Learning to read for multi-lingual child

[pena]

Hi Questions here to parents with multi-lingual children.

Which approaches did you take to introduce reading skills to your multi-lingual DC? Did you start with one language exclusively and progress to the other languages later, or did you do both/all simultaneously? and at which age did you start? which language did you choose to focus on supporting them - the school one vs the 2nd or 3rd? how do you minimise the confusion and keep their motivation?

Sorry so many questions, but DS is 5 yrs old and showing an interest in reading - I'm struggling as to the best way to help him. He goes to a French school and speaks French to DH and learns Mandarin with me. English we've kind of left to languish so he speaks as well as one can from watching Power Rangers.

Many thanks for sharing your experiences.

Of interest, especially if you are in East London:
Waltham Forest Bilingual Group .
You don't have to live in Waltham Forest to join!
Sorry not posting more, short of time...

Exactly my words to DH too MrsBojangles - "You do it then"

I finally managed to get DH to do Jolly Phonique (the French version of JP) with DS, despite his misgivings about my pushy mum neurotic anxieties since most French children don't start reading until 6 yo. DS seems to enjoy it, DH is thrilled that DS is reading and they like the special time together in French. He even asked me to not speak French to him when I tried to sneak in some JP exercises.

Not surprisingly, it has been better for all that dh took over the French literacy part as he can enunciate the subtle nuances in the letter sounds as can be expected from a native speaker.

I have not started to (formally) teach ds how to read in English as I'm focusing on his Chinese first. For now I'm taking a passive approach in English e.g. if he attempts to read the cereal boxes, I'd correct him and explain that the letter sounds are different in English. He seems to cope ok & to my surprise he even managed to figure out how to spell "Exoforce" in his letter to Santa even tho' the letter sounds for E and X are different in French. Hey, when the incentive is there...

I also consulted ds' teacher last week. He has taught at overseas French schools for almost 10 years and is familiar with multi-lingual children. He said that as long as ds receives instructions on the respective languages from clear and separate sets of teachers i.e. French from dh and him, Chinese from me, then there is no risk of language confusion. Also, he said that once ds understands one system of alphabets then picking up the additional ones is almost a snap - hence my Exoforce example I guess.

God! Why do they have to like toys with a million annoying little bits that need a manual and a PHD to assemble. Of course, I'm the one who'll be assembling Exoforce on X'mas day.

pena - my 6 year old is just learning to read, and our linguistic situation is similar to yours, but with different languages. He is learning in his weakest language. I will let him get proficient before introducing the other 2 languages. This means he may not be reading English books fluently til he is 8.

This worked for my dd, and she went straight in with 8 year old books in English.

LOL at Exoforce, you are right if there's motivation they'll learn it. I always have to try and not cringe with laughter when dd states that she wants to watch 'schrott', which is what I call rubbish TV cartoon series... so if it suits her she will use her German. Know what you mean re alphabet letters sound different. Same here. Really need to unload English homework onto dh ;)

And another quote from dd to smile over:
Mama why are you speaking English with papa but not with me?
'because papa doesn't speak German'
Papa you need to learn German!

As for toys with lots of little pieces... be glad you don't have a girl... all I say is Barbie and Polly Pocket!

I can also recommend (when they're a bit older) to get comics etc. to really make reading in the weaker language enticing.
Dd1 is 7 and bilingual in English/German, but German is by far her weaker language. She can read German but finds it a bit of a chore - since getting my old Donald Ducks (Lustige Taschenbuecher! )out of the loft she's been reading lots of German. Also, we put a TV in her room - but it only receives KiKa (German version of Cbeebies/CBBC).

ButternutSquash - many thanks for the link below.

Anyone who hasn't visited the Waltham Forest Bilingual Group site ButternutSquash recommended - should. Good book recommendations. The summaries of past speakers/experts they've had on bilingualism are very interesting if, like me, you find the whole area of language acquisition fascinating, or if you just want to pick up some tips for your own family.

It's hard work to follow the bi/multilingual path especially when you see that your own dc are "behind" mono-lingual children in speaking, reading and writing. I'm constantly reminding myself that it's OK, and he'll soon catch up in spurts and bursts as they inevitably do.

A funny/odd thing I observed in ds yesterday. He said that he didn't like the other children at school to know that he speaks Chinese. He also definitely prefers to play with the Anglophone kids in his class over the fully French ones. I can understand the strong desire to conform but a bit surprised that it is happening so early at 5 yo. Also that they appear to be very aware of the cultural differences and are expressing a preference in the friends they choose to hang out with.

