's still so little so I wouldn't worry too much. Go back to the Hungarian when it feels right, maybe to start with as a fun extra lesson on Saturday mornings once he's in school (make a special you and him time of it, set it up like a cool little classroom, lots of games etc). I don't believe in pushing a language.

I remember from my early trilingual childhood the insecurity of not feeling sure which language to speak to whom, which was then followed by years of selective mutism when I went to (bilingual) primary school. I'm not claiming it caused the SM, but having read up on the condition years later, lots of feelings came flooding back and I'm sure inside myself that that insecurity played a very large part in it. When my DS1 was small we lived in a trilingual situation (2 languages at home, another one in his nursery and community) and I did worry excessively about seeing him get quieter and quieter (yes, bringing my own issues in to the picture ).

Even if you delay teaching your children Hungarian for a little while, I'm guessing there will be visits to Hungary that will familiarise them with the sounds, which will hopefully spark their interest in copying and then talking the language. Also, DVDs and books in the second language are handy. My Chzech friend speaks with her dds in English at home in the UK, but they can speak Chzech just fine with their relatives when they go back for visits, thanks to regular visits, dvds, books, and any other exposure she's been able to get for them.

Listen to everyone's advice on here and also the speech therapist. Then follow your instincts about what it right. :)

2y 9m is very young still in language acquisition terms. From birth makes it easier, but up to about 5 it shouldn't be much of a problem - there are plenty of kids from minority language situations who don't have much exposure to the majority language until they start school - I know some Welsh adults who didn't know any English until they started school at 7, and there's nothing wrong with their English now.

Also, be careful that your own concern about the stammer doesn't bleed over to your son. Your fretting over it could make it worse. Stammers in children are not uncommon and they can grow out of it - certain even for much older kids speech therapy works wonders. My suggestions is relax, speak Hungarian to him and just let it evolve from there. Also, DS1 not speaking Hungarian will make it very difficult to bring up DS2 speaking Hungarian.

thanks everyone! all your comments have been great and useful, just a quick update.
just had our 2nd visit to the speach therapist (first one end of april)
even before we went there, i knew that his stammer is better than it was in april, he stopped making facial tension and the struggling bits are getting shorter and shorter. Speech therapist did an assesment on him on how advanced his understanding is (just in case it had anything to do with the stammering) and she said that it equals to an almost 4 year old's understanding which made me very poud:) (he will be 3 in sept)
this was our first time with this speech therapist and her overall opinion was that yes someone who never met him before would notice that there is occasional disfluency but he seems to be able to recover from it and he is not aware of it or if he is, it doesn't seem to bother him at all as he just doesn't stop talking.
we also agreed that she puts us on the waiting list for a video support therapy where she would asess me playing with him and if im using all the technics ok.
so i am happy that he is making a progress and hopefully he will grow out it soon.
in regards to hungarian, i only recently started talking to ds2 a very few basic words which ds1 surprisingly remembered and tried to copy them.
im feeling positive about the whole thing and have got to a stage where i am not (that:) worried about wheather he will end up talking (or understanding) hungarian.Main thing is that he lives a happy life and if later on he becomes interested in the language, i'll support him...

thanks again for all your comments and support and i'll give another update in a short while just to let you know how he is doing