Language joggling

Well, the summer is almost over, and we have been keeping busy for the last couple of months. There was a lot to do at Denver Public Libraries in June (clowns, balloon ladies, trained pigs - you name it), and in July we took Sasha on his first trip to Russia.

The timeliness of this trip was amazing. As described by multitudes of authors, 18-24 months are commonly characterized by a rapid growth in child's vocabulary. At this point, a child is using as many as 50 words in his speech, mostly nouns. This is also time to be vigilant about your child's language development. If he or she does not use any words, now is a perfect time to get a referral to a speech therapist. The earlier the better. I have seen on my friend's example that starting therapy in a timely manner gives great results. If your child drops most consonants, he might have a hearing problem. So, ears should be checked out again in such case.

In either situation, dropping the second language as a solution to speech delay might be a mistake. According to Barbara Zurer-Pearson, there is no study that either confirms or denies that switching from bilinguism to monolinguism is a likely solution to speech delay. In fact, speech therapy that gives results in one language can also imrove child's second language skills.

While in Russia, Sasha picked up a whole bunch of new words, and now he also uses three-syllable words, which he couldn't do before. He is eager to copy patterns of speech, although mostly he repeats last words in conversations he hears. Another thing Sasha started doing is singing. He can only sing one word from Russian songs that he learned (total of two), but it's a start.

We are back home, safe and sound. And yesterday, we noticed that Sasha chooses between his languages depending on whom he is talking to. Before (and during) our trip to Russia, he only had one word per concept in his vocabulary. Now, he actually switches languages when he talks. Yesterday's situation was in the kitchen, and he was demanding: "Food! Food!", because he got hungry. With me during the day, he uses the word: "Кушать!" (to eat). Or he might request a specific thing in Russian - банан, кашку, or яблоко (banana, porridge, or apple accordingly). But yesterday evening, Greg was home, and so Sasha chose English: "Food! Food! Grapes!"There are still plenty of words that he uses exclusively without switching languages: bus, ball, cheese,walk, ягода (berries), буква А (letter A), облака (clouds).

Fight Alzheimer's with bilingualism

If you weren't yet convinced (still?!) that being bilingual has tons of benefits, consider this: A new research by Canadian neurologists indicates that speaking multiple languages throughout your life helps delay onset of symptoms of dementia.

According to this new study, bilingual individuals were diagnosed with Alzheimer's almost 5 years later than monolinguals. And this cannot be contributed to better education, because in many cases the bilinguals actually had lower level of education, as they immigrated to Canada from other countries.

The researchers explain this phenomenon through the idea that bilingualism requires rapid "code switching" (in other words, you have to quickly go back and forth between two languages in your daily life), which is just another form of multi-tasking. Multi-tasking, as many other brain activities, helps stimulate the brain, thus prolonging its active life.

And one more time, it turns out that our brain is not confused by it, but, on the contrary, gets its exercise from bilingualism.

Sasha signs

So, I am wondering if we need to start a sign language vocabulary page for Sasha, as yesterday he has successfully used his first sign in a context. Greg was reading him books, one after another, and Sasha was signing "more" in between. There was no other interpretation for his sign, because he was actually complaining if you put him down and insisting on more by putting his fingertips together.

Truthfully, we did not teach Sasha sign language early on, when it would be helpful. Apparently, you can teach your baby to sign as early as at 3 months! The benefits are obvious - your child will communicate before he can speak. In our situation, we don't use sign language consistently, and the only signs Sasha uses so far is the pointing sign and "more".

For those who wonder whether communicating with signs diminishes child's ability to learn a spoken language, here is my linguistic opinion: No, it does not. A sign language (whether it is American Sign Language or British Sign Language or French Sign Language) is a language in it's own right. Different sign languages develop independently from each other and if you can sign in ASL, you cannot communicate with a Russian person who speaks Russian sign language. These languages have their own grammar, their own vocabulary and their own form. They also change with time.

So, if you are teaching your baby to sign, you are raising her in a bilingual environment. She might not be bilingual later on, but you are building the foundation to bilingualism with sign language.

Interestingly enough, ASL is widely used in speech therapy in America. I wonder if anybody has ever considered using a spoken language for speech therapy.

Blogging about blogging

I have been recently thinking about how many parents out there are blogging about raising their children being able to speak English and Russian languages. And it turns out there are not that many of us. So, I decided to share with you what I have found out.

The author of Learning with Mouse is a Russian speaking mom of a girl who is growing up in a trilingual environment - with dominant English and a pinch of German and Russian. It sounds like their multilingual story is not very successful, as the mom has been in the United States for a while now and says that raising her daughter in English feels more natural. English is also the medium for the media - books, movies, etc. If a book is in Russian, the child wants it to be read and translated. Both parents still try to expose the child to Russian and German,  but with monolingual English preschool it appears to be difficult.

On Bilingual Monkey, a Russian native mom encounters new sides of her own culture and laughs with her husband as they see their son trying to juggle Russian and English. It's too bad that she stopped contributing to it.

A 6 year old on http://spasfam.blogspot.com/ has recently decided that he loves Russia and all things Russian. The family has no native Russian speakers, but is willing to support their son's interest. So far, it seems like his motivation might be able to get him at least some knowledge of culture and basic words.

Irina McGuire seems to use the same method like myself - One Parent One Language. At this point, her son is about two years old and can differentiate between Russian and English, name parts of the face in both languages, and even mixes both languages together when building sentences (which is not a bad thing; the child is just experimenting to see what is proper in which interaction). That gives me hope that some day Sasha will reach this level, as well.

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There is an update on Sasha's vocabulary. I have also added the English vocabulary page that proudly contains one word.

Searching for foreign language books

This proves to be quite a task, as there are many websites that cater to bilingual education by offering bilingual books. Personally, I think that purchasing bilingual books is not necessary. There is more sense in finding books in one language, in other words, purchasing monolingual books in two different languages. First, if the book can be read in two languages, which language will be preferred by a child? If a child is very interested in characters, but cannot pick in what language this book will be read to him, the monolingual book benefits to acquiring more vocabulary.

Second, I feel that offering bilingual books means raising your child on generic culture: no culturally authentic characters, no authentic interactions, etc.

Worldlanguage.com, as well as Amazon offer foreign language editions (I searched Russian edition) for books that were originally published in English. They are beautifully made, but I see the same problem arising - generic characters and utterances. If you are looking for foreign language books for your child, here are the methods I suggest:

• Stop by a branch of your public library that is located in a neighborhood with high percentage of people who speak the language you are trying to teach your child. Most likely, there will be books donated by someone in the community and, even if you decide not to check them out, you can at least get a list of children authors.
• Search authors.
• Search "Russian children books" (or whatever language you need) instead of "bilingual children books".
• Team up with other parents to start book exchange to keep your selection fresh.

Learn words in sentences

I stumbled upon this video on one of the blogs that I am following.

The talking puppy

My family sent Sasha a Russian speaking puppy for his first birthday. In actuality, it is Fisher Price Laugh & Learn Learning Puppy that speaks Russian and is sold in Russia. It is great to have a toy that speaks my language, for a change. Not that I think that Sasha can learn any words from this puppy, but there are many ways to incorporate it into our daily plays.

What language does he babble in?

That's a good question! According to Barbara Zurer Pearson, Ph. D., "there is no reflex to say 'gooh'" ("Raising a bilingual child", Living Language, 2008). So, that means that every time Sasha is babbling he is trying to say something or, at least, practicing the sounds he heard. With my linguistic mind in action, I can imagine that, if he is practicing the sounds he heard from us, he should have a nice stew of English and Russian.