5 year olds can be funny that way Especially if they're making fun of him speaking another language it might make him reluctant.

We're lucky, dd's class is fairly mixed with 'foreign' kids and also they have just had a SN child start so they're learning sign language to help him, which they all absolutely love and nobody is making fun of the new kids only because he can't speak 'properly' yet. Have to say in that respect I'm very impressed with the school because they teach 'integration' . Shame we're moving away but hoping the new school will be the same.

Off now to have a look at that website

I've just checked out that site as well, it is interesting. Strange how they comment that many relatives try to discourage parents from bringing up children bilingually - we had that as well. There seems to be a fear of language, as though somehow the children won't "belong" to one culture, if they speak another language.

pena, my children have been behind others all through their school life. dd1 is now 10, and she seems to be pulling away with the others in her class at last. She has studied in English, French and German.

ds1 (8)is still struggling. I am not worried, but unfortunately, the school where we now are, places very high emphasis on grades. If your child doesnt get the grades, they dont look at why, instead they just make them repeat the year. This shows fundamental lack of understanding of bilingual children, and if they do it to ds, we may leave Germany altogether, because I really, strongly, do not want ds to be a year older than all the other children in his class. (he can be quite aggressive sometimes, could develop into a v bad situation) Plus, he is not immature for his age, and should be communicating with other children of his own age. We didnt have these problems in UK or France, where the attitude is more, just let them get on with it.

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Salut Pitch - Have you heard of Jolly Phonics - it's quite a well known method pioneered by a school teacher in the UK. They have also developed a French version for French Canadian schools called (surprise surprise) Jolly Phonique. I ordered mine from Amazon.

The principal method is very sensible and systematic, also resembles the approach at ds' lycee - recognising sounds and associating them with the letters, learning to blend letters to form words. We are working our way thru' the 36 sounds in French i.e. the 26 lettres & unique French ones like the accented lettres & the oi, on, en, an sounds.

I must say that I am learning a lot too and improving my own pronunciation! I think what's particularly good about this is that it helps ds develop a good ear for French pronunciation.

oh and you can also order from the Amazon french site - fnac - French books. If you live close to an Alliance or Institut Francaise they may have a children's library. Get CDs, DVDs, games - that I found was the most effective way to engage them in the language.

Essentially I try to blanket cover my kids with as much of their "minority languages" as possible. Its a battle since English is all pervasive, sounds cooler bec. all the other kids speak it, and all the animated movies are in English too. I used to surreptitiously switch Monsters Inc to the Chinese language version until ds discovered that the DVD also came in English - and now insists that I always put the films in VO version originale!

Oh - my MIL gave us lots of French cartoon classics which your ds might like. e.g. Bonne Nuit les Petits (ds loved it when he was 3 yo), Barbapapa (we got it free at a petrol station of all places in France), Bibiphoque, Felix le chat.

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I am teaching mine (nearly 6) to read french using this book , it's very good, based on "old fashioned" b-a ba method, so very similar to phonics methods. It's going very well!
I am also doing the same with DVDs, it's worth trying to get old French TV series, like Barbapapa, les Shadoks, L'Ile aux Enfants etc.

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Hi, Just reading through the link and found quite some interesting bits especially about the learing to read. I also must say that although I do have a strict OPOL policy in this house I do do sounds in English (I speak Dutch) as that is what he learns at school and I think it would be to confusing for him at this stage. I do think my ds realises that I only do it because of this. Also since starting full time school he mixes his languages an awful lot, meaning that he speaks less and less Dutch. But I am not worried as I have read a very very good book about raising bilingual children and realise that this is quite normal.

Hi, Just reading through the link and found quite some interesting bits especially about the learing to read. I also must say that although I do have a strict OPOL policy in this house I do do sounds in English (I speak Dutch) as that is what he learns at school and I think it would be to confusing for him at this stage. I do think my ds realises that I only do it because of this. Also since starting full time school he mixes his languages an awful lot, meaning that he speaks less and less Dutch. But I am not worried as I have read a very very good book about raising bilingual children and realise that this is quite normal.

Pitchounette, my rule is to have only one version of each dvd. My 2.3y old dd watches Noddy and never Oui-Oui, and Andy Pandy only in French. I feel this is coherent with the OPOL approach.
This discussion is really interesting, even if it raises some issues that are quite far ahead of us still. But no doubt they will arise earlier than we think.

you guys are so well informed and organised! belgianmama - what is the book?

