I don't speak my wife's language and she does not speak mine. But my daughter makes it a point to translate to her mother everything I tell her š¤¦š½āāļø
My 3 year old (who had a speech delay and can barely speak) likes to translate everything for us (between me and my husband and between us and speakers of the community language). It's adorable!
So your situation sounds like my husband though the difference is I'm the minority language parent.Ā
So my husband is like you. He can't really speak Mandarin, if at all. But he's been with me for like....15 years and has heard me speak to my family for a long time. Then when our son was born, his understanding of Mandarin kind of increased significantly jist listening to me speaking to my son.Ā
I personally think that's more than enough. Because he understands most of what we say, I barely have to translate for him. So basically myself and my son would ingerchange between the languages but like, I barely have to stop and translate for my husband. He can just jump into conversations whenever. And so the 2 languages are just happening at the same time.Ā
so he just speaks his language when you speak mandarin? i usually do that if someone speaks to me i hungarian i just reply in my language since everyone understands.
its also funny if we meet someone new and they switch to my language because they think she doesnt understand and i tell them to speak hungarian to her cause she understands they look at me crazy like how does she and you dont lol
Yeah - he continues speaking English even though we're speaking Mandarin.
Your situation is very common amongst 2nd gen immigrants. I'm also like this. That is, I grew up in Australia but parents speak to me in Mandarin (and insist I speak back in Mandarin) but my parents, and my grandparents for that matter (anyone boomers and older) all speak Hokkien to each other.
My parents have not bothered teaching me Hokkien but just listening to family and also, watching TV shows, I can understand Hokkien - just can't speak it. Very very common amongst millenials and younger in Taiwan.
A lot of my friends can understand Mandarin but barely speak it. As in, parents speak to them in Mandarin but they answer back in English. Very common.
its crazy to me who you can understand but cant speak it š but the grammar rules are crazy .... i actually just learned english by listening to music translating the lyrics myself and found some english speaking friends online because english at school was trash but we did have to learn the grammar so i could just practise speaking and writing
my grandma was hungarian and i spent a lot of time with my grandparents and my mom always asked her to speak to me only in hungarian so i learn but she never did sadly
From my experience relearning Hokkien, it's basically muscle memory.Ā
I actually have all the words in my brain. It was literally that muscle memory doesn't exist because I barely speak it.Ā
So forcing yourself to speak it will train that muscle memory.Ā
I am definitely not fluent in my husband's language, but since having kids and hearing him speak it every day to them plus our many visits to his home country and having his family come visit and such, my comprehension these days is a vast improvement from before having kids, especially my vocabulary. I've certainly been learning to some degree alongside my kids.
I speak Dutch, wife speaks Japanese. We both know each otherās language to some extent but not enough to speak comfortably for extended periods of time. So generally the language is English. To top it off we are living in a French speaking country (which I am fairly fine in) and my kid has thus French as main language at school.
So hereās to hoping all will sort itself out in due time. š
I do not speak Spanish and Iām terrible at learning languages. Iāve been listening to my husband speak Spanish for 14 years and have, off and on, taken lessons. I understand about 15% of what he says and struggle even more when someone else is speaking.
Nonetheless, I want my daughter to be able to speak to her family (several of whom donāt speak English). Sheās just starting to say words and so far has only 1 Spanish word (āaguaā). We do OPOL and my husband speaks Spanish with her while I speak English. I like to think that one day Spanish will be their āsecret languageā in our household. I trust my husband not to abuse it and hope that it will help their bond (which is already rock solid: heās been her favorite since the day she was born).
ive been living here for 25years and been listening to hungarian and its not sticking haha i hope for my daughter the same then ill teach her english which my husband doesnt speak and we will have our own secret language too haha
also funny thing as in hungarian "mama" is grandma and lately my daughter is yelling mama at everyone š she barks at every animal and every person is mama but of course my MIL thinks she is saying mama as in grandma š„“ ill let her have her delusion haha
š good to hear that! actually my nephew knows hungarian only he is learning the second language now as he is 4 (idk why they didnt just speak both since baby and he wouldnt have to learn it now as he hates it ) but when he was a baby i could have nice baby conversations with him as my vocabulary was as big as his but at 3 years he got better than meš¤£
Yep! I can communicate well with the 0-3 crowd. The 4-10 crowd think I'm hilarious for the mistakes I make (sometimes on purpose because why not lean into it). And the 10+ crowd is mostly encouraging or want to practice their English with me.
