Should or shouldn't I speak English to a child who will grow up in England?

[Meita]

Hi all,
I was hoping for some sage advice here... Although it is still very early days, as I'm only three months pregnant, but I'd still be interested in any suggestions or pointers.

My DP and I both grew up in Switzerland, and we speak Swiss German together unless there are others present who don't understand. DP's English is pretty good - he teaches and publishes in English - but it is still definitely an acquired second language to him.

Myself, I grew up bilingually, having an English mum and a Swiss dad who tended to speak English to each other when we kids were small, as my mum only learned Swiss German with us. So my "first" language chronologically is English, but as I went through school and Uni in German, English was never my "best" language. Until I moved to England three years ago... all the practice in English and the neglect of German have pretty much evened things out, so I'd say that now I'm equally fluent and comfortable in both languages.

So now we're wondering about what to do when baby arrives. We would definitely want the child to learn to speak Swiss German, as he/she would otherwise not be able to communicate with my DP's family, whose English is very limited.
I considered a OPOL approach, DP Swiss German and me English - BUT I would miss speaking to my child in Swiss German... and I don't know any English-language nursery rhymes or baby-talk but I do in Swiss German.

So instead perhaps it would be better to just continue as we are doing now, having the home language Swiss German.

Then again, I see two problems with that:
First, from my experience of talking to my cat , I know that I tend to constantly switch languages. I suppose it would be confusing for a child if it turns out to be "one parent, one language - the other parent, a mix of two languages"? What do you think?
Second, if we both stick to Swiss German, will we not make life harder for our child for when he/she starts interacting with his/her English-speaking environment? My mum likes to remind us kids that there was a time when we were really angry at them, telling them off for not having taught us the same language as our mates spoke.

Would appreciate any input - including pointers to books or web resources worth reading.

In your situation I would speak swiss german. You seem to be more comfortable in that language both as an individual (you say you would miss speaking swiss german with your child)and as a couple.
Your relatives will be able to communicate with your child if he/she speaks swiss german. He/she will learn English anyway as all the other input will be in English.

IMO it's only hard for a little while when the child starts interacting with English speakers and theres plenty you can do to expose them to English and English speakers before they are out in the world, at nursery or whatever.

My DD1 was at home alot in an English speaking environment till she started nursery at 2 in Spain. It took her a few months to catch up with her peers and even 4 years later her Spanish was not as fluent as theirs but she was only 5.5 yo when we left Spain and i think that by time she was a couple of years older and reading she would have caught up completely.

I actually regret now that we didnt do OPOL as we now live in the UK and have very little opportunity to Speak Spanish. DP finds it very hard to switch to Spanish, his native language, after speaking it to the DDs since they were born.

books - 'Growing up with two languages' author?
Another book by Tracey Tokuhama-Espinoa is very good
and one by Andersen couple. Sorry dont have them to hand.
will come back later and post titles. also just found this: www.biculturalfamily.org/multilinguallivingmagazine.pdf which looks interesting tho from a couple of years ago...

i mean its hard when they start to interact with the ML (majority language i.e. that of the country)in our case it was Spanish.

I think shitemum refers to "Raising Multilingual Children" by Tracey Tokuhama-Espinoa.

I spoke Norwegian to my son, although I spoke English to my husband, while living in the uk. He opted to speak English to our son too, although he is Polish, because he had been away from Poland so long, he felt English came naturally. More so than Polish.

Thanks for the comments and the books! Will check them out.

After considering your comment SM, I realised that I would probably feel equally sad about not speaking English to my child. After all, English is what I speak to my mum, in fact all my family. At least sometimes/most of the time. I suppose that's the point: We switch from one language to the other and back so easily and hardly noticing... Now, when I "think at" my unborn baby, it's all "hang on in there little one" i.e. in English but when DP and I talk about him/her it's definitely Swiss German.

I guess what I'm really asking, is, must I stick to one language only - for the sake of my child? Only if the answer to that is "absolutely yes" do I have to consider which one. Which, for now, seems like an impossible choice. But there is still plenty of time

I had very similar feelings to you, Meita, and I did not stick to only one language. My main reason being that there was so much - both in English and in Swedish- that I felt that I could give my children: I, not dh, was the one who knew all the nursery rhymes and the songs and, later on, the literature, even of dh's culture. Dh also speaks Swedish (my language) though tbh not very correctly. I don't think children get confused as easily as all that: mine certainly never have.

I think the reason most people are saying "consistency" is more because they feel consistency is the only way they can ensure something that is vital, namely enough exposure to the minority language. Because that is the tricky bit. And, as they grow older, ensuring that they actually are made to use the minority language on a regular basis. If everybody starts finding it easier to slip into English, then naturally the whole bilingual thing is going to fall by the wayside. For some people (most people?) that means Strict Rules. And there is nothing wrong with that, if that's who you are. Personally, I am not much of a routine person, but prefer to play things by ear: the moment anyone told me I had to speak Swedish, I would feel an irresistible urge to start reciting Wordsworth. Just for the sake of it. Because that's who I am.

On the other hand, I have found that I can support my family's bilingualism in other ways that work for me. One is simply noticing when we are speaking a little too much English and gently slipping into Swedish, hoping the others will follow suit.