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We only speak German at home (both dh and I as it's our mother tongue) but live in the UK. Our children attend an English school.

I try to read to them in German a lot and we have German DVDs/videos, story CDs etc.

However, we do have English books, DVDs and videos as well. I never ever speak to my children in English, only German, but I do read English books to them as I feel they should get to know them as well (and even though they do get read to at school I think it wouldn't be enough variety).

So far we only had one version, eg Bob the B. only in English, Julia Donaldson books only in English, some particular German characters only in German.

I have to say though that they're really interested to hear Bob the B. speak German (or even other language such as Italian, French, even American English, lol) as well. I can see this might not be consistent with the OPOL approach (which doesn't apply in our case anyway, here we have the family language German, the "outside language" is English). But it might to let them realise that Bob the B. (i.e. other people) can be bilingual (or trilingual or more) as well.

Also, I practise their reading with them, so they read their English Oxford Reading Tree books (and my 7-year-old his Chapter books) to me.
Talking about the books is mainly in German though.

My 7-year-old can now read simple texts in German as well although we haven't practised this a lot, only very occasionally.

I've now ordered a German textbook that's also used in German schools for them.

For my children it would be too much to learn to read in both languages at the same time, so we stuck to English first. However, I know some very clever children who learn both at the same time and don't even need much practice.

dd is learning to read German at school and after overcoming her initial problems, she seems to be doing fine, sounding words out the way they're taught at school. German is really quite phonetic (at least compared to English) so it isn't too difficult I don't think. She was chuffed last night when she got "Regenbogenfisch" and "angesengten Hemden". I find these long words and the silent "h" (ihn, seht) the only real problems so far.

I didn't want her to learn to read English at the same time because it would be really confusing learning to pronounce the same letters or groups of letters in different ways for each of the languages. However, she is always trying to read English by herself whenever she gets the opportunity.

In the end I let her use the Starfall website which someone on MN recommended. It's American so the pronunciation isn't always the same as mine but I let her play around the website as long as she likes and she's picking it up that way but I don't actively practice English reading with her.

So far so good.

SSShakeTheChi,

Are you living in the UK or in Germany? And how old is your daughter?
I am interested as my german/english dd (4.5 yrs) is currently learning to read in School in England. While she speaks German very well, I have not yet introduced much German reading so as not to confuse her too much.

I do agree with you, though, that reading in German is much more 'logical' (in the sense that you pronounce words excactly as you see them) with much fewer exceptions and than english.

I agree with SSShakeTheChi and annasmami about German being easier phonetically. I remember worrying about letting DS1 learn to read German first at school (and not teaching him to read English first) but I found it worked well. Both DSs taught themselves to read English once they'd learned in German at school. I still find that amazing.

My unscientific theory is that it seemed once the brain had learned how to decode the letters as words, it worked for the other language too. They found it easier to cope with the pronunciation oddities of English, perhaps because they had confidence in reading already. They both still read out new words and then correct themselves, e.g. "sight" - "seegt, oh, sight" as they match what they read with the word they know verbally.

geekgrrl - I found the Lustige Taschenbuecher good too for getting the boys to read more German. DS2 was keen to learn to read English so he could read Calvin and Hobbes by himself. Trouble was, he enjoyed all the English language books/comics so much more and his teacher called me in and said his German had got worse in the course of the 1st Year and he should read more German. I was struggling and he was resisting till I thought of the Donald Ducks.

annasmami, we live in Germany and dd (6 is in year 1 at a German school). When we started in August, there was only 1 dc in the class who could already read. They seem to be coming along very fast though. Can you get a German reading Fibel sent over? They concentrate on a particular letter/sound every page, ie. EU and then you get words like heulen, Beule etc coming up on that page although it is a storybook not just a collection of sentences. That's how it's taught here it seems.

The problem I found with dd learning to read both languages at once (starting from scratch) is that she'd transfer those fairly indistinct and short vowel sounds we have, like "uh" etc to German and it just doesn't work. I think once dc are confident enough in 1 language that they can read fairly fluently, recognise a lot of words by sight etc, you can make a start on reading another language.

Like you Fink, I didn't know whether she should be learning to read in English first since it's her mother tongue but I decided her primary school language is German for now so she really needs to be secure with that and at the moment, that's the most important thing.

Good to hear that your dc picked up reading English so easily.