Bilingual families

[Pitchounette]

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It really is his problem here, and you need to make him realise that if he wants to understand what is said between you and the children, he will need to start learning French.

There are so many opportunities to learn french over here. I am sure there are evening classes he can attend.

My husband has had to learn Danish, he still aint fluent, but he tries, and he gets frustrated and wants to quit but he doesn't.

My husband keeps it up by speaking to the children, sometimes me (I am forever going around correcting him, but it is worth it) and he reads the Danish goodnight stories, or other books that we have for the children.

You could get him to watch some of his favourite films in English with French subtitles, and then swap around watching the same film in French with English subtitles. One day he will be able to watch that film solely in French.

However, he knows it is something he needs to do for the sake of the children. I don't think he is bad, and I know he is never going to be fluent. Danish is too hard a language for that ever to happen. Most foreigners who have moved to Denmark don't achieve fluency even after having lived there for 20 years.

tbh - all he needs to do is 'understand' French well even if he doesn't want to go the extra mile to speak it well. this is much easier to do than to become completely fluent. He can then continue to speak english but will understand the conversatons not in English.

My sister married an Italian and he never learned to speak English very well but he speaks it a bit and he understands pretty much anything that is said so there is no problem about him undertanding when we peak to the children in English.

I am danish, my partner is french, we live in france (we been living in Ireland before and had our 2 children i england). We speak to each other in english since he does not speak danish and I am learning french, but still not strong enough.
I think that if your are all together maman, dad and kids then speak one language,english because you both understand, and no one will feel left out, and there will be no miss understandings. But if you are with the kids by yourself or playing etc. speak french and your partner english. You will still be able to teach your kids french and english. The children knows that maman speaks french and dad speaks english. and when we are all together we speak english. We are doing it this way at the moment so fx. at the dinnertable it is english because we are all together or if our children have done something wrong etc and we need to explain to them that they are going to loose some toys, spend time in there room etc. it is english because it is important that we can support each other. I don't speak very well french but I do understand most, but I still insist that big issues and mealtimes should be in english. But what we do is naming food on plate etc in french so the children learn (they are 2 and 3 ) and for me too learn. It has to be fun to learn another language. But don't expect your partner to handle a conflict with the kids in french I think you need to be really secure in a language before you deal with conflict with the kids. It works for us.

Why doesn't your DH learn french ?
I am half french/half english....DH is english but can speak good,( but not fluent ), french....we live in France,( but DH works in UK...I know complicated !).The children have engish as first language,( they also have an english nanny looking after them...though she speaks fluent french too as she was partially brought up out here ),and speak french at school and in community. Think it essential that each parent speaks the other's language to a certain extent. DH speaks exclusively english to DCs but Nanny and I swap backand forth.....

I am English, my partner is French. Both of us speak our own language to our daughter, and we always speak French together - I am bilingual, my partner's English is fluent but not yet good enough to sustain a long-term relationship .

Our issue is with my stepsons, whose mother is French and who have grown up monolingual French. They are given every extra opportunity to speak and hear English (for example I have just spent a few days in England with my elder stepson). Basically, I think we all need to be bilingual in order to get along (my partner completely agrees) and that's what we are working at.

Pitchounette - could he not take private lessons?

My partner started learning Italian 3 years ago with private lessons and he has made great progress at the ripe old age of 42.

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Yes...we are very lucky ! She came to us when we had our first,( he is 6 now ),we lived in London then....it just happened that she was partly bought up in France,( from 8-16 yrs ),though neither of her parents is french. Last summer we decided to move to France,( which we actually accomplished in November in the end....a certain amount of chaos goes on in the Mozhe household ), and she agreed to come with us. I think she likd the idea of going back to France.....though we will be going back to UK next summer,( possibly via a 6 month stint in NY..she will come with us too )....
We have 6 LOs now....as of 27th June !!! ....definitely the last I think.

I would agree with Denmark - my dh speaks Catalan, I speak English and we speak Castellano to each other. We each speak our own language to ds (only 10 weeks!) when on our own but if we are together we tend to speak Castellano as the ´family language´. Dh speaks good, but not fluent, english and I do not speak Catalan although I understand about 90%. I can´t see why we wouldn´t keep this up as he gets older and it certainly would make sense that any family discussions should be in a language we all understand perfectly.

Hopefully I will study Catalan at some point, I did try this winter but mistakenly signed up to a class for foreigners (where it took 2 hours to teach 30 people how to say ´my name is´) when I should have signed up for another level so boredom and frustration won out and I gave up..Dh continues studying english as and when he can. Your dh should make more effort to learn more french but many british people have a mental block about learning another language, it all seems impossibly hard so they don´t try...

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yes.....I will go back beginning of third week....but only because DS is in special care in the hospital attached to uni where I work....so will be convenient

DOes your husband feel a bit left out, as though you and your kids have a little private language? This is the only reason I can think he would intervene when he canT really catch whats been said. It sounds like he wants to contribute and make his presence kown. I would tactfully tell him not to intervene if youVe been speaking in French because he often misunderstands and although heS trying to be helpful it sometimes seems to backfire. Or alternatively you could speak English as a family. That way no-one gets "left out". How about: when youre with the children alone, French can be the language. But as a family, its English? ARe you a SAHM? If so, then they should be getting enough French. I take it you live in the UK (if you live in France, do not worry about the French at all).

I'm in exactly the same situation as you, Pitchounette, except that I'm half French half English...and have always lived in the UK. My father is English, but spoke fluent French, which made all the difference - as people have said!

My DH speaks very little French (and promised to learn about 10 years ago ), but does understand a fair bit - however, I end up speaking in English when we're 'en famille' and I'm not alone with the dds, so that he isn't excluded.

The problem is, dd1 - who is 3.5 - barely answers me in French anymore. Since starting pre-school (English) her English has overtaken her French, and although she understands perfectly, she struggles to speak

Will your children be going to French or English schools?

Forgot - my own 'solution' (isn't really) was to find a p/t French nanny/help when dd1 was 14 months old. She is wonderful, and has made a huge difference to my French as well as dd's - or at least did, prior to pre-school.

My mother is French and father is Irish, and I'm bilingual. Although they've been married 37 years my father still doesn't speak french, although we all spoke french to each other at home. I'm sure it has rankled him over the years, and I can remember the odd "can you say that in a language we all understand" comment. That said I don't remember any real friction. I think the fact that maman was a SAHM mother and my father worked long hours made a difference.

tripple, did you ever go through a phase of not speaking much French? I'm clinging to something I heard about kids needing to master one language properly around the age of 3, before being able to be fluent in both?

I'm a SAHM, but dh doesn't work long hours and is around a lot....knew it was all his fault...

No, I guess I always associated French as my "home" language. I also went to a French school until I was 6, so english was really my second language until I went to another school. It was great though, my siblings and I mostly spoke to french to each other until we were teens, especially in public.

Ah, French school...that would do it. I wish we lived nearer one, though suspect they wouldn't have dd anyway as neither of her parents is French National.

We used to speak French as kids too, thinking no one would understand that - my Mum still tends to do that, especially when commenting on other people on public transport, to my utter as in London a huge amount of people understand every word!

haven't read the thread but to answer OP:
I always wait til Dh has finished "discussing" then ask him what he has said and I expect him to tell me instantly. I never talk over him if he is the chief "discussing" parent.

However, sometimes I do get the rought side of his tongue, so to speak, as he doesn'thave chance to alter his tone of "discussing".