We’ve been at this bilingualism thing for over 5 years now, first with just S who went from outright refusing to speak German to reluctantly and haltingly speaking it sometimes to the chatterbox she is now, the one who tells me off occasionally for not speaking German with her. And then also with O who is a wee bit less stubborn and has always been going with the flow, mixing for quite some time and now doing his best to use the right language with the right person. Not yet always successfully, but I’m sure he’ll figure this out with time.
We’ve done all the things people seem to do when they try to raise their kids to be bilingual, of course, all the things you can read about here and here and here and here and here. And then some.
But the one thing that has not gotten nearly enough attention in all this is The Husband. ‘Cause when it comes down to it, I doubt our kids would be bilingual if it weren’t for him. Yes, I mean it - our kids would not be bilingual if it weren’t for him.
Him, the guy who has no interest in languages and isn’t, by his own admission, any good at learning them. I sometimes wonder whether it’s all worthwhile and whether he is not missing out on too many things when the kids and I speak German to each other, including times when he is around. But I don’t really give enough credit for his role in raising the kids to be bilingual. Maybe because his part is not as evident as that of people who speak German with the kids, but really, if he didn’t support having all this German stuff going on, we would not have made it this far.
It was he who encouraged me to speak German to the then still unborn Punk 1 and then got in on the act quite early on himself. It was always clear that he was going to be 'Papa' and not 'Daddy', and once he had picked up a few phrases and words related to baby, he used them. A lot. “Windel wechseln, S!” was an early favourite to let her know she was about to get her bum cleaned. But he also picked up and began to sing different kids’ songs to the kids and has read them the occasional German book. Sometimes he speaks German with us, and these days he tries to understand young Punk 2 speaking to him in German. He sometimes goes with us to German cultural things, like the upcoming lantern parade and the German street fair at which S ended up loosing her first tooth. He has also taken a class to try and learn German. This didn’t exactly make him fluent or anything close to it, but has in fact improved his understanding quite a bit as we noticed when Oma was visiting us this past summer.
Whenever I ask him whether he is having regrets about any of it, he unequivocally urges me to keep going. Not only because he understands the benefits of childhood bilingualism, but also because he is sincerely proud of the kids learning another language and long ago having surpassed him with their German skills. He actually gloats about this to his parents and siblings.
He has done much more to help the kids’ German along than he gives himself credit for, and I think much more than he thought he would when we were quite naïve about raising bilingual children and assumed they’d just pick up German from hearing me speak it to them.
Without him, the kids would not be bilingual.
-----
This post is part of the Raising Bilingual Children's carnival hosted over at Where going havo?.
4 comments:
You are so right to acknowledge your husband's role. I have quite a few friends whose children have missed out on being bilingual due to a partner not speaking their language, and several others who need to deal with simmering spousal resentment when insisting on passing on their family language to their kids.
Speaking a minority language often gets disapproval from family, schools and even strangers, it's great to see people who can put their kids' future first.
Oh, good post! We really don't acknowledge enough the contributions (and challenges!) of the lesser bilingual partner.
How awesome that your husband totally supports you and your children! Without his support your children would surely not be as bilingual as you describe them. While it's not impossible to raise bilingual children without the support of the monolingual parent or family, it IS extremely difficult!
I guess now I'm even more grateful for the fact that this is not an issue in my household as we both speak Spanish to our children because it's our native language. And, I'm also more in awe of those who don't have the same situation!
One of the reasons I'd be reluctant to move to Germany is that I don't know how good I would be supporting minority languages. I feel safer _being_ the minority.
So hat off to your DH!
Post a Comment