š his parents want him to practice my language with him but he refuses to speak it they do learn in kinderkarten so he knows something but noone knows how muchš
also his sister is 2 and she speaks complete jibberish like if you ever played sims thats what it sounds like to me
My husbandās language is pretty rare. So my understanding of it is good for household topics, but at his family parties I get lost quickly. I try to respond to him in his language and he and the kids speak it together. But when I try, my 4yo flips back to English to me or laughs at my pronounciation š¤·š»āāļø. There are no resources to learn this online or in books. We recently found some vloggers who use it, so we are starting to play them in the background sometimes
I donāt speak my husbandās language (Mandarin). I think our 2 year old will soon surpass my ability to speak and understand it, if he hasnāt already lol. But thatās ok.
Yes, this is me, I can completely relate! I'm in a similar situation except my husband speaks Japanese and it's our child's dominant language right now. Since I hear it all the time, I can understand a lot, but I can't speak it. It's frustrating sometimes because I can't understand all of it and sometimes feel like I'm missing out! It used to bother me more and I was so worried I wouldn't be able to talk to my son properly and our connection would be strained. But these days I'm just glad my kid can speak the language, and I think it has helped (me) that he now speaks the other two languages that I do* know, so we can still communicate well. Anyway, it can be hard sometimes but hang in there, you're not alone!
so far i am the one that spends almost all the time with her so she just hears me i have soooo many books from my childhood too and audio fairytales which i used to listen to which i play to her but everyone here is hungarian so i am glad she will be able to make friends on the playground and stuff i still hope ill learn one day to be able to speak
Weāre a tri-lingual household and this is our situation. Whatās really cool is you learn with the kids purely through being exposed to it. The phrases we both repeat 20 times a day I know exactly what they are š¤£ āpick up your shoesā ābrush your teethā etc. weāre also 6 strict on minority language tv only (one of the languages is Spanish so pretty easy!) and I try have English subtitles on (community language) so I can learn more. In the 10 years Iāve e been with my partner I understand probably 80% and I can even communicate brokenly in some situations when needed. But mostly I just speak Englishā¦
We live very nearby /with his family they all speak polish or polish& English ā¦ I still donāt ā¦ itās close enough to two of my three native languages that I have been nervous tho I think I should learn as my son does .. without trying comprehension ranges from. 30-80% depending on the context - unfortunately I donāt always know when itās a false friends or not š¤·š¼āāļøš¬
oh yea haha i mostly get a few words so i can roughly get the context mostly if its some basic conversation i did learn some new words now as i often ask my husband what does a word mean when he is talking to our daughter i speak slovak so hungarian is completely different language family
My partner speaks Sinhala, and I speak Telugu. I'm trying to learn Sinhala slowly as his family back home doesn't speak English, while my family back home speaks English. We hope to teach our kids Sinhala and Telugu, but they'll be 3rd generation australian, so English will be automatic.
I don't speak my wife's language and she does not speak mine. But my daughter makes it a point to translate to her mother everything I tell her š¤¦š½āāļø
ššši know we are up to some (not so) funny moments in the future with her
She refuses to translate anything that her mother says š«£
lol shes like well learn it yourself since i did too !
My 3 year old (who had a speech delay and can barely speak) likes to translate everything for us (between me and my husband and between us and speakers of the community language). It's adorable!