The most important thing that has helped is holidays in Sweden and contact with their Swedish cousins. Also, for dd, contact with other Swedish teens through chance encounters and the internet. Sweden is cool.
(It's the place where you get fed pudding every day and can swim in the sea and never have to do homework).

The second most important is dh's positive attitude. The families I know where bilingualism has failed often have an unsupportive father lurking in the background.

Third most important, I'd say, is the support I've had from books and songs. One person's voice is not a lot to establish a whole linguistic and cultural connection: books have helped enormously.

And finally, the fact that my children simply seem to like talking to me and we've had some very good talks over the years, so that gives me a chance to steer the language the way I want it, without making a big song and dance over it.

That sounds like excellent, well considered advice to me, cory. Thanks loads.

The possibility that we might eventually go back to Switzerland - that's distant future, but still - reveals another problem with sticking to Swiss German only. The child (or perhaps children, by then) would then not get any exposure to what would then suddenly be the minority language anymore. That would be a pity.

I suppose that as long as we are here, we needn't worry about insufficient exposure to English. So if DP sticks (mostly) to Swiss German and I say stuff in whatever language comes out, we should be ok. Then if we eventually do move back to Switzerland, I could stick to English and DP could be more flexible.

Honestly, huge thanks. I now feel much more confident about it all. Still will do some reading, but with a much less worried mindset

We brought up our DC English/German and since moving to Switzerland just over a year ago, we have added French to that mix. They are 5 and 7yo and are very fluent in English and German and getting reasonably fluent in French.

Like Cory, we did not stick strictly to OPOL. I spoke mainly English, DH German, our home language was German and we lived in Germany.

The important thing, imo, is to be flexible with the language but not to mix sentences. So if DD says, 'Kannst Du mir ein pencil geben' then I will remind her that it is called a Bleistift. (Although at the moment she normally asks for a crayon gris)

Btw, do you know about the MN Local Switzerland topic?

My stepmum spoke spanish and english to my SB and SS my dad doesn't speak spanish and they were raised in Britian, they both speak fluent spanish and english, neither seemed to suffer much confusion although did end up using a few spanish words as baby words for thinks iykwim.

After all that waffling i guess what i'm trying to say is go with what you feel comfortable with and it'll be fine. x

Meita - there are no hard and fast rules about this. If you want to speak more than one language to your DC then that's up to you.
What I would say is what others have said - dont mix the languages in the same sentence. And try to have a Strategy/Rules about what you speak when, where and with whom. For example you could agree to speak a certain langauge when at home with your DH and DC, a different one when with your parents. A certain one when you are alone with your DC etc. It helps to be consistent.
From personal experience I would also say that it would have been better for us in the long run if we had done OPOL rather than ml@home - minority language (English) - at home while living in Spain as we now have virtually no Spanish input from me, very little from DP and we are back in the UK.

So to sum up, if you are possibly going to be living in a german or swiss german speaking country in the furture then do include some of that language in your strategy. It´ll make it easier for the DC in the future.
I liked Tracey Tokuhamas book best of the 3 or 4 i read, it was the friendliest and most open and optimistic.

These are the other 2 books i have:

The Bilingual Family: A Handbook for Parents by Edith Harding-Esch

Growing Up with Two Languages: A Practical Guide by Staffan Andersson

They are also good. The Tokuhama one is hard/expensive to get hold of...

DH and I are (prematurely) considering this question and have come to the conclusion that OPOL is probably what we will do pretty much for the reasons shitemum states. This is tough for DH who is the bilingual one and slightly tough for me because I've worked a lot professionally with children in French BUT considering our circumstances (military) we don't know if we'll be in a French speaking environment, an English speaking one or a third langauge and we do want them to grow up bilingual. A flexible approach would be very difficult, especially when very tiny, for us but we might move to that as they get older.

That probably doesn't help!

Message withdrawn

Thanks again for all the really helpful advice, and the book pointers!

I'm currently thinking that to start with, we'll speak Swiss German as a family, and DP will speak Swiss German to the child (he says anything else would feel unnatural), and I'll speak (mostly) English to the child when I'm alone with the child.

But who knows, I might yet change my mind or find out that it's impractical.

I'll certainly talk to my mum about it, Pitchounette. I think my parents did a really good job overall however in a very intuitive way.
(My mum was 19, 21, and 22 when she had us kids (and 25 when her youngest died) and had no home address... was travelling around the world as a hippie and living from hand to mouth and had no worldly possessions apart from a suitcase full of SciFi books and no education beyond o-levels. Me being 34 (soon) and with the same DP since 9 years and living in our own home and studying for a PhD - I tend to go about things a bit differently than she used to! Sometimes I'm a bit envious of their light-heartedness of living day by day... but then, I just don't function that way. But I digress.)

Another issue at some point is going to be the question of bi-literacy, as Swiss German is not a written language. Growing up in the German-speaking part of Switzerland, you are constantly exposed to "proper" German, and you are taught German from year one at school - it is a prerequisite for learning to read and write, as there is no reading and writing to do in Swiss German. A Swiss German term for "proper" German translates as "written German". Ah well - still lots of time to consider this.

Yes, I was wondering about that. You will have to at some point start teaching your DC Schrift/Hochdeutsch otherwise the language is limited to visiting relatives in Switzerland.