I would like to ask if anyone that has been or is in a similar situation, for advice and/or just reassurance. Sorry it’s LONG but it’s a battle i’ve been facing for over 16 months now, I’d like to solve this and clear my mind.
I’m an expatriate living in France on a permanent long-term basis. My mother tongue is English and my partners is French, he is basic in English. It has been agreed upon us both that we will raise our French born daughter to be bilingual. When I look at the amount of time my partner has with our daughter, I can’t see her learning French until she starts going to school and interacting with other kids/staff (something she doesn’t get right now).
I refuse to speak French to my daughter, only for the fact that English in France is taught so poorly in schools, hearing it is rare, especially in my small country town. Brochures, books, websites or anything related to something being needed in English is never followed by correct grammar usage and not to mention the 101 spelling mistakes, so that will never teach her. I used to speak only French with her but when I started forgetting English (it’s possible!) I immediately stopped.
I feel like i’m always being condemned for putting the need to learn English first even though the official language in France is French. The community thinks i’m a typical arrogant foreignor who refuses to integrate with French society (not the case!). I know learning French should be priority as she is in France but I also feel like I have a big responsibility to teach her English as she will only have me to rely on. We can’t afford to send her to a private English school and why should I when I can teach her properly and for free at home and she can learn French for free at school?
My in-laws and other parents all refuse to understand how important it is for her to learn English just as much as French, not just for my sake but for her future too. If she grew up only speaking/hearing French, it would be harder for her to learn English at a much later age, we plan on being in France for quite a few years. French people have a very bad reputation when it comes to learning English, their reluctance to learn and being proud of their language, they see no reason to teach/learn English really.
It would be nice to hear of anybody elses opinion, if anyone else agrees that my daughter will pick up French from school and how things are won’t affect her especially if your an expatriate in the same situation. I don’t think France is too familiar with bilingulism. I was looking at all the people who were struggling with English so this has really made me think about it, reassuring myself that i’m doing things the right way. I do feel guilty as this is France but the only time French people speak English is if they work for an English owned company and they are barely fluent.
Oh dear Nic. Please keep up with English.
I can’t tell you of the kids I know who were speaking their parents’ language only and became fluent once they were in ‘la maternelle’, at age 3.
You can always communicate in French when people are around, and focus on English when it’s just the two of you.
Good luck!
Keep up with English for sure. It is, at current, the most valuable language.
Your husband speaks French, everyone she meets while out and about speaks French, she’ll learn French in school, etc. She needs you to speak English to her. The more you speak it the faster she will learn, but if you are uncomfortable speaking English to her outside (because of stares, comments, or what-have-you) you can make up for it with consistency while inside your home.
hypatia - my partner speaks just French and me JUST English to her. Everyone, besides my partner, thinks it’s not relevant for my daughter to learn it at all because she is French and living in France. What about me? I’m Australian, it’s my mother tongue. If I speak to her in English, my in-laws quickly correct me and tell me not to speak English and even tell my daughter not to speak it cause we are in France and French people speak French. I speak French to everyone but my daughter and partner as we are focusing on moving to Australia or England in the future and i’m the only one they can learn from as I said.
I don’t know why everyone seems to be so against it, maybe it goes along with those who think teaching them too much at once will do more harm then good, it will confuse them I don’t know. I wouldn’t mind speaking both myself with her but if you see how bad English is in France and how rare it is, I’d prefer to focus on just English as I completely agree with carpe vestri vita ‘It is, at current, the most valuable language’. They are both important for her to learn just I can’t seem to get my point across as to why we should focus on both rather than just French!. Perhaps you may know of any ‘good’ article on this topic that’s in French? about children and bilingualism.
Usually I don’t care about what people have to say if I believe i’m doing the right thing but I won’t be always there to defend it if there will be a time when people say to her ‘‘don’t speak English’’ and she listens to them as she will feel like she is being punished for it.
I would strongly encourage you to stand your ground and keep up the English with her. I know that this is easier said than done, but I’m sure you will never regret it.
Here are two sites with great articles and real life anecdotes on bilingualism/multilingualism that I have found particularly useful. I am not sure if they have articles in French but you might find someone in the same situation as you are in the discussion boards.
Not only should you speak English to her, you need to make sure she speaks English to you to keep the language active, otherwise she will only speak the common denominator language. As the mother, you have all the cards, she needs everything from you, it is also your special bond, my wife is from Brazil and she insists the children speak Portuguese at home, especially with her. I support her in that as well. Here are some of the reasons your daughter should learn English as well.
A) France is not the center of the world and French has not been a lingua franca for hundreds of years. Sorry France. Any insistence that “French is enough” is from deep insecurity and/or arrogance. Ask them what they would say if an American said “English is enough”?
B) It is her mother tongue, and presumably you have relatives in Australia. If she loses her English she loses the ability to communicate with half her family? Our children have been to Brazil and can hold their own, and their cousins have been here as well. Those family bonds are very important.
C) It will not hurt her ultimately, it will help her brain development, though there will be a lag in French until she is 7 or 8, then she will be bi-lingual in both languages and catch up, if she is normal developmentally.
D) It is more than to be bilingual, it is bicultural. My first “foreign” language was French, I love the south of France in particular, but its biggest impact on me was not linguistic it was cultural. Having at least one other “point of view” and comfort zone helped me keep a lot in perspective over the years, otherwise we buy into local cultural preferences or prejudices as “gospel” and that usually leads to small thinking and small lives.
E) English IS the lingua france now, like it or not, and speaking it well will open up whole worlds to her.
F) You may not live in France all her life. What is true today may not be tomorrow.
Finally, it is her mother tongue, and you are her mother. Much of what you have to give her comes from being Australian, and who you are, not a translation of who you are. Hold your ground with her and the family, no one will regret it later, and if she loses English, she will surely struggle to reclaim it or wish she had later on. It is just too useful.
Good luck!
Chris
PS I have other posts on this (most are on music) if you look you can find them they may help.
I would say that regardless how much time you (vs your DH) spend with your daughter you shoudl speak only English to her - children have been shown to learn two languages better when one parent speaks one language and the other speaks the other language - you will be surprised how fast she will learn it even if he spends very little time with her.
At what age do you plan on sending her to a play group/nursery school as the younger you send them the better they will also learn it. My sisters child learnt Portugese very easily and she had her mother speaking only English at home but got the Portugese from the school she went to and she went mornings only from 2 years of age. Even at older ages they will pick it up perfectly. If you yourself teach her both she is more likely to get confused and start mixing the languages up (I had a friend whose parents stopped teaching her French when she started saying words that were half French and half English - she would have sorted it out in the end if they hadn’t stopped.
Maybe get her into a group for toddlers or whatever where they speak French or go to library story time in French but keep your own contact with her English.