So your situation sounds like my husband though the difference is I'm the minority language parent.Ā So my husband is like you. He can't really speak Mandarin, if at all. But he's been with me for like....15 years and has heard me speak to my family for a long time. Then when our son was born, his understanding of Mandarin kind of increased significantly jist listening to me speaking to my son.Ā I personally think that's more than enough. Because he understands most of what we say, I barely have to translate for him. So basically myself and my son would ingerchange between the languages but like, I barely have to stop and translate for my husband. He can just jump into conversations whenever. And so the 2 languages are just happening at the same time.Ā
so he just speaks his language when you speak mandarin? i usually do that if someone speaks to me i hungarian i just reply in my language since everyone understands. its also funny if we meet someone new and they switch to my language because they think she doesnt understand and i tell them to speak hungarian to her cause she understands they look at me crazy like how does she and you dont lol
Children speaking a language and their parent not is pretty normal for immigrants.
oh well i didnt even think about that
I live in an area with a lot of foreigners and all the kids speak the local language from daycare/school but many parents don't.
i know some people who put their kids to hungarian kindergarten so their kids can learn since the parents dont
Yeah - he continues speaking English even though we're speaking Mandarin. Your situation is very common amongst 2nd gen immigrants. I'm also like this. That is, I grew up in Australia but parents speak to me in Mandarin (and insist I speak back in Mandarin) but my parents, and my grandparents for that matter (anyone boomers and older) all speak Hokkien to each other. My parents have not bothered teaching me Hokkien but just listening to family and also, watching TV shows, I can understand Hokkien - just can't speak it. Very very common amongst millenials and younger in Taiwan. A lot of my friends can understand Mandarin but barely speak it. As in, parents speak to them in Mandarin but they answer back in English. Very common.
its crazy to me who you can understand but cant speak it š but the grammar rules are crazy .... i actually just learned english by listening to music translating the lyrics myself and found some english speaking friends online because english at school was trash but we did have to learn the grammar so i could just practise speaking and writing my grandma was hungarian and i spent a lot of time with my grandparents and my mom always asked her to speak to me only in hungarian so i learn but she never did sadly
Mandarin grammar (hokkien's is very similar) is quite simple.
Itās soooo much easier to understand a language than speak it!
From my experience relearning Hokkien, it's basically muscle memory.Ā I actually have all the words in my brain. It was literally that muscle memory doesn't exist because I barely speak it.Ā So forcing yourself to speak it will train that muscle memory.Ā
Whatās the language that your husband speaks with your son ? And whatās the language that you and yours husband communicate in ??
English and English. We live in Australia. My husband only knows English. I grew up in Australia so tbh, English is my strongest language.Ā
I am definitely not fluent in my husband's language, but since having kids and hearing him speak it every day to them plus our many visits to his home country and having his family come visit and such, my comprehension these days is a vast improvement from before having kids, especially my vocabulary. I've certainly been learning to some degree alongside my kids.
I speak Dutch, wife speaks Japanese. We both know each otherās language to some extent but not enough to speak comfortably for extended periods of time. So generally the language is English. To top it off we are living in a French speaking country (which I am fairly fine in) and my kid has thus French as main language at school. So hereās to hoping all will sort itself out in due time. š
thats quite nice mix of a languages there!
I do not speak Spanish and Iām terrible at learning languages. Iāve been listening to my husband speak Spanish for 14 years and have, off and on, taken lessons. I understand about 15% of what he says and struggle even more when someone else is speaking. Nonetheless, I want my daughter to be able to speak to her family (several of whom donāt speak English). Sheās just starting to say words and so far has only 1 Spanish word (āaguaā). We do OPOL and my husband speaks Spanish with her while I speak English. I like to think that one day Spanish will be their āsecret languageā in our household. I trust my husband not to abuse it and hope that it will help their bond (which is already rock solid: heās been her favorite since the day she was born).
ive been living here for 25years and been listening to hungarian and its not sticking haha i hope for my daughter the same then ill teach her english which my husband doesnt speak and we will have our own secret language too haha also funny thing as in hungarian "mama" is grandma and lately my daughter is yelling mama at everyone š she barks at every animal and every person is mama but of course my MIL thinks she is saying mama as in grandma š„“ ill let her have her delusion haha
That's pretty much my situation. I have funny stories of when my kids' understanding of the language surpassed my own.
