Want son to speak language of grandmother, but don't know how!

[Tattie100]

I am british, but DH is part flemish. We want DS to be able to communicate in flemish (with his grandmother and family) but DH's flemish is patchy as he never really lived in Belgium and hasn't spoken it much since he lived with his mother? Any suggestions?

Get grandma over for a while, if you can cope with MIL around for longish periods? Or regular communcication with that part of the family (you can all talk for free on skype if everyone has internet access). Also, when DS is older, if you can, try to spend plenty of time with the Flemish speaking part of the family especially any who have children/neighbours with children - kids pick up languages really quickly, you'll be surprised at how much a 4 year old will learn in one summer. I'm speaking from experience here, as my family moved to France when I was a kid. I'm already having some fun skype conversations with French speaking niece and nephew, who want DD to speak better French than their grandad does!

Thanks Roskva - some good ideas - ds is only 20mths and quite slow in his development of language, and I am a bit worried that at this stage having grandma communicate in flemish might confuse matters - do you think we should perhaps wait until ds is old enough to spend summers with grandma? Also, I wouldn't mind (too much!) her coming for extended visits but our current home is quite small and it would be a bit cramped for everyone unfortunately!

Tattie, I don't think it's ever too early to start, and personally I wouldn't worry that ds will get confused, he is more likely just to think that Gran speaks differently to Mum and Dad, and uses different word. It is likely that he will learn the words that it takes to get Gran to respond to him in the way he wants. At first he may not grasp the concept that an English word and a Flemish word mean the same thing - that comes with time. However, I do think that early exposure to a language makes it easier to learn, and I think that my brother was insane not to speak to his children in English - his ten year old is now finding it harder consciously to learn than if she had picked it up from hearing it spoken around her.

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hi !
flemish is part dutch and part french, so try to get some basic things for those. the net is very good and sometimes you can hear how to say a word too.