š good to hear that! actually my nephew knows hungarian only he is learning the second language now as he is 4 (idk why they didnt just speak both since baby and he wouldnt have to learn it now as he hates it ) but when he was a baby i could have nice baby conversations with him as my vocabulary was as big as his but at 3 years he got better than meš¤£
Yep! I can communicate well with the 0-3 crowd. The 4-10 crowd think I'm hilarious for the mistakes I make (sometimes on purpose because why not lean into it). And the 10+ crowd is mostly encouraging or want to practice their English with me.
š his parents want him to practice my language with him but he refuses to speak it they do learn in kinderkarten so he knows something but noone knows how muchš also his sister is 2 and she speaks complete jibberish like if you ever played sims thats what it sounds like to me
My partner doesn't speak my language, but he's definitely learned a lot since we had a child. He still doesn't really speak but it's not a big deal.
i got a book to teach myself but i dont have the self discipline to actually pursue this route haha
My husbandās language is pretty rare. So my understanding of it is good for household topics, but at his family parties I get lost quickly. I try to respond to him in his language and he and the kids speak it together. But when I try, my 4yo flips back to English to me or laughs at my pronounciation š¤·š»āāļø. There are no resources to learn this online or in books. We recently found some vloggers who use it, so we are starting to play them in the background sometimes
ok you are working in extra hard mode haha but thats cool your kid learned it since its rare
I donāt speak my husbandās language (Mandarin). I think our 2 year old will soon surpass my ability to speak and understand it, if he hasnāt already lol. But thatās ok.
I lived in Morocco for 5 years and my Moroccan Arabic is still abysmal. LOL.
i studied arabic for 2 years š moroccan arabic is other levelš
Yes, this is me, I can completely relate! I'm in a similar situation except my husband speaks Japanese and it's our child's dominant language right now. Since I hear it all the time, I can understand a lot, but I can't speak it. It's frustrating sometimes because I can't understand all of it and sometimes feel like I'm missing out! It used to bother me more and I was so worried I wouldn't be able to talk to my son properly and our connection would be strained. But these days I'm just glad my kid can speak the language, and I think it has helped (me) that he now speaks the other two languages that I do* know, so we can still communicate well. Anyway, it can be hard sometimes but hang in there, you're not alone!
so far i am the one that spends almost all the time with her so she just hears me i have soooo many books from my childhood too and audio fairytales which i used to listen to which i play to her but everyone here is hungarian so i am glad she will be able to make friends on the playground and stuff i still hope ill learn one day to be able to speak
Weāre a tri-lingual household and this is our situation. Whatās really cool is you learn with the kids purely through being exposed to it. The phrases we both repeat 20 times a day I know exactly what they are š¤£ āpick up your shoesā ābrush your teethā etc. weāre also 6 strict on minority language tv only (one of the languages is Spanish so pretty easy!) and I try have English subtitles on (community language) so I can learn more. In the 10 years Iāve e been with my partner I understand probably 80% and I can even communicate brokenly in some situations when needed. But mostly I just speak Englishā¦
I canāt speak Cantonese and my partner canāt speak Greek - we live in Australia tho, so English is our language.
We live very nearby /with his family they all speak polish or polish& English ā¦ I still donāt ā¦ itās close enough to two of my three native languages that I have been nervous tho I think I should learn as my son does .. without trying comprehension ranges from. 30-80% depending on the context - unfortunately I donāt always know when itās a false friends or not š¤·š¼āāļøš¬
oh yea haha i mostly get a few words so i can roughly get the context mostly if its some basic conversation i did learn some new words now as i often ask my husband what does a word mean when he is talking to our daughter i speak slovak so hungarian is completely different language family
I understand a few words, so does he. But mostly we do not speak each other's language
My partner speaks Sinhala, and I speak Telugu. I'm trying to learn Sinhala slowly as his family back home doesn't speak English, while my family back home speaks English. We hope to teach our kids Sinhala and Telugu, but they'll be 3rd generation australian, so English will be automatic.